|
|
|
Parents mobilize against proposed school closings
The School Reform Commission will tonight unveil a list of recommended school closings. Parents at one South Philly school plan to fight back.
Parents mobilize against proposed school closings
Former schools superintendent Arlene Ackerman may be gone, but education controversy is on its way back. The School Reform Commission (SRC) will tonight unveil a list of recommended school closings at a special 5 p.m. session following the regular 3 p.m. meeting.
Parents at South Philly’s E.M. Stanton Elementary School will be there. “It shouldn’t close because it’s a high performing neighborhood public school,” says James Wright, parent of a sixth grader at Stanton, which he believes the District will propose consolidating with Chester A. Arthur School and perhaps closing. “We have 15 partnerships, including with Art Sanctuary and University of the Arts. We have a dance instructor and a drumming instructor. It’s so successful where it is — any kind of movement will disrupt that.”
The number of students attending Philly public schools has shrunk over the years and the District has plans to close, consolidate and reorganize schools to save money. The 2010 Census showed a slight population growth in Philadelphia for the first time in 50 years — after the exodus of a quarter million people. That, along with declining birth rates and the growth of publicly funded and privately managed charter schools, means fewer students. The District has an estimated 70,000 empty seats, and has lost 11,000 pupils in the past five years alone.
But the closings may not deliver the desired results. As the Philadelphia Public School Notebook reports, a recent Pew study found that “widespread school closings often fail to generate expected savings or meaningful student achievement gains, but can contribute to significant community upheaval and neighborhood blight.”
Parents and communities have been mobilized since this June, when the Notebook released a confidential draft school closings proposal. The closing process is guaranteed to get heated--and political. In South Philly, Kenyatta Johnson, State Representative and Democratic nominee for the City Council’s 2nd District seat, has pledged his support for Stanton. Stanton parents successfully fought a proposed closure in 2003.
“We’re fully utilizing our space,” says Wright. “We turned an empty classroom into an art studio.”
One 2009 report praised the school for a “uniquely artistic climate through investment in its philosophy that everyone is an artist and creativity is essential to exploration and learning.”
The Notebook and Plan Philly have teamed up to cover this process. Full coverage can be found here. Today’s announcement begins a three-month process of legally mandated hearings before the SRC takes final votes on the closings.
- ActiVman
- adventures
- Arts
- Ask A Man-About-Town
- Award Tour
- Awards
- Bad Idea Factory
- Beer
- Below the Curve
- Bikes
- Booze
- Brian Hickey
- BRT
- Budget
- Budget Fuss
- Business
- Casinos
- City Council
- City Hall
- CouncilMANIC
- CP Abroad
- CP in the Community
- Criminal Justice System
- Day Tripper
- Death and Taxes
- Delaware River
- Design
- DROP
- Drugs
- Dubious Distinction
- Elections
- End of Days
- Environment
- Fashion
- Film Fest
- Financial Meltdown
- FrackTrack
- Free Library
- Gambling
- Gay Stuff
- Get Lit
- Greenstorming
- guns
- Hall Monitor
- Health
- Health Care
- Hello, Kitty
- Holidays
- Ice Cubes
- Iggles
- Immigration
- In Memoriam
- Labor
- Lawsuits
- Letters
- LGBTQ
- Maps
- Marcellus Shale
- Media
- MMA
- Mummers
- Music
- MUST READ
- Mysterious Mysteries
- Nation
- News
- Non Sequitur
- Opinion
- PA politics 2010
- Parking Wars
- Parks and Recreation
- People Send Us This Stuff
- Philadelphia Police
- Philadelphia Union
- Philaphemera
- Philly From Scratch
- philly madness
- Photos
- Poverty
- PPA
- President Obama
- Print Edition
- Prisons
- Protest
- Readers Write
- Real Estate
- Rock Bottom
- Schools
- Science
- Screwing Philly
- SEPTA
- snow
- So Lush
- Soccer
- Sporting Life
- Sports Complex
- State Politicians
- State Politics
- Street Art
- Strike
- Stuff We Like
- Taxes
- Taxi Drivers
- Tech Fetish
- television
- The Budget Crisis
- The City Paper
- The CLOG
- The Human Condition
- The Mayor
- The Phightin Phils
- The World
- Things that make you go hm
- Tinfoil Hats Off
- Under the Table
- Under the Tables
- Urban Development
- Urban Planning
- urban wildlife
- Video Poker
- We Call Shenanigans
- Weather
- Web Junk
- Weekend Omnibus
- White House
- What We've Found
- Women's Issues
- Flyered Up!
- How 'Bout That Weather?
- it's always sunny in philadelphia
- Stu!
- Shopping
- get out
- 10-track mind
- ArtsFlash
- Bloggity
- Bruce Being Bruce
- Colleges
- Comedy
- Gigantic Surprises
- Hello Canary
- Hello Puppy
- errata
- get lost
- Inside The Fishbowl
- Library Closings
- Local Support
- Movies
- Murder
- Night Moves
- Recycling
- radio
- Scientology
- Sex
- Sixers
- Skeeze Police
- State Politicians Screwing Philly
- That's a cool stencil!
- Theater
- Things We See
- This Week
- This Week in Oates
- University City
- WIN
- What we don't heart
- trailer!
- what we heart
- Feeling Guilty
- Askadelphia.
- Broke in Philly
- Contest
- Dance
- Dear Paper Doll
- Do A Good Thing
- Education
- Film Fest Schism
- G20-20 Vision
- Goodbye
- Gossip
- Great American Heroes
- PATCO
- Pearl Jam Week
- Puppy
- Stars of the Photostream
- sustainability
- Lower Merion Webcam-Gate
- The Cycle
- Equality Forum
- Bureaucrat of the Week
- Animals
- ElectionEar
- Photostream
