HAVERHILL – While considering steps to merge with Northern Essex Community College (NECC), Whittier Regional Vocational Technical High School’s committee voted last week to end or consolidate several underperforming classes for next year, including Design and Visual Communications.
Supt. Maureen Lynch proposed closing Early Education and Care, Engineering, Construction Craft Laborer, and Design and Visual Communications. Each was attracting less than a handful of ninth -grade students.
Several teachers and graduates spoke at the beginning of the meeting, urging the committee to keep the Design and Visual Communications and the Early Childhood Education programs. Only four students signed up for each for next year.
Only two students signed up for construction craft, which will probably be integrated with other construction programs. A total of four students signed up for Design and Visual Communications, which is graduating 14 out of 26 students this year.
Masonry was also on the list, but chair Scott Wood requested it not be included. Many ninth graders expressed little interest in majoring in those programs, and Lynch said funds for these declining programs were needed for plumbing and heating and air conditioning equipment in the 50-year-old building.
She said the school must be “good stewards for the taxpayers” and must take care of the students and staff.
To merge the Whittier and NECC campuses into one on the current NECC campus, the two institutions continue to meet to discuss sites for a new Whittier building, which may be built in part by the Massachusetts School Building Authority.
Whittier attempted to secure funding for a new building from the 11 towns and cities in its district last year, but voters rejected the $444.6 million project last January.
A closing plan for the underperforming courses will be reviewed by the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.
Any students currently enrolled will be allowed to finish the programs, Lynch said. ♦
