Wish Realized as School Reopens

The only thing 5-year-old Charity Nwadike wanted for her birthday last year was to go back to her old school.

It may have taken a while, but her dream for a newly revamped, and finally reopened, Locke Early Education Center has come true.

On Thursday a beaming Charity, with bouncing pigtails, welcomed parents, teachers and Los Angeles Unified School District administrators back to the center. The school, which caters to children from 2 months old to second grade, was closed last year for repairs of flood damage caused in December 2004. The school’s 183 youngsters were divided among nine other campuses.

“It was my fifth-birthday wish that the school open again,” Charity said into a microphone before dozens of adults at the school’s grand reopening ceremony. “I used to learn here when I was 4. I missed my friends and my teachers.”

Though Charity may not have realized it in June when she blew out her birthday candles at the Ruth Washington Early Education Center, her wish was on its way to becoming reality. Construction workers began the Locke reconstruction project just a month later.

Principal Katie Haire said heavy rains had flooded the school and seeped into the building’s drywall. Once the standing water was gone, mold spread throughout the building, which forced the school district’s Office of Environmental Health and Safety to red-tag the center and close it until the campus was refurbished.

By Oct. 3 -- after three months of work and $1.8 million worth of bonds from measures K and R -- the campus had a new roof, new floors, a new air conditioning system, new drywall and fresh coats of paint.

Parents mingled with school administrators at the celebration, holding their children with one hand and greeting school board members with the other.

“I’m so happy,” said Lucia Martell, a mother of four whose youngest two are still attending Locke. “My children are back here, and I know they’re excited.”

Shirley Joe, a parent representative who frequented school board meetings with Martell and others, said Thursday’s reopening exemplifies the power parents can have over their children’s education.

“If the parents get together, they can rule everything,” Joe said. “If our kids go to school, early, they’re sure to go to college.”

School board member Mike Lansing, who represents the Locke district, thanked parents for being insistent and for keeping the center’s needs on the front burner.

“This is only the start, though. We have a lot of children who need a lot of these opportunities,” Lansing said. “If there’s one thing we need in this city, in this state, in this nation, we need to level the playing field for our children ... so that our children don’t have to continue to run uphill for the same opportunities.”

The event also doubled as a welcoming ceremony for Carol Truscott, the new local district superintendent, who praised the concept of early education.

“I have learned, when it comes to education, that prevention is better than intervention. The stronger the start, the better the finish,” Truscott said. “Our goal is to make sure that kids are always enthusiastic about learning.”

Locke Early Education Center, across the street from Locke High School on 111th Street, serves the children of teenagers and other parents who are working, going to school or looking for a job. It is one of the largest early education centers of the district’s 102 sites, with a capacity of 204 youngsters, compared with an average capacity of 125 at other centers.

Charity’s mom, Edith Nwadike, said she remembers how the center’s closing upset her daughter.

“It was a really heartbreaking thing,” Nwadike said. “Every time we would pass the school, she would want to stop to see if it was reopened again.”

Charity loves being back.

“I’m reading first-grade books in kindergarten,” she whispered in the hallway as adults toured the school’s seven classrooms and infant center. “So now, when I go to first grade, I’ll be ready.”