Tuckahoe, Shinnecock Nation Contemplate New High School

The Tuckahoe Common School District is in the early stages of contemplating the construction of a new high school that could be a fresh start for some Shinnecock Nation students following a trend of poor test scores, repeated accusations of racism, and claims of mistreatment at Southampton High School.

“We’re right at the very beginning stages of finding out what this would be, and nothing is going to happen without the Tuckahoe community’s approval,” School Superintendent Len Skuggevik said on Tuesday. “So I don’t want anyone thinking that this is going anywhere until it’s something that they want.”

The first step is a feasibility study, the administrator explained, and while the district is currently exploring its options, it does not have a plan yet in place.

But despite the preliminary nature of discussions, Shinnecock leaders stress that momentum is growing and the high school could someday be a reality.

“This is absolutely, 100 percent not a bargaining chip,” Germain Smith, secretary of the Shinnecock Council of Trustees and a Southampton Board of Education member, emphasized on Monday, “and that would be very sad that we would have to resort to something like that just to bring equity in the district.”

Earlier this year, members of the Shinnecock Nation approached Tuckahoe administrators with the proposal to build a high school. The idea has been circulating around the Shinnecock community for the better part of a decade, according to Bryan Polite, chairman of the Shinnecock Council of Trustees.

“It’s not something that just spurred out of some of the issues that Shinnecock parents and students are currently having with the Southampton School District,” he said last week, “but it’s certainly more of a catalyst now that there are issues arising.”

In March, members of the Shinnecock Nation and other minority communities aired their grievances at a Southampton Board of Education meeting, pointing to alleged wrongdoings over money allocation, professional conduct, student discipline and more. They cited hate speech and instances of disrespect toward Shinnecock students, both by fellow classmates and teachers.

“As Shinnecock community, we were here before the school and before the Town of Southampton,” Smith said, “and yet the mistreatment that you heard spoke about in some of the earlier board meetings still continues to this day.”

Before the start of the 2019-20 school year, Smith said he first visited the Tuckahoe School District with about a dozen other Shinnecock parents. At the time, there was one student from the territory enrolled, he said. Today, there are about 40 students in grades pre-K through eight, including his two daughters, Delaney and Adison.

“Our kids are doing very well there as a whole,” he said of the Shinnecock community. “It was kind of a natural progression to explore expanding that school.”

Among administration and Shinnecock leadership, how exactly to go about building a new high school from scratch remains the biggest question — and part of the goal of the feasibility study is to answer it. The State Department of Education has also suggested multiple pathways to consider, Smith said.

“We’re really just excited to be able to explore options,” Polite said. “I think every community and every parent should be able to have the options if their current situation is not working for them. And even if it is working for them, I think it would be a tremendous miscalculation on Shinnecock’s part if we don’t at least explore this tremendous opportunity.”

According to State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., there are three ways to build a high school for Tuckahoe.

The first is to merge with another school district, a move that failed at the polls in 2014 when Tuckahoe and Southampton had proposed a merger. The second is to dissolve the current common school district — which only allows for pre-K through eighth grade — and recreate it as a union free school district, which include high schools, he said. And the final option would be a redesignation as a union free school district, requiring authorization from the State Legislature.

Among more than 700 school districts in New York State, only 21 of them are common school districts, Thiele said.

“Tuckahoe, even with a high school, would be a relatively small district, and the issue is whether or not it’s sustainable and financially feasible, and that’s why you do the feasibility study to see that,” he said on Monday, adding, “But, to me, it’s a local decision. As their state legislator, I certainly would provide them with the legal mechanisms to be able to do that.”

The assemblyman anticipates that state building aid would help with the capital project itself, “but for the most part, given Tuckahoe’s combined wealth ratio, the majority of it would still have to be financed through a bond and the taxpayers would pay for the majority of it,” he said.

Smith said that the feasibility study will identify available state and federal aid, as well as any applicable grants, and pointed to potential private donors, as well.

“Once the ball is rolling and the state is behind us 100 percent, and they say, ‘Okay, this is your pathway and this is what we’re gonna do, and this is how we’re going to help you,’ I don’t think funding will be an issue,” he said. “At least that is my hope.”

At any given time, there are between 130 and 150 school-aged children living on the Shinnecock territory, Smith said, whose tuition is covered by New York State. Currently, the Southampton School District receives nearly $5 million for its 97 Shinnecock students. If the district were to lose those funds, Smith said he expects it would have a negative impact on Southampton taxpayers — and ultimately benefit the taxpayers of Tuckahoe.

“I would imagine that it would be a hurdle for Southampton to overcome, with the loss of funding,” Polite said. “The unfortunate aspect of all this is that the Shinnecock students, the Shinnecock community has longstanding ties to Southampton School District. Me, myself, I was a Mariner, I was captain of the football team. I bleed maroon and white, and love Southampton High School. I had great experiences there.

“It would be sad, I think, for my niece or nephew — I don’t have kids — to have to go to a different school,” he continued. “But there’s a tremendous amount of upside to that, as well, and there might be a situation where you could pick and choose.”

It is too early in the process to say what the timeline will be, moving forward, or even where a new high school would be built — though Shinnecock leadership has pointed to, potentially, somewhere on the Tuckahoe campus, or across County Road 39 on Stony Brook Southampton’s property.

“What I will say is that in this current political climate, we would want to move this along as quickly as possible,” Smith said. “We’re not talking 10 years down the road — we’re talking much sooner than that.”

Thiele said he doesn’t see politics making a Tuckahoe high school more or less likely but would judge the idea based on its merit — provided it’s financially viable and the same quality of education would be upheld, he noted.

“The facts matter more than anything with regard to the political climate,” he said. “Let me put it this way: I don’t see anything in the political climate that would prevent this from happening. It’s a local decision. It involves the state, and we certainly want to let those decisions be made locally.”

Once the feasibility study is complete, and if it shows that a high school would be possible, Skuggevik said the idea would be put to Tuckahoe voters to decide.

“My opinion, in this case, doesn’t make any difference,” he said. “It’s what the Tuckahoe community wants to do.”