A 12,000-square-foot addition under construction at Bruce Guadalupe Community School’s 1st-5th grade campus at 1028 S. 9th St. in Milwaukee’s Walker’s Point neighborhood will allow the school to shrink classroom sizes while serving more students. The project is part of a larger $6 million capital campaign being undertaken by the United Community Center, which operates
A 12,000-square-foot addition under construction at Bruce Guadalupe Community School’s 1st-5th grade campus at 1028 S. 9th St. in Milwaukee's Walker’s Point neighborhood will allow the school to shrink classroom sizes while serving more students.
The project is part of a larger $6 million capital campaign being undertaken by the United Community Center, which operates the growing charter-school through a partnership with the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. So far, UCC has raised about $1.7 million of the campaign goal.
In addition to a third-floor addition being added on top of the building, which is expected to be done by December, the project also includes renovations to the school’s lower level to create more classroom space as well as a larger cafeteria and kitchen area, said Shaba Martinez, Bruce Guadalupe’s director of academics and technology.
The lower-level renovations should be completed by sometime in August, and ready for students to enjoy this fall.
Smaller classes
While a big reason for pursuing the addition is the need to accommodate more students at the elementary campus, which had an enrollment of 850 students last school year, the chief reason is to create more classrooms to allow for smaller class sizes.
Following the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on schools and students, educators and leaders at Bruce Guadalupe saw a lot of students that had different needs, Martinez noted.
“They needed smaller group sizes. They needed more one-on-one attention, and additional services, such as special education, intervention, guidance services, so one strategic thing we are doing across all of our schools is drastically reducing our class sizes,” she said.
Classrooms being added at the elementary campus as part of the addition and renovations, include two new third-grade classrooms, one additional 4th grade classroom and one additional 5th grade classroom. The school is also adding additional classrooms for a second Spanish teacher, and a second science teacher, and another gym teacher, Martinez said.
The UCC schools, which also include a K4-K5 campus and two 6th-8th grade middle schools, (Bruce Guadalupe Middle School and Acosta Middle School), used to have classes of around 28-30 students, especially in the upper grade levels. The goal going forward is that no class will have more than 25 students.
“Our goal is to top off our K4 and K5 classes at about 20 students, our 1st and 2nd grades at 22 students, and then in grades 3rd through 5th, keeping those class sizes at between 22-24,” Martinez said. “From a classroom teacher’s perspective, having four to five less students in your room makes a really big difference.”
High-achieving school
According to its last report card from the state’s Department of Public Instruction, 97% of the high-achieving school’s students were Latino. The school received a four-star score, exceeding the state’s expectations.
“The vast majority of our students are Hispanic, with the majority either having Mexican, or Puerto Rican backgrounds, and we do have students from other Latin and Central American countries,” said Martinez, stressing that while the school does not offer dual language instruction, it does work to support its Spanish-speaking families.
“The vast majority of our families are bilingual. And about half our families start out with their child in K4 or K5 primarily speaking Spanish. All of our classrooms have a Spanish-speaking teacher or aide. It’s really incredible, those students will start at age three or four speaking mostly Spanish, and by the time they are done with K4-K5, they are fluent in English.”
As they get older, the students are offered Spanish language instruction, so they don’t lose their Spanish skills. The school also has a robust Latino arts and culture programming.
“We strive to teach them the power of being bilingual,” Martinez said.
[caption id="attachment_572431" align="alignnone" width="1024"] A floor-plan rendering gives a glimpse of the classrooms being added at Bruce Guadalupe Community School's addition. (Rendering courtesy of UCC)[/caption]
