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San Juan Diego to Offer a Fifth-Grade Class: School Targets at-Risk Middle Schoolers, Mostly Poor Latinos

Posted on: Sunday, 16 April 2006, 03:03 CDT

By Sheila B. Lalwani, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Apr. 16--Racine -- When Vicky Rocha, 12, won a $1,000 scholarship for college, her parents, Leonides and Roci Rocha, naturally felt proud.

The student at San Juan Diego Middle School won an essay contest, and the Rochas credited their daughter for her hard work.

But also felt grateful to the school.

"We like it OK," Leonides Rocha said. "She's happy."

And, when the time is right, they plan to send their son to San Juan.

"I just want him to go there," Rocha said. "The teachers. The study center for homework is a good idea."

The Rochas might get their wish -- a year earlier than expected.

New grade to start

San Juan Diego Middle School -- one of only a handful of religious-affiliated schools in the state that targets at-risk middle schoolers, mostly impoverished Latinos -- is launching a new grade for the 2006-'07 academic year.

A new fifth-grade class is scheduled to begin in the fall. Roughly 18 inner-city minority students are expected to enroll in the opening class. The 18 students will learn under a different schedule than their peers, but school officials are hopeful that the additional grade will help some of the city's most disadvantaged youths.

"We need to get at them much sooner," said Laura Sumner-Coon, director of development. "We thought if we could get them in here in fifth grade, we could get more mileage."

According to school records, 61 students attend the school in sixth, seventh and eighth grades. About 87% of the student body is Latino, 8% is non-Hispanic white and 5% is African-American.

The school, in one of Racine's highest unemployment areas, was established in 2003.

Many of the students come from homes where only Spanish is spoken. In several cases, parents achieved only a basic education.

The Catholic middle school is one of 20 schools in the Lasallian Association of Miguel Schools, which seeks to provide a quality education to impoverished, underserved neighborhoods around the country.

San Juan is the only Miguel school in Wisconsin.

Move makes sense

School Principal / Director Michael Frontier said school officials thought it made sense to add another grade because students coming into the sixth grade generally had lower reading skills.

The school's finance board recently decided that it had the money to move forward with the project.

"We'd like to start younger," Frontier said. "Hopefully, we can give them even more attention."

A different approach

No new construction will be necessary to launch the new grade, Frontier said.

Two teachers will help the fifth-grade students, and the structure of the grade will be different from others at the school, Frontier said.

The school offers long school days and dismisses students at 4:45 p.m. Many of the middle school's students return to the school at night for homework. But the fifth-grade students will complete their school day at 4:45 p.m. and will not be required to return later in the day.

Records indicate that about half of the students needed for the fifth-grade class already have signed up.

San Juan Diego Middle School is accepting applications from parents interested in enrolling their children in fifth grade. For information, contact the school at (262) 619-0402.

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Copyright (c) 2006, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

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