Our School, Our Home
MISSION
VISION
The Rafael Hernández School is a community school integrating a dual language and inclusive education model for bilingual, biliterate, and multicultural students and teachers who are models of critical consciousness and academic excellence.
We believe that every child deserves the opportunity and support to become bilingual and biliterate. So we provide an ability-inclusive path to our linguistic inclusion model that leverages both a student’s dominant and partner language to cultivate their genius. We are a restorative justice school that believes in collective responsibility for one another. We hold each other accountable for our impact, and celebrate change in our community. Our children proudly take their identities into the world, and build a more just society because they have experienced one in these walls.
Core Values
Bilingualism
Honoring, valuing, celebrating and being proud of constantly learning and leveraging the power of being bilingual.
Respect
Acting in a way that shows care for how our actions impact our learning, ourselves, others and our school.
Inclusivity
Including and accepting everyone into our community as their whole self and ensuring them access and support that allow them to flourish.
Leadership
Modeling integrity, inspiring others to break barriers and living out our values.
Achievement through struggle
Without struggle there are no achievements. In this community, perseverance and the belief that the process is more important than the product is demonstrated.
Love
Building positive relationships where we show empathy, patience and understanding to each other.
Bilingualism
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Respect
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Inclusivity
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Leadership
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Acheivement through struggle
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Love
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Bilingualism 〰️ Respect 〰️ Inclusivity 〰️ Leadership 〰️ Acheivement through struggle 〰️ Love 〰️
Community Hub School Model
As a community hub school, the Hernández strives for continuous improvement in the key practices of the community school model, with the goal of creating the best possible environment for students to learn. These key practices include:
Collaborative leadership, shared power & voice
Expanded, enriched learning opportunities
Rigorous, community-connected classroom instruction
Culture of belonging, safety and care
Integrated systems of support
Powerful student and family engagement
Brandel Delgado is our Hub School Coordinator and is the main point of contact for organizing partners, programs and supports. He can be reached at bdelgadorodriguez(at) bostonpublicschools.org. Friends of the Hernández is our main partner in implementing this model.
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when many Puerto Ricans were migrating to Boston. At that time, parents felt there were no schools equipped to address the language needs of their children. In response, community activists petitioned the Boston Public Schools to establish a school where Latino students’ educational needs could be met. The school committee agreed to establish a school named after Rafael Hernández, a Puerto Rican poet, composer and musician whose songs dealt with the loneliness and isolation of migration and the difficulty of fitting in. His songs have become classics in the Latino culture today.
Initially, the Rafael Hernández School was set up exclusively for Latino children. The children were recruited door to door, where parents, so alienated from the system, had been keeping them home.
When the Boston desegregation order was handed down in 1976, it was decided that the most educationally appropriate way to integrate the Hernández would be to make it a two-way language school. In 1987, the school was moved to its current location in order to increase the number of students who would be able to attend the school.
Today, children from across the city come together at the school to celebrate two languages, Spanish and English, and to honor the heritage of the many nations from which they come.
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The Rafael Hernández School cherishes the memories of Margarita Muñiz and Ken Larson, two beloved leaders of our school who passed away in 2011.
Margarita Muñiz spent 39 years in the Boston Public Schools, 30 of them as the Principal of the Rafael Hernández School. Ms. Muñiz came to America at age eleven without her parents, and throughout college, it was her dream to work for the Boston Public Schools and make a difference in the lives of children for whom English was a second language.
Under Margarita’s leadership, the Hernández School has been nominated as an Effective Practice School by the BPS, received a 2005 Teacher Team of the Year from USA TODAY, and has had three teachers nominated by the Mayor’s Office as Boston Teacher of the Year.
Ms. Muñiz began her career with the Boston Public Schools in 1972 as an English as a Second Language (ESL) teacher in the Office of Bilingual Education. She served as District Coordinator of Bilingual Education in the Multicultural Office. In 1981 she became Acting Principal of the Hernández School and became permanent in 1983.
Margarita received several awards in recognition of her many contributions as a bilingual educator and leader in Massachusetts. Among her numerous recognitions, she was Boston Public Schools Principal of the Year in 2009, a Barr Foundation Fellow from 2007 to 2010, and named one of 100 Outstanding Women in Massachusetts in 2003. Margarita was also honored for her contributions and leadership by Governor Patrick as the State House recognized Hispanic educators in Massachusetts.
Margarita passed away after a long battle with cancer in November of 2011. In September of 2012, the Margarita Muniz Academy, a groundbreaking bilingual high school, opened in Jamaica Plain.
Ken Lowell Larson grew up on his family’s farm in Grenora, in northwestern North Dakota. Following high school, Ken attended the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks and graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Speech Pathology. After college, Ken moved to Port Townsend, Washington and started his school career as a speech pathologist in the Port Townsend/Port Angeles schools. Ken later moved to Seattle, Washington where he expressed his culinary and artistic talents by establishing both a catering and upholstery business.
Ken’s next and final move was to Boston, Massachusetts where he spent 27 years as an administrator with the Rafael Hernández School. Ken spent his professional life as the Director of Operations and Assistant Principal for the Rafael Hernández School, where he worked side by side with his great friend, Margarita Muñiz. Ken was an outstanding educator and administrator. He was instrumental in supporting Principal Margarita Muñiz, and together, they made the Hernández School an outstanding two-way bilingual school.
Ken’s passions included traveling the world. Each summer at the end of the school year, Ken Margarita took time out to explore the world. These places included Europe, Central and South America, Egypt, Norway, and the Galapagos Islands. Ken loved to cook and enjoyed foods from all over the world.
Ken passed away unexpectedly in November of 2011
“A Legacy of Excellence,” by Yvonne Abraham, Boston Globe, Nov. 20, 2011
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Watch “Dos idiomas, Una comunidad” video:
This film explores the racial and political challenges of bilingual education in the United States and the role that Margarita Muñiz played within the dual bilingual language program in the city of Boston and the state of Massachusetts. The film begins by shedding light on the fight for better bilingual education programs during the Boston Public Schools’ desegregation case of the 1970s and introduces Margarita as an advocate for the children who depended on it to succeed.