Why Should Delaware Care?
A.I. du Pont has been characterized as one of the most popular high schools in the Wilmington area in the past. Today, the school has less than 600 students enrolled. Some believe the school’s history should serve as an opportunity to reflect on what enabled that decline.
For many Alexis I. du Pont High School alumni, their years spent in the school were spent fostering relationships with classmates from different socio-economic and cultural backgrounds.
Many of those students built friendships in renowned programs like the school’s marching band — formerly led by the late Paul Parets, who was known for his love for the school and its students.
The high school has always been known for its history. Shirley Bulah of Bulah v. Gebhart, which challenged school segregation, graduated from A.I. du Pont High School. The band marched for several presidential inaugurations and President Joe Biden announced his vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris at the school.
Despite the high school’s popularity and history, A.I. has plummeted in its enrollment over the last 14 years and today it is the smallest traditional high school by enrollment in the state.
In 2010, A.I. du Pont had 660 students from its feeder pattern go to the school, and 683 additional students choice in from Dickinson and McKean high schools.
This year, A.I. du Pont has 570 total students, compared to 605 students last year.
Community members in the district believe there are a variety of reasons for the enrollment decline, like limiting the number of choice applicants selected, ending the bussing system for students who choiced into the school and the increased presence of charter and private schools.
In the months since Parets’ death, the school’s graduates have strengthened their alumni group, Friends of A.I., with the goal of rebuilding the school and supporting the students currently attending.
‘A little bit of everything’
The Friends of A.I. alumni represent different dynamics of the school over the decades.
Wilmington began bussing its students into the suburbs in 1978, and Greg Wilson, who graduated in 1979, remembers the city bussing students when he was a senior in high school.
Other alumni, like Brenda Steffon who graduated in 1988, saw the full effects of forced bussing on the school.
“It was a school that really encompassed a lot of different people,” she said, “They may not be people that you went to church with, or were your neighbors. And the band really was a great [melting pot] that you would meet people from all over Wilmington, Hockessin, Greenville, Centerville.”
Many feel the late 1990s to early 2000s were part of the school’s golden age. Senate Majority Whip Elizabeth “Tizzy” Lockman, who graduated from A.I. High School in 1997, said some students lied about their addresses to attend the school before the start of Delaware’s choice program.
“There was just a little bit of everything for every kind of student. It was a very traditional comprehensive high school at the height of its existence, and I think it just served any student who walked through the doors,” Lockman said.
The school’s marching band was one of the more popular programs for students, but part of that popularity came from Parets’ desire to give all students an opportunity to be involved.
Jared Obstfeld, who graduated in 1990, said some students participated in the games and parades as band managers. He believes Parets ensured that all students had the opportunity to attend these events, whether they played an instrument or not.
Another graduate, Tony Brown, said that Parets’ instruction helped him develop personal responsibility, and showed him “what it’s like to be a citizen.”
It wasn’t just the band that drew students in, the school was also known for its journalism, fashion and auto-shop programs.
But when the Charter School of Wilmington was established in 1996, it marked the start of an altered education landscape for the Red Clay Consolidated School District.
From three high schools to seven
The same year that the Charter School of Wilmington was established, the state also approved a school choice program, allowing families to enroll their children in public and charter schools outside of their designated feeder pattern.
Many Delawareans, like Lockman and Delaware Charter Schools Network Executive Director Kendall Massett, agree that the Red Clay Consolidated School District was a leader in school choice and charters.
But some community members believe that the addition of charter schools and the choice program has spread the school district out too thin. The district currently has two magnet schools, Cab Calloway School of the Arts and Conrad School of Science. It also has the Charter School of Wilmington and the Delaware Military Academy.
During a November school board meeting, board members expressed concerns that there are too many seats available and not enough students to fill those seats.
“The fact that what has launched three high school options in Red Clay is now seven in Red Clay alone, if you count Red Clay authorized charters, magnets and traditional schools. So that’s a huge difference,” Lockman said. “That’s not even speaking to the fact that you’ve got Vo-Techs and other charters that are not Red Clay charters.”
To blame the decline on the district’s charter schools is disingenuous though, said Massett, who advocates for Delaware’s more than two dozen charter schools.
Community members have also pointed toward various decisions from Red Clay’s board of education for the decline in enrollment like the decision to end bussing for students who choiced into A.I.
