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Green Dot Public Schools, a network of unionized charter schools, is announcing a handful of changes to the Locke High School cluster of schools that will be of interest to admirers and critics.
Front cover of Stray Dogs, Saints, and Saviors, the 2011 book about the effort to rescue Locke High School
Located near Watts, Locke was converted to charter school status through a 2007 teacher petition and given over to Green Dot in 2008. The just-announced changes include creating a campus-wide 9th grade academy and bringing the satellite campus called Locke Tech onto the main grounds of Locke.
The changes are necessitated by the increase in students coming into Locke with below basic skills from 67 percent to 82 percent, Green Dot CEO Marco Petruzzi told LA School Report.
However, the overall impact of the Locke turnaround effort remains strong, Petruzzi said in a press release: “Graduation rates and API scores are way up, more students are passing the California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE), and far more students are attending college.”