FLINT (WJRT) -
(03/13/13) - Another big change for Flint Community Schools, as the Board of Education votes to merge and close buildings.
It's a plan some teachers tell us they didn't see coming.
Wednesday night, the Flint school board passed a plan to consolidate Flint Community schools by a unanimous vote.
Four schools will close, two schools will become one and a high school will be revamped.
Bryant, Dort, Washington and Zimmerman are slated to close.
Northern will no longer operate as a seventh-twelfth grade school, instead it will house the district's Alternative Education Center. A program for seventh-ninth grade students is being added.
Northern High School students will shift to either Northwestern or Southwestern.
Brownell and Holmes will become a S.T.E.M campus, focusing on science, technology, engineering and math.
Brownell would cease to operate as a K-sixth, but it would remain open as a Pre-K on the campus.
The district's interim superintendent is billing this as a reconfiguration - the first phase in a master plan set to right size the district.
In doing that, they can provide additional services and the right resources for students.
"There's a lot of emotion, a lot of history attached to our buildings, but beyond that, we have to realize we have to provide the best product for our students and our parents," said Larry Watkins, interim superintendent.
Watkins says the district is trying to work down a more than $11 million deficit.
These changes are scheduled to take effect at the end of the school year.
Northern High School junior Darry'l Holmes isn't sure where he'll be graduating next year.
"It's depressing," Holmes said.
"It'll just be really sad and disheartening to see this school close and all the teachers that work here," said parent Thomas Wandrey. His daughter attends Washington. "My parents were school teachers. They have financial obligations and everything else. It's affecting their homes as well."
Becky Beck, with the Washington Neighborhood Association, is concerned about what could happen once the school building is empty.
"They're going to do the same thing they've done to the rest of the vacant buildings. It's going to be vandalized. It's going to be scrapped and probably torched," Beck said.
