New School: A Lesson in Determination

Wanda Clemmons first tried a private school near Crenshaw Boulevard. When that did not work out, she moved her family to be near a public school in Woodland Hills. Still dissatisfied with the lack of personal attention her children were receiving, Clemmons decided to take matters into her own hands. Last month, she opened an elementary school.

With about $10,000 in savings, the 30-year-old mother of six leased a building on Martin Luther King Boulevard in Southwest Los Angeles. Inspired by the efforts of renowned Chicago educator Marva Collins, Clemmons opened the Marva Collins Educational Facility last month--the first school in Los Angeles patterned after Collins’ teaching methods.

Collins was thrust into the national spotlight about 10 years ago after CBS’ “60 Minutes” did a story about her and a television movie depicted her ability and determination to transform supposedly uneducable minority children in Chicago into academic overachievers.

Clemmons and her six teachers say the school, which includes pre-kindergarten through eighth grade, is making headway, with more than 100 students enrolled. She said the average monthly tuition of $350 a student, plus an initial enrollment fee of between $675 and $700, more than covers the school’s basic monthly expenses of about $19,000.

‘Academic Skills’

“We’re creating the future leaders of the world,” Clemmons said. “We want them to leave here positively motivated to go out and face life with the academic skills that they need and not to let people put them in categories of failure. They’re our future.”

Most parents interviewed this week said they are satisfied with the school, which emphasizes Christian-based instruction and the drilling of basic language arts skills over a seven-hour school day.

“I’m satisfied,” said Gwendolyn Campbell, who has two children at the school. “My sons love the school, and as long as they learn, that’s what’s important.”

But there have been some rumblings of discontent. Several parents have complained that children roam the building unattended and the front office appears disorganized. Also, some parents complain that Clemmons has misrepresented Collins’ link to the school.

“It was never made clear to me that (the school) was not Marva Collins’ school,” said Robert Jones, who removed his three children from the school.

Jones is one of three parents to withdraw their children, mainly because of disagreements over Collins’ role.

“I was told over and over that this is Marva Collins’ school and she was the director and she was monitoring the school and all of the teachers were taught by her,” Jones said.

Children Removed

Theresa Golden, who also removed her three children, said the school’s disorganized administration and Clemmons’ inability to properly convey Collins’ connection to the school have left some parents disillusioned.

“What she (Clemmons) was maybe trying to say and how she said it and what some parents understood was confused,” Golden said.

Clemmons visited Collins’ Westside Preparatory in Chicago last June, two weeks after hearing of a failed attempt to open a Collins-inspired school in Compton. Clemmons and Collins said they signed an agreement giving Clemmons permission to use the educator’s name in the school’s title, but specifying that Collins would not be “academically or legally responsible” for the school.

Clemmons’ teachers were trained at Collins’ school and are certified by the state and Los Angeles County. Also, Collins arranged for a publishing company to donate $80,000 worth of textbooks to the Los Angeles school.

“I have never told anyone Mrs. Collins owned the school,” Clemmons said. “I said she was directing the school in the sense that she agreed to professionally monitor the school and give us advice.”

Provide Advice

In a telephone interview from Chicago, Collins said she supports the school but believes that it lacks organization. As for her role, Collins said she agreed to give advice but added that “I don’t want to get involved” in directing the school.

“It takes too much time in terms of my commitment,” she said.

Collins said she will visit the school next month to see whether it measures up to her standards and will try to quell any confusion over her part in the project.

Like all private schools in California, the Marva Collins Educational Facility is not subject to accreditation by the state. Its graduates presumably would be eligible to enter the ninth grade in a California public school.

Local public school officials interviewed this week said they are aware of Collins’ notoriety, but are not closely familiar with her teaching methods or with Clemmons’ school.

Part of the two-story, lime-green building is still being renovated. So far, four classrooms are operating, with two grades to a class. Secondhand desks and office furniture, posters of famous black leaders and brightly colored carpeting accent the building’s interior. Large, royal-blue letters taped to a second-floor hallway proclaim the school’s credo: “Welcome Success. Good-bye Failure.”

Self-esteem raising jingles, no playground recess, weekly poems and book reports and phonics exercises accent the school day. There is also the daily morning recitation of the 700-word “Marva Collins Creed,” exhorting students to “use each day to the fullest” and “pursue happiness and success for myself,” while warning that “no one will give it to me on (the) proverbial platter.” The creed stresses: “Failure is just as easy to combat as success is to obtain.”

Eighth-grader Gail Bullock, for one, is happy at the Marva Collins Educational Facility.

‘Own Pace’

“In my other school, I didn’t want to go to school, and my mother realized the problem. It was the teachers,” she said. “Well, here it’s different. They give you the work at your own pace and work with you until you get better and everyone is at the same level.”

Despite the rift with some parents, Chicago educator Collins believes that Clemmons’ project is worth the effort.

“Even if the school doesn’t work out I’m still not angry with Wanda,” Collins said. “She did more than what a lot of people do. She tried.”