Recollections Of TMSA | Part One
by Noel Mayeske
The Main Street Academy opened 10 years ago today. It represents one of the most fulfilling projects I’ve ever been part of—life-changing, actually. The fruit of a bold and determined community effort begun in 2006, it was simply amazing to see the doors swing open for the first time.
© 2020 noel_photo_eye
It began as an idea.
An unlikely one at that, given that most of us were new to public charter schools; and certainly, none had created one before. Today, it affects the lives of nearly 1,000 stakeholders inside the building daily - students, faculty, and administration - and thousands outside its walls, including parents and extended family, not to mention the taxpayers who fund the school. (Every charter school is also a public school!)
To give the idea wings, we needed partners, hard work, and - mirroring what we hoped to see in students - a willingness to learn.
In early 2006, two couples in College Park, GA - Wayne Whitesides and Jennifer Fine, and Carol and David Shaginaw - independently began exploring starting a charter school. Each put the word out to friends, which caught the interest of many in the Tri-Cities area (College Park, East Point, Hapeville). Both connected with Fulton County Schools reps to discuss the idea, who suggested they combine efforts, which they did.
Wheels Turning
By December 5 of that year, Wayne and Carol arranged the first public meeting. Gillian Horsley, with Imagine Schools in Atlanta, was tapped to address the crowd, informing us about how charter schools operated and how Imagine could help us create one as an official partner. The room Wayne reserved at Wagon Works in East Point was packed.
By late January 2007, a Founding Committee was formed to begin to flesh out plans. We met at Wayne & Jen’s home and elected officers. With Carol as president, Wayne as vice president, Audrey Thompson as treasurer, and myself as secretary, we were off to the races. The original committee also included Mikey Brayton, Keisha Burnette, Tina Donaldson, Kathy Gallagher, Anne Goehring, Tracie Greene, Stacy Kerber, Mollie Mayfield, Lauren Rife, Carolyn Santos, Jennie Scott, David Shaginaw, Holli Stephens, Dr. Karen Sullivan, and Melissa Thomas.
Other key members would later join the committee, including Hugh Austin, Dr. Robert Baker, Jordan Bennett, and Jane Randolph. Many other key parties were involved, a few of whom can be seen in the photo below.
Months of meetings followed, mostly in the basement of the College Park First United Methodist Church - where we’d later house the Upper Academy.
Public meeting #6 | College Park First United Methodist Church | April 19, 2007
© 2020 Kristin Mayeske
I remember the thrill of big decisions made by the Founding Committee. We approved the school name Jen had created - other options included “Imagine” and “School” with one of these words in the middle: Neighborhood, Community, and Southside. We selected Spanish as the foreign language to be taught. (My vote for Mandarin Chinese was for naught.) We debated making it a year-round school; an International Baccalaureate® (IB) school; uniforms or not; extracurriculars; gender separation or not; and had many discussions about a facility.
The ability to cast a vote on such important choices was profoundly moving. Normal life didn’t afford most of us the opportunity to be so directly involved in building something so substantial. The impact our choices would have on others’ lives wasn’t lost on me, nor the rest of the team.
Getting The Word Out
The Founding Committee worked hard to make sure the community knew about the school and could get involved. I remember carrying flyers to every park or playground, chatting up random adults with kids to tell them about the planned school. Volunteers manned the Main Street information booth at numerous festivals and neighborhood meetings.
Momentum built as Wayne made key connections for us with Fulton County school board members and created a website for interested parents to register for updates. Many of us attended board members’ community meetings. Meanwhile, we worked on the petition, submitting it to Fulton County on March 24, 2008. We thought it was solid - the results of 18 months of planning. However, it was voted down unanimously on July 7, 2008. We were crestfallen.
Hitting A Wall
That could have been the end of the story. Some of us were up against a wall: with school-age kids, we needed a school for them then. Several families enrolled our kids at College Park Elementary, joining its fabric, becoming PTA officers and participating in the life of the school. Led by Wayne, we even explored converting it to a charter. The appeal of a charter, for many of us, was the ability to help create programming we thought would elevate a school, such as an IB program or other special curricula. We also hoped to widen the enrollment zone so that anyone in the Tri-Cities could attend.
