Audubon Junior High School

History of Audubon Junior High School

Audubon Jr High was built in 1922 alongside the Mt Auburn school in the Woodland Hills neighborhood of Cleveland, Mt Auburn school was built a block away as a elementary school. Both schools where built as population in Cleveland continued to grow into the 1920s. Many major and large additions were made to the school as enrollment grew. In all the school would grow to 154,277 sf and would feature two gyms, a library and a large auditorium. Like many Cleveland schools of the 1920s the architect behind Audubon was Walter Roy McCornack which designed many Cleveland schools during the golden age of growth in the district between 1914 and 1925. In the early years of Audubon the primary student make up was White Hungarian, Slovak, and Italian immigrants that largely had family, that came to Cleveland to work in the steel mills and garment industries. However the demographic stability of Audubon’s neighborhood was shattered in the post World War II era. As the Second Great Migration brought tens of thousands of African Americans to Cleveland in search of industrial employment, the city’s rigid racial boundaries began to break down. The East Side became the primary destination for Black families, not by choice, but due to the systemic containment policies of redlining and restrictive covenants that barred them from the West Side and suburbs. The impact of this demographic seismic shift on Audubon Junior High was immediate and profound. By the early 1960s, the school had become predominantly African American. As the student body became Black, the allocation of resources from the white dominated School Board began to dwindle a pattern of "benign neglect". By the early 1970s, the physical and social conditions at Audubon had reached a crisis point. The "Audubon Issue," as it was termed in contemporary community documents, centered on a triad of problems including Physical Decay, Discipline and Safety, and Educational Equity. In response to rising crime and racial tension, the local Catholic parishes which anchored the remaining white ethnic population formed the Buckeye Woodland Catholic Community Council, under the guidance of progressive clergy and organizers, the Council took a radical step, they identified the plight of Audubon Junior High as a shared problem in the community. The activism surrounding Audubon was intense and effective. Parents from both racial groups toured the school, documenting 16 specific problems, ranging from the broken plumbing to safety hazards. They took these demands to the Cleveland Board of Education and their fight was successful. 13 of the 16 problems were fixed by the board in the following years. By the end of the decade the school board was forced to desegregate the district under a court order. However by this time the student population at Audubon was declining due to the remaining white students leaving and black families able to move to the suburbs to escape the crime that plagued the neighborhood for decades. This caused the district to repurpose the school for students with learning and behavioral disabilities. By 2010 it was chosen to close when enrollment continued to decline it was one of 18 schools closed in 2010. In 2021 it was one of many schools to be selected for a possible redevelopment into 107 affordable apartments for seniors, however nothing has come of this plan.