Catherine Ferguson day care.jpg

Catherine Ferguson Academy in Detroit is a unique school that offers daycare to teen mothers.

(Gus Burns | MLive Detroit)

Tatyana Duncan, 17, and Darshea White, 16, both teen mothers and juniors at Catherine Ferguson Academy in Detroit pictured to the left of Catherine Ferguson teacher Nicole Conaway, 36, of Detroit. They are protesting the school's new Big Picture Learning curriculum in which students are asked to teach themselves without being bound to a traditional lesson plan.

DETROIT — It's late-morning at Catherine Ferguson Academy for Young Women in Detroit.

Caretakers gather at the entrance with strollers containing the children of students and begin a leisurely stroll down the sidewalk on Selden Street in Detroit.

Out back, several students — teenage mothers or mothers to be — tend the vast urban garden that's been touted as a cutting-edge educational tool for inner-city kids. It was the focus of a documentary named "Grown in Detroit."



All seems peaceful, but on Thursday, four students and a teacher walked out in protest of the school's new self-taught format they say is robbing students of their rightful education and causing increasing numbers of students to drop out.



They were joined by about a dozen others in a demonstration organized by youth-activist organization BAMN, which stands for "by any means necessary."



Conaway said the school employs eight classroom advisers, there are no class changes, and teachers who specialize in one subject are now expected to teach all subjects.



Due to the layoff of the school's only two math-accredited teachers, Conaway said no students will receive credits toward graduation in that subject.



The school has dwindled to near 50 students — although there may be 100 "on the books," said Conaway — who spend their days without direction, often frittering away time until the closing bell.



"Students will say, 'I'm on Facebook because I'm a teenager and that's what I'm going to do. I need guidance, I need direction," she said.



Darshea White, a 16-year-old junior from Detroit and an aspiring pharmacist, carried a 4.0 GPA throughout her first year of high school at Detroit's Communication and Media Arts High School.



She got pregnant and transferred to Catherine Ferguson Academy for Young Women for her sophomore year, where she failed her first class ever.



"Since I make up my own work, I have to sit there and think what do I need to do today to get a history credit, what do I have to do to get English," said White, the mother of a 9-month-old. "Since they can't really teach us anything, it seems they just give us anything to keep our hands moving.



"For history, I'm doing outlines of the book, but I'm like how is this teaching me?"



Conaway said she's allowed to give one to two lectures per week but is instructed by the administration not to teach a daily lesson plan.



Tatyana Duncan, 17, a junior and mother, said she hasn't received a single credit toward her graduation this academic year. She'll have to repeat a grade.



"I've always been at least a 2.0 to a 3.0 student," she said. "It really makes me mad because... I've never failed a grade."



"It's well, you didn't teach yourself enough so you get no credits. We're not learning anything."



Thursday's protest was organized as CNN reporters were inside the school covering a story about the success of the Big Picture Learning Model, Conaway said.



Certain teachers and students, she said, were preselected and briefed before cameras entered the school.



White said she was scolded by an administrator when she attempted to talk to one of the CNN reporters in the cafeteria.



This MLive reporter attempted to speak with Principal G. Asenath Andrews but was abruptly stopped by an employee and questioned before making it to the office just 20 feet from the entrance.



A security guard escorted me from the building and refused to answer any questions. She did accept a business card and said she would pass along the request for comment.



Attempts to contact school officials at two phone numbers listed for the school were met with a busy signal.