Others from the Main Street Founding Committee kept the effort going, including Carol as president, now partnering with EdisonLearning and tweaking aspects of the petition per the county’s request. I’m eternally thankful to all involved, creating a new petition that was approved by Fulton County on May 21, 2009 and by the State of Georgia on March 11, 2010.
The path was set for the idea to become reality.
Preparing To Open
Securing a facility and a staff were crucial next steps. Many people were critical in this phase, but Mollie Mayfield’s leadership as board president cannot be overstated. As vice president/treasurer (and later board president), she led us to sign leases for the first five years in the classroom portion of two College Park churches - St. John’s Episcopal and College Park First United Methodist Church. (Her real estate acumen would come in handy five years later, when she and then-president Rob negotiated the purchase of our permanent location on Lakeshore Drive.)
All photos in carousel © 2020 noel_photo_eye
Another key team member—thankfully in the same role today—is Virginia Smith, Vice President of HR & Operations. Her leadership in ensuring financial stability has been key, because the lack of that is the reason many charter schools fail. Nobody has been a more consistent contributor to TMSA’s success from day one to the present than Virginia.
Cliff Thomas designed our stylish logo and other branded assets to help solidify our identity. Raine Hackler—a former Teacher Of The Year in Atlanta Public Schools—was selected as Principal. Then—with some last-minute adjustments at the church facilities to account for nearby railroad noise—the doors were ready to open.
With no buses (common for charter schools), every family arrived on Opening Day and all ensuing days by car or foot. It made for great photos, as families brought their scholars to become TMSA’s inaugural class.
A Legacy and a Future
Many challenges were to come, including expanding past our initial enrollment of about 600 K-6 scholars to become a K-8 school with more than 850 students by 2012. Led by a stellar group of governing board presidents to the present day (chronologically: Mollie Mayfield, Dr. Robert Baker, Bianca Motley Broom, Dr. De'Andre Pickett, Jennifer Fine, and Heather Wells), we also secured a permanent facility, hired principals, became accredited, got rechartered twice, and improved academic outcomes in a wide range of areas. In addition to the board presidents leading us, we wouldn't have succeeded without Anne Goehring, Stacy Kerber, and Mikey Brayton working virtually every day both at the school and in the community to solve problems and make things work.
My roles—as PTO president, elevating our parental participation; and five years on the governing board, including creating and chairing the governance committee—inform much of the work I do in the rest of life, from my marketing / design / communications career to being a dad.
Marketing For New Wins
I had the pleasure of creating almost all branding, marketing, photography, and event promotion design (implemented on social media) for our three largest fundraisers:
Tri-Cities Run Walk - led by Tracie Greene for 10 years | Started 2010, prior to opening
The Main Street Academy Annual Art Show - led by Allison Hanlin (since 2018, partnering on it with Gay Speer Carney) | Started 2011
The Main Street Academy Annual Silent Auction - led by Anne Goehring | Started 2014
All photos in carousel © 2020 noel_photo_eye
All photos and designs in carousel © 2020 noel_photo_eye
These special events, along with other successful fundraisers initiated by the Parent Teacher Organization (PTO)—sales of citrus fruit, chocolate and spirit gear sales—have raised more than $250,000. Just as importantly, they’ve galvanized our stakeholders - parents, teachers, students, board members, and the community - to put their oar in the water and help move our school forward.
Sustaining the excitement, work ethic and positivity of Day One—fused with the ability to reach audiences, create partnerships, and learn from mistakes—has been integral in building new wins together.
11 Alive story celebrating TMSA’s 10th anniversary | Aired September 4, 2020
Many thanks to Dr. Robert Baker, Jennifer Fine, Anne Goehring, Stacy Kerber, Mollie Mayfield, Wayne Whitesides, and others for facts and dates in the timeline.