Photo: Emma Friedman/ WBZ NewsRadio
EVERETT, Mass. (WBZ NewsRadio) — Everett Mayor Robert J. Van Campen proposed converting a former high school building into a middle school to combat overcrowding in Everett Public Schools.
“We have to make some kind of generational investment to solve this problem,” Campen said. “In Everett today, we have children who are learning in hallways, learning under stairwells, learning in spaces that were never intended for teaching.”
Campen’s plan is to transform the district’s K-8 schools into K-6 schools and send seventh and eighth graders to a designated middle school located in the former Everett High School building.
The building on 548 Broadway St. housed Everett High School for nearly a century until 2007, when the school moved to its current location on 100 Elm St.
During the 2025-26 academic year, 454 seventh graders and 512 eighth graders — excluding eight students attending Devens School, a co-educational public therapeutic day school — attended an Everett Public School.
The middle school would be the hub for some thousand students in the district.
“I want to give our seventh and eighth graders, and our K-6 buildings, the space and facilities they need in which to learn, grow and thrive,” Campen said.
With full funding, Campen said the project could take three to four years.
WBZ NewsRadio’s Emma Friedman (@EmmaFriedmanWBZ) reports.