Academy for boys gets passing grade

The school addresses students’ varied needs with strict rules and mentoring.

CLEVELAND (AP) — A boys academy started by a security guard/football coach who helped develop a Heisman Trophy winner has received passing marks from the state in its mission to provide order, discipline and a safe school environment for the area’s young men.

Glenville High School football coach Ted Ginn Sr. started the Ginn Academy last year with ninth- and 10th-graders. It scored “continuous improvement” on its first state report card. The mark is the equivalent of a “C” but stands out in the Cleveland school district, where most other schools failed or were on the brink.

All of last year’s 101 ninth-graders moved up to 10th grade at the academy, and 37 of the 39 10th-graders were promoted.

The high school has added juniors, growing to 230 students, all dressed in shirts, ties and, on occasion, bright-red blazers. Many transferred from private or charter schools. Some travel from the suburbs under an open-admission policy.

Plans call for enrollment to reach 500 to 550. Ginn and Principal Byron Lyons say they have to find another site and move the academy from its present location — a former east side health-careers high school — before seniors arrive.

The district promoted Ginn Academy as being for boys “at risk” of dropping out.

But Ginn, who coached 2006 Heisman Trophy winning quarterback Troy Smith, now with the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens, as well as son Ted Ginn Jr., a Miami Dolphins wide receiver, says any child can go astray without guidance. The school accepts a boy if the family makes a good case for admission and gives assurances it is committed to the program.

Some Ginn Academy students require direction, others a school where they feel safe. The school addresses their varied needs with strict rules, mentoring and teachers devoted to kids whose personal lives are often unsettled and complicated.

“Ginn Academy gives the kid who wants to have a life plan a chance,” Ginn said. “That kid can survive in a conventional setting, but can he ever reach his full potential?”

Ginn is not a certified teacher or school administrator. The former high school security guard is paid $66,950 to serve as executive director, which includes setting the tone in the building and promoting the school.

Ginn Academy has seven paid “youth support personnel,” who escort assigned groups of boys to class. They also visit the boys’ homes once or twice a month to get a feel for their family lives.

Students and parents sometimes balk at the scrutiny, said youth support specialist Cecil Gamble, a former East Cleveland firefighter and Cleveland schools truant officer. To them, the attention seems more like stalking.

Gamble encourages the boys and seeks to be a dependable male presence for those whose lack of one breeds anger and distrust.

That kind of support is the main reason Vickie Campbell-Konah transferred her son, 10th-grader Joshua Konah, to Ginn Academy this year from Maple Heights High School.

“I’m a single parent, and I want him to have strong men to mentor him,” she said last week at an open house. “That’s what I’m hoping for, that role model.”

Lawrence Drake, a stocky, macho-looking sophomore, tried to shrug off his mentor last year.

But now Lawrence realizes he needs the supervision. He got into trouble with the law before coming to Ginn.

When a new student recently rejected Lawrence’s counsel and called him out, Lawrence declined to fight.

“I used to be that troubled kid, too,” he said solemnly. “I told him, ’I don’t want to see you go down that path. I’ve been there.”’