3 Voices
In October 2016 Houston’s storied 45-year-old High School for the Performing and Visual Arts changed its name to Kinder High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, in exchange for a “donation” from the Kinder Foundation of $7.5 million. Part of the money, $5 million, will be used to upgrade theater equipment in the new school under construction now.
There was little opportunity to debate this proposal before the HISD Board of Trustees voted in favor of the deal six days after it was publicly announced.
The name of the school matters. What’s in a name? When a public institution is as long-lived, successful, and beloved as HSPVA is, when it’s the only school in the system with national name recognition, and when that name connotes a heritage of excellence built with the efforts of all our community, from the smallest taxpayer to the top of the creative class here in Houston--there’s a lot in that name, in that identity.
The name of the school is valuable intellectual property. Would Disney change its name? No. Among public schools, HSPVA’s brand is at the Disney level.
Kinder has bought the name. In a few years, most people will not know the school’s achievements belong to all of us. The new name sounds like a private school with an endowment. Though Kinder offers no endowment, they are happy to imply they did. They are happy to take credit for the efforts and success of others.
This issue is about the school’s identity and who owns it, and who has the right to sell it off cheaply. Should the “donor class” in Houston so easily be able to grab our best intangible and tangible assets with their excess pocket change?
My two friends and I, another HSPVA mom and one of the school's original alumni, want to keep this conversation alive. But first you have to agree that the name matters. We’d like to tell you why we think it does.
Sarah
I went to a typical high school in the 1970’s. Football players and cheerleaders controlled the social order. I had a friend who went to the brand new High School for the Performing and Visual Arts. It sounded so cool. I wished I could make the escape she had.
In my mind I’ve had a relationship with the school since I was a teenager, but in reality I’ve been around for three years, since my son began attending in Visual Arts. For the first time in my 23-year history as an HISD mom, I participate at school. I love being around the students––their energy, their collaborative spirit. Their social order is flat––it’s an incredibly diverse and accepting milieu. There’s nothing else like it.
To be associated with HSPVA has given me an unaccountable, secret joy. It represents the best we can accomplish together in Houston with a public school, working inside all the financial and political restrictions that entails.
When you buy something and put your name on it, that’s a declaration that you own it. With the name change, Kinder now owns the HSPVA brand, the achievements, the 45-year history, the whole identity.
The HISD board calls this a “public-private partnership.” It’s not a partnership when one party owns the other. The school’s identity was sold. And that “donation” was not a gift. It’s not a gift when you receive something of equal or greater value in return. That is a sale.
As “Kinder” high school, we become just another arts organization dependent on the kindness of billionaires. That’s the opposite of what HSPVA has been. Independence and making do with regular public school funding, PTO-type fundraising, and basic equipment is PVA’s stock in trade. This name change plunging us into the billionaire world is not an upgrade.
It’s a genetic modifier.
I’m not just sad about the name change. I feel ripped off. This was a perversion of democracy. Kinder dealt in secret with Friends, using information about the school’s final equipment needs that no other groups had. HSPVA Friends negotiated the contract to sell the name without any input from the public and presented it as a fait accompli. Friends is not a disinterested party. This donation is almost ten times their entire revenue stream for 2016, and while they don’t profit directly from this transaction, relationships and big attention-getting donations are valuable in their industry. When Kinder pressured the school board to vote in just six days by saying the offer would "expire," that’s stifling public discourse.
I have had enough of feeling helpless about our country’s frayed democracy.
I don’t feel helpless about HSPVA. We can get this story out. That will matter.
Jeff
I am a citizen, taxpayer, supporter, and alumnus of the third class to graduate from HSPVA. I spent three years promoting the HSPVA brand with all my classmates. We struggled to establish a stellar reputation, to garner added funding for life-altering programs. So did every student, teacher, and staff for the last 45 years. While I was forming my own identity, HSPVA was forming its own. We grew up together.
It is no longer an experiment. The results are in. The school now has a national and international reputation of excellence. It is the crown jewel of Houston and its school district. The HSPVA brand is one of the most valuable assets our school community has.
I was shocked that the name was given away to a “donor,” and for the grossly disproportionate share of less than 8% of the cost of the new facility now under construction. I was so upset I wrote to three Trustees of the HISD Board and posted the email on Facebook.
I swallowed my hurt pride when HSPVA Friends and current faculty told me this gift would not really change the name. Kinder donated at a crucial time when HISD came up short on the funds needed to complete the new school. They said resistance to the gift could risk scaring away major donors. Reconciling to the positive, I posted an essay on why adding Kinder to the name was securing a long-awaited patron.
