BEMIDJI — Parents of students and leaders of a youth program based in Bemidji’s J.W. Smith Elementary School are grappling with the potential closure of the building as the district faces a looming budget deficit and excess space.
The district claims the closure would represent about $1 million in budget reductions, with more than $3 million in cuts needed to avoid a deficit. The Bemidji Area Schools’ Board of Education is expected to hear a presentation and vote on the matter at a special meeting 5 p.m. Monday, March 2, at the downtown district office.
J.W. Smith is the district’s oldest school building, built in 1954. It sits in a central, walkable neighborhood of the city and serves a smaller geographic area than the elementaries on the outskirts of town. But to some families, it’s more than just a place for reading, writing and arithmetic.
"This is our school, this is our family,” said Jodi Klammer during a Thursday, Feb. 26, interview inside a J.W. Smith classroom. She has three kids enrolled at the school, who also attend the on-site Boys and Girls Club.
Klammer is affiliated with the White Earth Band and works at the Bemidji Indian Health Service office. She open-enrolled her children while living in Laporte to attend J.W. Smith, starting at pre-K. While she lives closer to Bemidji now, she expressed that she and her kids were disheartened when they heard about the possibility of J.W.’s closure.
"I don't know if we're going to find that anywhere else, because they didn't grow up with our family the way that we're growing up with them," she said.
Ann Aitken Humphrey of the Leech Lake Band is an instructor at Bemidji State University, and also open-enrolled her two children at J.W. Smith while her family lives in Cass Lake.
"A lot of what I teach is all about Indian education and how important it is to have an LIEC [Local Indian Education Committee], how important it is to have education and teachers that understand our kids and where they're coming from culturally,” Aitken Humphrey said. “And J.W. has such a high population of Native kids that it is a really special place.”
J.W. Smith’s student population is 70% Indigenous, and the school incorporates Ojibwe teachings and language into the school’s culture and activities.
The state education department’s latest snapshots shows that demographic is nearly flipped at the district’s other elementary schools: Lincoln Elementary’s student population is 30% Indigenous; and at Solway, Northern and Horace May, it’s less than 20%.
"What we know about representation, in terms of what children see and what they believe they can become, is very clear," Aitken Humphrey said. “If they don't see themselves represented across the larger scheme of things, they're going to believe that they do not have a place there. And so being able to watch that flip switch — I mean, it happens to us as Native people all the time.”
Nearly 80% of J.W. Smith students are eligible for free and reduced lunch, 8% are experiencing homelessness and more than a quarter of the students need special education services.
Boys and Girls Club of Bemidji Area Director Andrea Kent said it was a natural fit to launch a grant-funded program inside J.W. Smith, which is right next door to the club. The club serves kids ages 6 and older during after-school times.
It received a $2.7 million grant from the Minnesota Department of Education in 2023 to launch a 21st Century Community Learning Site at J.W. The program is funded through the U.S. Department of Education for “high-quality programs and services that support learning and development for young people,” an MDE webpage stated.
“We would dream of this celebrating its 10-year anniversary and its 20-year anniversary," Kent said. “The magic here is because of the nature of the club and the teachers and parents all being in this together, the communication is open.
"The consistency is there. There's structure for kids. And we can learn what's working in the school day and apply that to the after-school period between 3 and 6 p.m.”
The program is prioritized for J.W. students and offered free of charge. Kent said the J.W. site, serving 116 youths in the last year, has proven to be a star example for the grant program. Kent expressed concern that without the school there, there will be no renewals of the grant.
Klammer’s children also participate at the J.W. club site. She said the after-school programming inside the school offers her peace of mind.
"I was worried about transitions,” she said. “The way that Boys and Girls Club worked with the school, there was absolutely no transition issues whatsoever, because everybody just works together and everything was so smooth.”
The J.W. club site has numerous partners in the community that give these kids new experiences. Branch Coordinator McKenna Rohe said students explore with the Headwaters Science Center, learn dance from the First City Dance Studio, music from Headwaters Music and Arts, and work on their social emotional learning skills with Peacemaker Resources.
“These are all things including dance lessons that like they wouldn't be able to do if they didn't come here,” Rohe said. “Not every kid has that flexibility.”
The J.W. Smith Boys & Girls Club branch is slated to host its first-ever powwow on April 14. Boys and Girls Clubs at Red Lake and Leech Lake are expected to participate, as well as invited youth drums.
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