Boston parents of students from the now-closed Croft School in the South End have managed to pull off a kind of educational miracle after the unexpected closure of the Croft School last spring.
On Sept. 8, the school community will open the doors of the new South End Village Academy. The 85-student school will be a parent-led, nonprofit and independent entity at the same location.
The academy is emerging from a financial crisis and organizational scandal at Croft School that left many families and educators shaken and worried about the future.
But instead of closing and dispersing, dedicated parents formed a nonprofit, established a governing board and raised enough to plan for a $3 million operational budget. This includes a $1 million founding pledge from donations, including many anonymous ones, and expected tuition.
Ming Min Hui, incoming board chair for South End Village Academy, said parents spent all summer working to set up the new entity. Hui comes with organizational chops, having spent the past three years as executive director of the Boston Ballet, a role from which she will now step down. She says she’s thrilled to be taking part in this new adventure, which is a volunteer position.
“This entire story depended on a tremendous amount of will and resources and civic engagement coming together to bring this to fruition,” Hui said. “No single person can be credited with the entire story. It took an enormous amount of love and labor from many, many individuals to make this story happen.”
Aja Jones, a parent and board member, says she is excited about the new start for her third-grade daughter.
“I went into this headfirst. I didn’t waver when ... all of this was going on. From the beginning, I knew that I wanted to stick with this community,” she said.
The reality of a new school was hard to imagine last March, when Croft founder and executive director Scott Given was suspended after admitting he kept two sets of books to conceal $13 million dollars in debt.
In June, Given was the subject of an administrative complaint filed by the Massachusetts Securities Division for misrepresenting school finances. The case is now pending.
The two other Croft Schools, one in Jamaica Plain and another in Providence, Rhode Island, will remain closed.
While some parents are still asking for answers, many are focused on the new academic year.
“What happened last spring around the financial issues at the school was a complete shock to everyone in the larger community,” said Suzanne Mendes, board member and spokesperson for South End Village Academy.
“This was a story that rocked our world as a community, but it’s not the story that is binding us. We’re very much looking forward to a new school where there are so many of the values that we’ve preserved,” she said.
The new website for the school is already up and inviting new families.
“Welcome to our village,” it says. “We are building more than a school. We are building a village — one rooted in connection, gratitude, and a shared belief that how we learn, live, and care for one another matters.”
Organizers are asking for donations to help meet their goals of offering 40% of students financial aid. Tuition is $34,000 per year, according to Hui and other organizers.
Board members told GBH News most students at the school live in the South End, but others who attend will come from nearby Roxbury, Dorchester and Jamaica Plain.
Cristina Lopez has been named founding head of school. Lopez was formerly the head of school for the former Croft School in the South End, which her two children attended. She told GBH News she spent more than a decade in school leadership in public schools, mostly charter schools, and that a key lesson in her experience is making sure teachers are compensated and have time to develop their skills.
“We make sure that they have time to step away from the classroom, to be responsive to data, to really communicate with families, to have an authentic partnership with them, to do the planning and collaboration they need,” she said.
The academy is planning to start out at site of the former Croft School on Washington Street. But organizers say they have already secured a new property on Plympton Street as its future home to expand through grade 6.
Construction is expected to begin this year with the goal of welcoming students for the 2027-28 academic year.
Most classes will have just one grade, except kindergarten, which will have two classrooms. The school plans to have a ratio of two to three teachers per classroom.
The former school had 120 students compared to the 85 at the new school.
Jones, whose daughter will be starting third grade next week, said she’s confident the new school will offer the attention and educational needs she wants for her child.
Her daughter is an average student, she said, but the experiential learning program will be challenging.
“I believe that the small classroom size that we have, the small community that we have, is fitting for my daughter’s needs, and what she needs to get out of school,'' she said. ”I love that she’s in the South End.“