Then I learned the details about how the deal went down and what is in the contract. They are so disturbing, I can no longer call this a gift. When a billionaire can subvert the democratic process with secret negotiations to surprise the HISD board with terms that expire on the brink of deadlines, it is hardly the prototype for a private-public effort. It is NOT the state-of-the-art agreement HISD should have, with a morals clause, a time limit on the name, and confined to the building or parts of it, conformed to not just the letter of the HISD policy but more importantly, the intent. This voter wants transparent democracy!
They sold the SOUL of HSPVA. Read the Faustian contract. The IDENTITY and all references to it will now put Kinder as top billing. Forever--even if they move to another building after the institution resides in the prime real estate downtown. This is unprecedented, undemocratic, and unnecessary, which in my mind makes it unethical.
Ann
As a parent of a former HSPVA student now an aspiring actor, I am committed to protecting our young artists. The decision to pursue a life in the Arts is not an easy one. There certainly is no monetary incentive. My son decided to follow his passion and is currently pursuing a BFA degree in Acting at a well known university. People don’t hesitate to say to me “What! You’re letting your son go to college to become a waiter?” What other career path garners such a reaction? What other career path calls your sanity into question?
I think of HSPVA as a painting, a work in progress. In the late 1960’s HSPVA was just an idea in Ruth Denney’s mind. In 1971, the school opened in a vacant synagogue. It was a blank canvas that the inaugural class began to apply their creativity to. This past August, a new class arrived at HSPVA. They were drawn to HSPVA by beauty of what is already on the canvas, the spirit of creating in a supportive environment. As they grow artistically, they too will put their mark on this canvas.
By selling the HSPVA name, HSPVA Friends has literally scratched the Kinder name onto this beautiful masterpiece. When we sell Ruth Denney’s legacy like a pair of Gucci loafers to be scooped up by the first wealthy person that comes along, what does it say about us? When we decide to put perfecting an Arts facility ahead of the idealism of the young artists that will occupy the space, what does that say about us?
True artists know a beautiful, well equipped building does not make art. Art is created by people that are willing to open their heart to the world in the hopes of connecting to their audience, sharing a moment that transcends everything that divides us and unites us in our humanity.
The Kinder name will not be a source of pride and inspiration for HSPVA students. It will be a subtle reminder that artists have less value in our society because they are not wealthy and follow the road less traveled.
In October 2016 Houston’s storied 45-year-old High School for the Performing and Visual Arts changed its name to Kinder High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, in exchange for a “donation” from the Kinder Foundation of $7.5 million. Part of the money, $5 million, will be used to upgrade theater equipment in the new school under construction now.
There was little opportunity to debate this proposal before the HISD Board of Trustees voted in favor of the deal six days after it was publicly announced.
The name of the school matters. What’s in a name? When a public institution is as long-lived, successful, and beloved as HSPVA is, when it’s the only school in the system with national name recognition, and when that name connotes a heritage of excellence built with the efforts of all our community, from the smallest taxpayer to the top of the creative class here in Houston--there’s a lot in that name, in that identity.
The name of the school is valuable intellectual property. Would Disney change its name? No. Among public schools, HSPVA’s brand is at the Disney level.
Kinder has bought the name. In a few years, most people will not know the school’s achievements belong to all of us. The new name sounds like a private school with an endowment. Though Kinder offers no endowment, they are happy to imply they did. They are happy to take credit for the efforts and success of others.
This issue is about the school’s identity and who owns it, and who has the right to sell it off cheaply. Should the “donor class” in Houston so easily be able to grab our best intangible and tangible assets with their excess pocket change?
My two friends and I, another HSPVA mom and one of the school's original alumni, want to keep this conversation alive. But first you have to agree that the name matters. We’d like to tell you why we think it does.
Sarah
I went to a typical high school in the 1970’s. Football players and cheerleaders controlled the social order. I had a friend who went to the brand new High School for the Performing and Visual Arts. It sounded so cool. I wished I could make the escape she had.
In my mind I’ve had a relationship with the school since I was a teenager, but in reality I’ve been around for three years, since my son began attending in Visual Arts. For the first time in my 23-year history as an HISD mom, I participate at school. I love being around the students––their energy, their collaborative spirit. Their social order is flat––it’s an incredibly diverse and accepting milieu. There’s nothing else like it.
To be associated with HSPVA has given me an unaccountable, secret joy. It represents the best we can accomplish together in Houston with a public school, working inside all the financial and political restrictions that entails.
When you buy something and put your name on it, that’s a declaration that you own it. With the name change, Kinder now owns the HSPVA brand, the achievements, the 45-year history, the whole identity.
