Three Terrebonne schools on the chopping block at next school board meeting

The fate of three schools facing potential closure will be decided by the Terrebonne Parish School Board. The Bayou Black community is not happy.

Terrebonne Parish Superintendent "Bubba" Orgeron revealed his plans to overhaul the Terrebonne Parish School District to members of the Bayou Black community Nov. 29. The plan includes consolidating Bayou Black Elementary School, Gibson Elementary School and Honduras Elementary School with other schools.

The vote will be during the next Terrebonne Parish School Board meeting, which starts at 6 p.m. Dec. 5.

The plan would see Gibson students pool with Schriever Elementary School, Honduras Elementary School with Village East and Acadian, and Bayou Black would see some students go to Mulberry and some to Schriever Elementary School.

The overhaul, Orgeron said, would place more certified teachers in front of students by merging schools with dwindling student enrollment with other schools to make classroom sizes about 20 to 24 students per class. It would remove certified teachers from positions like librarians and computer labs and place those teachers back in front of classrooms. The plan gives a flat 10% pay raise to all teachers.

"The teacher in the classroom is the most important factor in education," Orgeron said. "Believe it or not, when you consolidate a school, you need less certified teachers, so some of these teachers can fill gaps where we need more certified people."

The school district has about 180 uncertified teachers across the parish. According to Orgeron these changes would do away with inefficiencies that move the best teachers into positions that aren't directly teaching students. By placing the certified teachers back in front of students, fewer uncertified teachers would face job loss.

The community pushed back against his proposal. Residents said they prefer the smaller classroom sizes that are at their schools. It gives their children a more personal education and fosters time for more one-on-one, they said. They argued that in schools like Mulberry and Schriever, their children would be lost in the crowd.

They also feared that the shuttering of their school would sound a death knell for their community. What was a community, they asked, without a school?

"This school is home," Katelyn Bourgeois said. "When I walk in that front door it's the same floor, it's the same walls, it's the same vibe, it's the same smell. This is home. This is the school that I picked up a double-wide trailer to make sure he came here. I picked that house up when he turned 1 to make sure he could come here."

Bourgeois has a son in the school, and another child soon to enter the school system. She said the nearly 100-year-old school is the one she attended as a child, and where she wants her children to learn. If the school is closed, she will begin homeschooling her children.

"The thing is, it's not about how they are going to treat my kids over there, because I am not giving them the chance to go over there," she said. "It's Bayou Black or homeschool."

Her sentiments were shared by many other parents who said the school is familiar to them. They said it's an anchor in the community and gives those who attend it a sense of pride about where they come from. They acknowledged that as kids grow older, they move away into the high schools. In those early years, they want their children to be closer to home.

"No kid, at this age, from kindergarten to fourth grade, should be [riding] an hour-and-a-half to go to school," Joshua Bridges said. "The teachers are great here. Smaller classes, individual teachers, it works with them every time."

"I don't understand why you want to put them in larger classrooms," he added

Members of the community said taking away their school is unfair. They pay their taxes like everyone else, why can't they have a school like every other community, they said. The school has great marks, they said, which proved the smaller classrooms were better. Former Justice of the Peace Horace Johnson argued, with documentation in hand, that Bayou Black has a better educational average score than Schriever Elementary.

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Community members said they understand the enrollment is down, and Korey Burnet asked why Gibson and Bayou Black can't just be merged to keep his children closer to home. He said he doesn't want to give up his school. But a Gibson-Bayou Black merger would be a compromise allowing to still put more students in classrooms together.

He said new subdivisions are being built, and new homebuyers will be dissuaded if there is no school nearby. As Brunet spoke, many people nodded in agreement.

"You're going to take them completely out the bayou, man," said Tyler Breaux, another parent. "I'm scared to move them anywhere else."

This article originally appeared on The Courier: Terrebonne superintendent lays out school consolidation plan at Bayou Black