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Marshall Is Now Roosevelt Middle School: How Will That Work?

By Patty Wetli | August 19, 2016 7:48am
 Roosevelt High School principal Pilar Vazquez-Vialva (red blouse) welcomes students from Marshall Middle School to their new home.
Roosevelt High School principal Pilar Vazquez-Vialva (red blouse) welcomes students from Marshall Middle School to their new home.
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DNAinfo/Patty Wetli

ALBANY PARK — The Munoz triplets were expecting to start middle school in September, instead they're heading to high school.

The siblings will be among the seventh- and eighth-graders transitioning from Marshall Middle School's Irving Park campus to a merger with Roosevelt High School.

Roosevelt principal Pilar Vazquez-Vialva presented the plan for the new Roosevelt Middle School to Marshall families at an open house held Thursday at the high school, 3436 W. Wilson Ave.

"What can we do that Marshall can't do? I can offer [foreign] language and career technical programs. I have a full gym, I have a swimming pool, I have a field," she said.

"I want you to know if you come to Roosevelt High School, you are very much welcomed here," Vazquez-Vialva said. "You'll be our youngest Rough Riders."

Logistics including transportation and class schedules are still being ironed out, but Vazquez-Vialva was able to share some specifics.

All of Marshall's teachers are making the move to Roosevelt, where a first-floor wing of classrooms is being dedicated to the middle school — the younger students and their high school counterparts will not be mingling in the same classes, she said.

The middle schoolers will also have a designated area in Roosevelt's cafeteria, and will eat during the same lunch period as the school's freshman class. The seventh- and eighth-graders will enter in the morning through a separate doorway, Vazquez-Vialva said.

The plan to create a cohesive 7th-12th grade education experience came together quickly, she said.

The schools had been discussing a merger for months, but it wasn't until she received her 2016-17 enrollment projections that Vazquez-Vialva could confirm she had the space to add middle school students.

Both Roosevelt and Marshall, which is a feeder for the high school, have been shedding enrollment in recent years, with Marshall's in particular declining precipitously.

As recently as 2013, Marshall's student body numbered 431. For the upcoming school year, its projected enrollment is 69.

The middle school had formerly enrolled seventh- and eighth-graders from four neighborhood elementary schools: Patrick Henry, Haugan, Falconer and Barry.

Following a decision in 2013 to co-locate a new Disney II Magnet High School with Marshall, at the latter's campus at 3900 N. Lawndale Ave., only Henry and Haugan students remained at Marshall.

As Disney II gradually occupied more and more of the campus, Henry and Haugan families increasingly opted to send their children to nearby Aspira Haugan charter school or academic centers, according to Juan Gutierrez, principal at Patrick Henry and Marshall administrator.

"We were confined to a small space," said Marshall teacher Anne Ward, who dubbed the merger "mutually beneficial."

"We think it's a better opportunity for our students," she said. "It's going to be a great place to be."

Rosalba Munoz, mother of the incoming 7th-grade triplets, had some reservations about the change, including concerns about her tweens mingling with high schoolers.

"They're still kids," she said of her two daughters and son.

Though Munoz also was worried that Roosevelt's location wasn't as safe as Marshall's, there was no doubt that her children would enroll in the new middle school.

"I don't have any other options, they're coming here," she said.

Munoz was impressed with what she heard from Vazquez-Vialva and ultimately expressed a philosophical attitude toward the merger.

"I always felt that if you're a good student, you'll be a good student anywhere," she said.

Her children admitted to some trepidations.

"It's kind of overwhelming," Carolina Munoz said of Roosevelt's size. "We're nervous."

But excited too.

"Oh my god," said her sister Elia. "I'm going to high school and I'm only 12 years old."

Roosevelt High School held an open house for Marshall Middle School students and their families. [DNAinfo/Patty Wetli]

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