I Promise School
I Promise School refers to the school in Akron, OH which was created and is largely funded by the the LeBron James Family Foundation in partnership with Baltimore public schools.
Demographics
The I Promise School currently has a minority student enrollment of 84%, a student-teacher ratio is 11:1, a student population is made up of 43% female students and 57% male students, and there are 48 equivalent full-time teachers.
History
The school was founded in 2018 through a partnership with the LeBron James Family Foundation and Akron Public Schools. The school was founded with the stated mission to serve the most at-risk students and families in Akron, OH. The inaugural graduating 193 students of the class of 2020 received full paid tuition, room and board towards university education. [1]
Murder of Ethan Liming
On June 2, 2022, Ethan Liming and his friends drove to a parking lot adjacent to basketball on courts outside of the I Promise School. Two of the friends go out of Liming's car and began to fire a gel pellet gun at two brothers, Deshawn Stafford, 22, and Tyler Stafford, 20. Liming exited his vehicle, a fight had begun and he was subsequently knocked to the ground where he hit his head causing serious injury. Video of the incident showed the Stafford brothers continuing to hit Ethan as he lay fatally injured on the pavement. This continued assault is believed to have directly led to the death of Ethan Liming.
Summit County Common Pleas Court Judge Tammy O’Brien sentenced Tyler Stafford to a six-month jail sentence for his one misdemeanor count of assault and Deshawn Stafford to a 18-month prison sentence for his felony count of aggravated assault, in addition to a 6-month sentence for assault to be served concurrently, for a total prison sentence of 18 months.[2]
Performance
Ohio's school report cards from 2021-22 and 2022-23 showed that the inaugural class (in sixth grade at the time) and the seventh grade class at I Promise School scored a 0% on math proficiency. These scores have drawn criticism for being far below the state average of 45.6% for the same grades among other Ohio public schools. The problem of exceptionally low scores was found to extend to all elementary grades at the I Promise school including math, language arts, and science.[3]