The HISD board calls this a “public-private partnership.” It’s not a partnership when one party owns the other. The school’s identity was sold. And that “donation” was not a gift. It’s not a gift when you receive something of equal or greater value in return. That is a sale.
As “Kinder” high school, we become just another arts organization dependent on the kindness of billionaires. That’s the opposite of what HSPVA has been. Independence and making do with regular public school funding, PTO-type fundraising, and basic equipment is PVA’s stock in trade. This name change plunging us into the billionaire world is not an upgrade.
It’s a genetic modifier.
I’m not just sad about the name change. I feel ripped off. This was a perversion of democracy. Kinder dealt in secret with Friends, using information about the school’s final equipment needs that no other groups had. HSPVA Friends negotiated the contract to sell the name without any input from the public and presented it as a fait accompli. Friends is not a disinterested party. This donation is almost ten times their entire revenue stream for 2016, and while they don’t profit directly from this transaction, relationships and big attention-getting donations are valuable in their industry. When Kinder pressured the school board to vote in just six days by saying the offer would "expire," that’s stifling public discourse.
I have had enough of feeling helpless about our country’s frayed democracy.
I don’t feel helpless about HSPVA. We can get this story out. That will matter.
Jeff
I am a citizen, taxpayer, supporter, and alumnus of the third class to graduate from HSPVA. I spent three years promoting the HSPVA brand with all my classmates. We struggled to establish a stellar reputation, to garner added funding for life-altering programs. So did every student, teacher, and staff for the last 45 years. While I was forming my own identity, HSPVA was forming its own. We grew up together.
It is no longer an experiment. The results are in. The school now has a national and international reputation of excellence. It is the crown jewel of Houston and its school district. The HSPVA brand is one of the most valuable assets our school community has.
I was shocked that the name was given away to a “donor,” and for the grossly disproportionate share of less than 8% of the cost of the new facility now under construction. I was so upset I wrote to three Trustees of the HISD Board and posted the email on Facebook.
I swallowed my hurt pride when HSPVA Friends and current faculty told me this gift would not really change the name. Kinder donated at a crucial time when HISD came up short on the funds needed to complete the new school. They said resistance to the gift could risk scaring away major donors. Reconciling to the positive, I posted an essay on why adding Kinder to the name was securing a long-awaited patron.
Then I learned the details about how the deal went down and what is in the contract. They are so disturbing, I can no longer call this a gift. When a billionaire can subvert the democratic process with secret negotiations to surprise the HISD board with terms that expire on the brink of deadlines, it is hardly the prototype for a private-public effort. It is NOT the state-of-the-art agreement HISD should have, with a morals clause, a time limit on the name, and confined to the building or parts of it, conformed to not just the letter of the HISD policy but more importantly, the intent. This voter wants transparent democracy!
They sold the SOUL of HSPVA. Read the Faustian contract. The IDENTITY and all references to it will now put Kinder as top billing. Forever--even if they move to another building after the institution resides in the prime real estate downtown. This is unprecedented, undemocratic, and unnecessary, which in my mind makes it unethical.
Ann
As a parent of a former HSPVA student now an aspiring actor, I am committed to protecting our young artists. The decision to pursue a life in the Arts is not an easy one. There certainly is no monetary incentive. My son decided to follow his passion and is currently pursuing a BFA degree in Acting at a well known university. People don’t hesitate to say to me “What! You’re letting your son go to college to become a waiter?” What other career path garners such a reaction? What other career path calls your sanity into question?
I think of HSPVA as a painting, a work in progress. In the late 1960’s HSPVA was just an idea in Ruth Denney’s mind. In 1971, the school opened in a vacant synagogue. It was a blank canvas that the inaugural class began to apply their creativity to. This past August, a new class arrived at HSPVA. They were drawn to HSPVA by beauty of what is already on the canvas, the spirit of creating in a supportive environment. As they grow artistically, they too will put their mark on this canvas.
By selling the HSPVA name, HSPVA Friends has literally scratched the Kinder name onto this beautiful masterpiece. When we sell Ruth Denney’s legacy like a pair of Gucci loafers to be scooped up by the first wealthy person that comes along, what does it say about us? When we decide to put perfecting an Arts facility ahead of the idealism of the young artists that will occupy the space, what does that say about us?
True artists know a beautiful, well equipped building does not make art. Art is created by people that are willing to open their heart to the world in the hopes of connecting to their audience, sharing a moment that transcends everything that divides us and unites us in our humanity.
The Kinder name will not be a source of pride and inspiration for HSPVA students. It will be a subtle reminder that artists have less value in our society because they are not wealthy and follow the road less traveled.