Its schools are Claiborne Pell School, Frank E. Thompson Middle School, and
Rogers High School. Preschool students go to leased classrooms at John F. Kennedy Elementary School, a
Middletown Public Schools facility in
Middletown. The Middletown arrangement is scheduled to expire in 2021. opened in August 2013 as a consolidation of previous elementary schools. Pell, constructed on the former Sullivan school site, serves all areas of Newport, allowing for all families to have access to the same facilities and services at the elementary level. The building has a capacity of 842 students. A bond worth $30 million to build a new consolidated elementary school was approved by voters in November 2010. The
Rhode Island Department of Education only funded the amount of space that the school was projected to have; it added an additional two classrooms after a request from Newport authorities. Pell had 890 students when it first opened, and Pell is overcrowded as it had 950 students. and because parents were interested in Pell's new facilities. Pell has two playgrounds. and six in operation in the mid-2000s. The relatively small schools remained in operation even though the city is only large; members of the Newport community wished to keep them open as they wanted their children to be in walking distance of their elementary schools. The schools served different socioeconomic groups as their service areas were different. By the 2000s the enrollment levels had declined. In addition, all of the elementary schools needed maintenance; three had been originally built in the late 1800s. Some students traveled by school bus to other elementary schools because special education services were only offered at certain schools and so the schools could have better socioeconomic and/or racial balances. The acting superintendent of the Newport school system in December 1944 proposed closing Callendar and Coggeshall schools, but at the time the action was not done. Callendar School ultimately closed in January 1974. The building became a condominium. ;Thomas Coggeshall School • The school, which opened in 1899, The addition was funded by the
Public Works Administration in the 1930s. • A January 1, 1976 fire damaged the former Cranston portion, and students temporarily attended classes at First Presbyterian Church School from that day until April 1977. Sean Flynn stated that therefore the Cranston section had a more "modern" appearance stemming from the renovations taken after the fire. The auditorium, which occupied the addition, The companies planned to convert the school into apartments with one and two-bedroom units available; a total of 34 units were proposed. The companies had offered $1 million for the complex. ;Sheffield School • Sheffield School had no playground facility. In 2018 Island Moving Company paid $900,000 to acquire the former Triplett Building. ;George H. Triplett School • Triplett had been commissioned in 1989, the building and land having been purchased from Jesus Savior Church of Newport, RI. Previously the school had been known as Jesus Savior School, a
parochial school built in 1960 and closed in 1987. The district began a lease arrangement in the Jesus Savior building in 1989. In 2019 Island Moving Company paid $900,000 to acquire the former Triplett Building. In 2011 Sullivan School moved into the former Triplett building and became known as Sullivan-at-Triplett School until its closure in 2013. • Children living on the grounds of
Fort Adams attended Underwood. The school also received students from other parts of Newport as some other elementary schools had closed; three school buses served the school. all made of wood framing. Ambrogi stated that "It’s a school design more appropriate to southern California or New Mexico" as inclement weather is common in Rhode Island. Members of the Newport community believed that Underwood School's modular classrooms were small and that the facility seemed more like a
summer camp building instead of a school; therefore the school received the nickname "Camp Underwood". The school board minutes from October 1959 stated that the design was, according to consultant Dr. Carl H. Porter-Shirley, "that of a school village" made up of "self-contained" units. The school had no auditorium and no gymnasium. • The school closed in June 2013, and the school district gave it to the city government on October 1, 2013. The property was sold in 2015 for lower than its $3 million appraisal. ==References==