MILWAUKEE– Delays have been announced to parents of students who attend Fernwood Montessori. In a letter to parents, Milwaukee Public School officials announced that 4 out of the 60 lead tests required retesting for safe lead levels. But early Tuesday evening MPS announced that the Milwaukee Health Department reported that Fernwood met its safety standards and both students and staff could return to Fernwood on Friday, April 25th.
During the Milwaukee Public School Board of School Directors meeting last week, Superintendent Dr. Brenda Cassellius announced that Fernwood Montessori would attempt to be re-opened by Wednesday, April 23rd.
On Tuesday night, Dr. Cassellius released a statement to Fernwood and MPS parents stating, “I am pleased that we will be able to reopen Fernwood and that students and families will be able to finish this school year in their building,” Superintendent Brenda Cassellius said. “Working in partnership with the City of Milwaukee Health Department has allowed us to move forward on our lead remediation work with urgency and precision. We have a lot more work to do in other buildings across our district and will move with the same level of urgency and care for those communities.”
Fernwood staff will be given Wednesday and Thursday to have their classrooms prepared before students return to the school.
As for Starms Early Childhood Center and LaFollette School, both schools remained closed.
According to a MHD official, Starms Early Childhood Center is more than 50% of the way through with their cleanup and LaFollette School only began their lead remediation clean-up last week and could take up to a full month before the LaFollette gets fully cleaned and tested.
At this time, MPS and MHD are still working on putting together a Lead Action Plan that sets remediation and clean-up policies for the entire school district.
Both the school district and health department have said that even when LaFollete, Starms Early Childhood Center and Fernwood Montessori are complete with their clean-ups, there are still more schools that both agencies will check for high lead dust.
