‘One last hurrah’: Math, Civics and Sciences athletes say goodbye to their closing school

Samiyah Heard has grown up in the hallways of Mathematics, Civics and Sciences Charter School.

From a first grader just learning how to read to a freshman competing on the school’s track and field and girls’ basketball teams, her surroundings haven’t changed, but Heard certainly has.

Over nine years, she has developed relationships with teachers and made lifelong friendships, going from a quiet girl to a confident teenager. But in October, when the news was announced about MCS’s closure at the end of the academic year, Heard was filled with a mix of emotions.

“This school has shaped the person I am today,” said Heard, who’s from East Oak Lane and competes in the 100- and 400-meter dashes and the long jump. “I’ve been here since first grade and I’m just stepping into high school. It wasn’t anger, it was more so sadness because for some kids, it’s difficult to get into other schools.”

MCS’s founder and chief administrative officer Veronica Joyner, 73, said that the closure of the nearly 25-year-old charter school in North Philadelphia was because of her impending retirement and that she didn’t think anyone could replace her.

“When I founded this school, it was the largest charter in Pennsylvania in 1999,” Joyner said. “The School District of Philadelphia gave me a one-year charter. I decided to retire because I’ve had years of fighting to get the five-year charter.

“I’m being shut down because I did the right thing and I’m going to continue to do the right thing.”

But district officials refute that statement, saying that they wanted to keep the school open and are dismayed at Joyner’s and the school board’s decision to close; even other members of the charter school community have said they’re concerned about Joyner’s move to close without a transition plan.

It wasn’t an easy school year to navigate. Many students saw their best friends transfer to new schools when enrollment opened or their favorite teachers leave for another job. However, it didn’t stop them from staying or getting involved in extracurricular activities.

» READ MORE: This Philadelphia charter’s closure announcement was a surprise to the district

In fact, competing in a club or playing a sport was a welcome diversion from the stress and worries of finding a new school. For some, it also served as motivation to win and represent the Mighty Elephants one final time.

“When the basketball team heard it, it was like, ‘This is the last year, let’s go win it all,” said sophomore Milak Myatt, who transferred to the school this year from Imhotep Charter and has hopes of playing at the Division I level. “This puts me in a situation where I have to choose another school. I’ve been to four different schools in three years — I’m trying to find a home for the next two.”

The school’s athletic director, Lonnie Diggs, who’s also the boys’ basketball coach and has been the vice principal for two years, joined the MCS 20 years ago.

Along with former basketball coach Dan Jackson, who left to become a pastor, Diggs played a fundamental part in bringing athletics to the school.

At first, the school’s basketball teams competed in the Charter League, which included eight charter schools in the area. In 2005, MCS joined the Public League and the PIAA in boys’ and girls’ basketball and cheerleading.

This year marked the first time that MCS fielded a track and field program.

“We kind of built it from the ground up,” Diggs said. “We started winning, started getting better players in the program, and some kids were going on to college with scholarships.

“It meant a lot, because our kids saw the notoriety that kids from the Public League and PIAA were getting. We didn’t want them to feel like they were second class, we wanted them to have the same opportunities.”

The Mighty Elephants boys’ team made its second trip in school history to the Public League championship this season, falling to three-time defending champion Imhotep.

The program won a Pub title in 2020 against Simon Gratz. Wooga Poplar, a cousin of Myatt who recently transferred to Villanova from Miami, led the Mighty Elephants to victory.

MCS also made a semifinal appearance in the PIAA Class 3A playoffs this year and finished with a 20-11 record. That’s when its season came to a close and the realization started to set in that there wouldn’t be a next year.

“We just didn’t want to lose, because everybody knew. Everybody in the stands knew, everybody on the court knew that if we lose this game, it’s going to be the last time we were putting that jersey on.”

“That day there were a lot of ups and downs,” Myatt said. “We just didn’t want to lose, because everybody knew. Everybody in the stands knew, everybody on the court knew that if we lose this game, it’s going to be the last time we were putting that jersey on.

“After the game, nobody was talking,” said senior Aiden Brown, who will play at Penn State-Abington next season. “We told each other that we loved each other and did one last hurrah. You could definitely feel the energy and how hard it was on everybody, especially Coach Diggs.”

In other sports, including girls’ basketball and cheerleading, the athletes had to deal with their teammates transferring midseason, which affected competitions and lineups.

The cheerleading team had 20 members at the start of the season. By the end, 12 remained.

“It was like, ‘Dang, I just met you and now I can’t see you no more,’” said freshman Sakiyah Beckwith of Hunting Park, who joined the school this year. “We tried to plan stuff, but we’re going to miss each other. It was a crying moment because I met really nice people on this team and they showed me what true friends are.

“I was upset. I came here hoping to be part of the cheer team each year. I wanted to do this for the rest of my high school years.”

Her teammate, sophomore Sadiyah Harris-Taylor, stopped her and said, “I feel like that shouldn’t discourage you. You can continue cheering somewhere else.”

That kind of encouragement kept the student body together this year.

» READ MORE: A deal to save a Philly charter was nearly worked out, but its founder balked. Parents are furious.

While it was hard to see friends leave, it was also difficult for students to say goodbye to their teachers.

At the end of the girls’ basketball season, coach Keesha Morgan, who taught ninth-grade science, told her team she would be departing for another teaching job.

“I’m glad she told us, literally, our last game,” said senior Jabriyah Gibbs, who’s heading to Cheyney University and will be a walk-on for the team. “She stayed with us throughout the whole season and didn’t leave us, because we would have had nobody. I just feel like the school closing affected the whole team.

“She was saying she’s proud of us and wants the best, so I appreciate her.”

It was hard for Diggs to see teachers he’s known for years move on elsewhere, he said, but he understood — this is their livelihood.

“I’m going to be honest, when I heard about the school closing, I didn’t think it was actually going to happen,” Diggs said. “I thought somehow, some way, the school would stay open. It was hard to swallow — you build so many relationships with the kids, the parents, and staff over the years.”

Students tried to protest the closure and use their voices to petition the School District of Philadelphia, whether it was marching across the street on North Broad or showing up at board meetings. It showed Diggs how much the community cared about the school.

But as the school year went on and no change was happening, Diggs and the rest of the MCS staff needed to accept things and help their students find other schools.

“Many of the better schools generally don’t accept seniors because they want the students to be there for at least a couple of years,” Diggs said. “We reached out to many of the high schools, charter and public. We’ve had seven or eight different school fairs this year where schools came in and try to get students enrolled, and even recruit teachers.”

For Diggs, who will take over the coaching job at Chester Charter, MCS will always be a second home.

Even though he would be out of a job at the end of the school year, it was important, he said, to stay because many students were going through transition and change.

They needed a familiar face to offer guidance.

“When one door closes, another one opens,” Diggs said. “MCS was a family; many schools aren’t like that anymore. The school became part of kids’ lives. It goes much deeper than academics or even basketball. I appreciate my time there and trying to take what I learned to other places.”

» READ MORE: Hundreds of Math, Civics and Sciences Charter students walked out of class to protest the school’s upcoming closure

The athletes were able to keep their uniforms from this school year as a token of remembrance.

The boys’ basketball players still plan to call one another the “Elephant gang” or “E gang,” while the cheerleading team won’t forget those bus rides, chatting with teammates and finding words of inspiration before a competition.

“Nobody is going to ever take these moments away from us,” Brown said. “This whole experience, nobody can take that away. It’s forever in our hearts — everybody is going to remember MCS.”