Students bound for the Bayside Sixth Grade Campus in Virginia Beach will rejoin seventh and eighth graders at Bayside Middle School next school year.
The Virginia Beach School Board voted to approve the consolidation last month, ten years after the campuses were split in two.
It’s the right time for a change, said school board chair Kim Melnyk.
“The Bayside Sixth Grade Campus has served a lot of purposes, but its time is up,” she said.
In 2014, sixth graders started going to school at their own campus, sometimes called Bayside 6, while seventh and eighth graders remained at the original Bayside Middle School. The split was intended to foster learning in a smaller environment for students during a challenging transition year, according to Bayside 6’s website.
At the time, Bayside Middle School was failing subject assessments and was at risk of losing accreditation, so the division split the grades into different campuses to help student outcomes improve.
Bayside 6's website references research that suggests sixth graders can be more successful in a “smaller, more intimate” school environment, but didn't name the research.
In the past decade, the sixth grade campus fulfilled its mandate. Bayside 6 students have performed above the state accreditation standard for math and English for the last three years, according to the Virginia Department of Education’s School Quality Profile.
Now, school officials have several reasons for combining the two schools. Consolidation would benefit the students and the school division's budget, they said at November’s meeting.
The Bayside 6 building is one of the worst in the district, school officials said. It was constructed in 1957 as Aragona Elementary School and then became Kemps Landing Magnet School in 2001 until 2014..
Jack Freeman, the division’s Chief Operations Officer, called the Bayside 6 building one of the “poorest” on a scale of facility quality, referencing a 2018 facilities master plan. The report indexes facility condition and educational adequacy.
Bayside 6 was scored the worst in the division followed by Princess Anne High School — one of the oldest high schools in the city where only half the building was renovated after a fire in the 1990s — and Princess Anne Elementary School.
Sending sixth graders back to Bayside Middle School will put them in a better learning environment and clears the way for the division to get rid of the building and save operating and Capital Improvement Program expenditures, Freeman said.
It was unclear from the staff’s presentation if that meant demolishing, selling or doing something else with the building. The division is still deciding what to do with the Bayside 6 property, Melnyk said.
Bayside 6 teachers will join the staff at Bayside Middle School, and the school will maintain the same student-to-teacher ratio. Some staff, like elective teachers and the school improvement specialist, currently work at both campuses.
Students will have more access to school activities and clubs that foster a sense of belonging and school spirit. Staff will be more able to “plan vertically” for instruction across grade levels, said James Smith, Senior Executive Director of Middle Schools.
The consolidation also cuts down on the number of transitions students zoned to go to Bayside have before high school.
The elementary years take place at Virginia Beach’s Tri-Campus: pre-kindergarten through first grade are taught at Diamond Springs Elementary; second and third grade at Newtown Elementary; and fourth and fifth grade at Bettie F. Williams Elementary.
Starting next year, students will matriculate to Bayside Middle School and later to Bayside High School, without the stop at the sixth grade campus.
Five schools before reaching high school is a lot for any student, school board member Jessica L. Owens said at November’s meeting.
Melnyk said the division has received positive feedback from staff about the consolidation.
“I think the teachers are excited just to have one community, one middle school, the way it is everywhere else,” she said.