At some point between 2008 and 2009, the enrollment exceeded 1,400 students, which was too many students in the building, said Mark Pruitt, the director of secondary schools at the Red Clay Consolidated District. Pruitt was also the assistant principal at A.I. during that time.
Pruitt said he believes this marked the start of wait-listing some choice applicants because the school was over capacity.
As alumni like Steffon moved away from their alma mater, they hoped the district would take care of the high school they admired. But they believe the district has enabled the enrollment decline to worsen over time.
“The school board has let that ball drop to a point where it almost feels like now we’re in a Hail Mary with two seconds left in the game,” Steffon said.
What has Red Clay done?
A.I. du Pont High School’s reputation has evolved over time, and some alumni believe it’s received a negative connotation from other community members.
“[Hearing people who graduated from A.I. High School] say, ‘I would never send my kid there,’ they don’t have a whole lot of information to back that up with. But what they know is that there’s lower attendance, that there’s inner city kids, that it’s a Title I school,” Obstfeld said.
Elliott Warburton graduated from the high school this past May. But he believes there was a stigma against the high school that started when he graduated from middle school in 2020.
Warburton witnessed the effect of the enrollment decline on the school’s programs. When he was a freshman, the marching band had roughly 50 students. By the time he was a senior leading the band, there were only 15.
Although many alumni feel there was a lack of action in the past, the board has attempted to address the situation in recent years.
During an October 2022 board of education meeting, Pruitt led a presentation to the board outlining the history of the district’s enrollment patterns. For some board members, it was the first time they’d heard about A.I. du Pont High School’s enrollment struggles.
“I’m horrified that that ship of A.I. sank for so many years. And that us as a board, me included, because I’ve been on this board a long time, we didn’t address this,” then-board member Adriana Bohm said. “That thing literally was sinking. And we did nothing … that should never happen in Red Clay again.”
Wilson said that lack of knowledge was a partial reason why the group pushed for the A.I. Task Force at a September 2022 board meeting.
The task force’s goal was to assist the district in identifying resources and programs that satisfy the needs of current students. It was also responsible for suggesting ideas to rebrand the school and for innovative courses and programs to attract future students.
The task force presented multiple solutions in a July 2023 board meeting. Those potential solutions included creating an esports curriculum, two additional career and technical education (CTE) pathways for the 2025 school year and that the board consider the high school’s attendance zones.
Committee to release recommendations
At its November 2024 meeting, the Red Clay Consolidated Board of Education created a special committee to look at attendance zones, enrollment and programming. The committee’s recommendations are due to the board by July 2025.
The district will use the 2026-27 school year as a planning year for the school choice program, and changes will be implemented by the 2027-28 school year.
In the meantime, the district has added new programs to A.I. High School, like an early college academy, which is in its first year, and two CTE programs. The district has marketed those programs so that students will either choose to stay in their attendance zones or choice into the school, Pruitt said.
But the district still faces criticism from its community members who believe those marketing efforts are not enough.
“They need to put some good marketing behind these programs they’re doing and raise awareness in the community more than they’re doing now,” Obstfeld said. “More interest is going to bring more students over to the school, which is going to inflate those programs. It’s going to draw attention to them.”
‘It should wake us all up’
While the Red Clay Consolidated School District’s Board of Education reviews potential solutions in the coming months, alumni like Lockman see the school’s transformation as an opportunity to reflect.
“It should wake us all up to want to take broader action, because no student deserves to have their alma mater fall into disrepair. But more importantly, students today deserve to have a great, healthy, well-resourced school to go to,” Lockman said.
The Friends of A.I. alumni group is also working with the district and administrators to address students’ needs while waiting for the committee’s recommendations to potentially go into effect.
The group doesn’t consider itself as working against district leadership, they’ve instead collected donations for students and have worked with A.I. du Pont High School’s principal to ensure students benefit from the contributions.
In the future, the alumni group also aims to form different committees, like a Parent Teacher Student Association (PTSA), an activism group and boosters to help with fundraising.
“[Obstfeld] and other members from the band have really brought a lot of energy to what we’re doing… all we can do is support the school where it’s at, some help the kids where they are, and try to help make the committee as impactful as it can be in addressing the disparity in attendance zones,” Wilson said.
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