By Joe Beckman

(The opinions and views expressed in the commentaries and letters to the Editor of The Somerville Times belong solely to the authors and do not reflect the views or opinions of The Somerville Times, its staff or publishers)

To me, as a long term member of committees dealing with the Green Line, school reform, and affordable housing, the current process for the High School seems naive: well-intended, but not connected with the needs of either the city, the kids, or the parents. Plans developed in silos risk being hit by missiles. This will be one of them.

My initial response was to eagerly support the plan’s ample open space, makerspace workshops, and integration of tech and academic, vocational and career exposure. Knowing that Artisans Asylum just had a huge rent increase, and that others pay up to $30,000/month for such spaces, it seemed exciting that the school could support and work with Somerville entrepreneurs in developing tech, career, and entrepreneurial options.

With such partners, the school and the innovators could attract plenty of college and university partners as well. But no potential partners were mentioned. None from what is our largest industry – college – nor our fastest growing economic driver – entrepreneurs – were ever engaged. Such partners could help find private investor capital to expand the calendar, teaching time, and space. But the Planning Committee seems to have missed this opportunity, which is central to our future as a city.

My second response to the plan was shock at its price. Although the Planning Committee admits that, at $255 million, it will cost even more than the most expensive public high school construction in the state’s history, they don’t mention that its cost-per-student, at nearly $200,000, is twice the price of Newton North, the record holder from 2011. And Somerville is not Newton.

That per-student cost seems even riskier in our rapidly gentrifying city, where school enrollment has declined from 2,800 in 1960 to 1,231 today. I thought, as do many, that the number of apartments large enough for high school age families was in sharp decline.

Checking with the Assessor’s list, I found that I was wrong. We have 53,242 bedrooms for rent in the city. Those are bedrooms as the Assessor defines them, and the number of those that afford real privacy is probably far lower. But they are sufficient to house a population that can fill a high school of the size contemplated in the plan, assuming a more normal distribution of families than currently exists in Somerville.

The price is still steep, however, and partner investors could cut it dramatically. Particularly if the high school could be in more than one building.

My third response was to mourn an education innovation that the Committee ignored: dual enrollment with area colleges, which could save hundreds of families thousands of dollars in redundant college tuition costs.  In other words, we could plan the High School the way we plan other construction in the city – with a clear return on investment, and clear financial returns to students, parents and the greater community.

There are hundreds of dual enrollment schools located in cities across the country, few of which have as many colleges nearby, and as rich a cultural context as Somerville. These model has been around for decades, and full college credit for coursework in high school is ever more critical in an era of college tuition hyperinflation. Participating kids could graduate with up to two years of full college credit if the Committee and the school drew from the model that was created here in Somerville: Jobs for the Future’s Early College High School.

My fourth response was serious disappointment that the Committee ignored what may be the third most important subway station on the city’s Green Line extension: Gilman Square. The city’s Planning Department well understands the value that the Green Line gives developers – our Union Square projects’ total value is now climbing to $3 billion. Yet commonly understood transit-related real estate economics were ignored in the plan.

It’s not too late to link these silos. The plan has some excellent features, but it is limited – by the state, not just the Committee – to a single building. But next door is the 42,000-sqaure-foot Homan Building. Were we to integrate it, along with other adjacent spaces, into the plan, we might shave off 30% of our costs while bringing in $30 to $40 million in private funding for incubators, retail, and entrepreneurial support. Those incubators could, in turn, draw interest from colleges eager to form partnerships with venture firms.

With colleges and commerce as partners, the High School could deliver careers, jobs, and substantial growth in a key neighborhood of the city, above a new Green Line station. They might even build a real station to make up for the MBTA’s own mismanagement of their construction budget. And that station, like the one now being planned for Union Square, with the Library, Arts Council, and other partners, could show visitors Somerville’s reality: diversity in culture, but also in enterprise, in business, and in careers.

In other words, linking the school silo to business, to college, to careers, is what Somerville is all about already. Why should our new High School ignore that unique and really valuable feature? That’s the reason we live here in the first place.