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LeBron’s School Didn’t Promise Miracles
The Akron Beacon Journal reported that upcoming eighth graders at LeBron James’s I Promise School in Akron, Ohio, hadn’t passed the math portion of their state proficiency exam in three years.
Right-wing publications ran harsh headlines indicating LeBron James’ school was a disaster. However, a school cannot be blamed for failing to fulfill a target that it did not expect to meet.
In 2018, the LeBron James Family Foundation and Akron Public Schools collaborated to open the I Promise School. It began with 240 third and fourth graders, with plans to extend into grades one through eight by 2022. The school was designed to act as an intervention for the school district’s lowest-performing students. (The lowest-performing students in Akron were almost two grade levels behind.)
The I Promise Program had operated in Akron elementary schools for over a decade prior to the establishment of this school. The students were distributed throughout the district, making it difficult to connect them with services that might assist their “growth.” The I Promise School solved that problem by placing all of the lowest-performing students in one location.
Despite being lauded as a LeBron James-founded institution, I Promise School is not a private or charter school. According to Michelle Campbell, Executive Director of…