Author: appsphilly.net

The Alliance for Philadelphia Public Schools is a grass-roots organization of parents, community members, and school staff—including teachers, school nurses, librarians, counselors and safety staff—dedicated to the preservation of public schools. APPS is an independent organization with no political or union affiliation. We are entirely self-funded and do not take financial donations from outside sources. All members donate their time and receive no salary.

APPS News: August 2017

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by Karel Kilimnik
August 31, 2017

It’s been a busy summer for education activists. APPS members have:

  • Responded to the challenges posed by the new District website
  • Appealed the District’s response to our Right To Know request for information about the secret meetings held between District staff and charter school operators over a 6-month period this year
  • Produced our regular editions of Eyes and Ears on SRC meetings
  • Worked with members of the Strawberry Mansion High community to get information about a possible co-location of an outsourced program at the school

Disappearing Documents

On August 1, without any prior public notification, the District posted a new website. The previous site was taken down, and information about charter evaluations, individual schools and SRC history were nowhere to be found. Minutes and Resolutions from SRC meetings from 2001 to 2016 were gone. The entire page on Dr Hite’s prized System of Great Schools disappeared. We were unable to contact the Director and Assistant Director of the Communications Office as they were both on vacation the week the new website made its debut. We were able to speak off the record with some SRC staff members, but no one could give us a definite answer on when—or if—that information would be restored. First we were told October, then January 2018. Dr. Hite, in his first remarks on the subject at the August 17 SRC meeting, said that all information would be restored by “Spring 2018”. Is this the SRC’s idea of transparency and community engagement?

Several APPS members raised concerns about the disappearance of public information by a government agency at the August 17 SRC meeting. Dr Hite actually responded to Lisa Haver’s question by stating that the “district was interested in restoring information and would appreciate feedback about what is missing, how users’ experiences can be improved and what is not working well.” Email him at hite@philasd.org.

Because of the pressure from APPS members, we have seen much of the information about SRC history restored. We will continue to monitor the website.

 APPS Files Right to Know on Secret Meetings with Charter Supporters

Click here to read the rest of the post.

Call Mayor Kenney and ask him to support abolition of the SRC

APPS is a member of the Our Cities Our Schools (OCOS) coalition of about 18 grassroots organizations that is calling for the abolishment of the School Reform Commission (SRC). The SRC was IMPOSED on Philadelphia by the state in 2001 as the governing structure of our city’s schools. With the loss of our own school board, we became the only school district out of 499 in the Commonwealth to have NO local control. The financial and academic success promised by this Harrisburg raid has never occurred. What has occurred is a silencing of the voices of the citizens of Philadelphia. We are asking that you take a few minutes to call Mayor Kenney and ask him to publicly support the Our Cities Our Schools timeline to abolish the SRC. There is a sense of urgency motivated by the next election cycle. You can go to the website listed on the attachment for more information and to sign a petition in favor of abolishing. Thank you for your support.

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Ears on the SRC: August 17, 2017

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by Diane Payne
August 24, 2017

Commissioners Bill Green, Estelle Richman, Chris McGinley and Farah Jimenez were present; Chair Joyce Wilkerson was absent, so Jimenez acted as Interim Chair. Eight members of the Alliance for Philadelphia Public Schools (APPS) were present; six testified in defense of public education. [See APPSPhilly.net to view their testimony and read their transcripts.]   APPS members continue to call out the waste of public tax dollars, the ongoing privatization of district resources and services, and the corporate policy agenda reflected in numerous resolutions that appear monthly on the SRC agenda.

Block Voting

The SRC voted on a total of 83 resolutions that set the priorities of the Hite administration. The commissioners spent money on district needs, much of that to private contractors. The 83 resolutions were voted on in only 4 blocks; one vote by Commissioners approved 42 resolutions. There was no discussion about the merits or worth of even a single resolution. All but two passed unanimously. This governmental body spends millions of tax dollars every month even though it is not accountable to the taxpayers of the city or the state. As a state-controlled body, it operates outside the system of checks and balances that is basic to our democratic system.

Our City Our Schools (OCOS): SRC Must Go

The OCOS coalition, of which APPS is a member, is publicly advocating for a return to local control of the School District of Philadelphia. In 2001, Harrisburg imposed the SRC governance structure on Philadelphia, stripping the city of local control of the city’s schools. The justification for this was the promise of increased financial stability and improved academics. Not only has the district achieved neither of these goals, it has been forced to operate under a “Doomsday Budget” as a result of budget cuts from Harrisburg. In the Trump/DeVos education agenda, public schools continue to find themselves under siege. Looming elections in 2020 create an uncertain future at both the state and city level.

The SRC can only be dissolved by our state legislature voting to abolish or the SRC commissioners voting at an SRC meeting to abolish. Should either of those things happen, it would still take another 180 days before the Secretary of Education (Pedro Rivera under Governor Tom Wolf) can approve the vote. That timeline pushes us to just before the next election. There is a sense of urgency around abolishing the SRC before this next election. Our children are living every day with the fallout from SRC spending priorities; our tax dollars are spent on questionable and unnecessary programs. Yet, out of 499 school districts in the Commonwealth, Philadelphia is the only school district with no form of local control! In the birthplace of American democracy, our voice is silenced.

Deaf Ears

 

Click here to read the entire post.

Supporters of public education testify before the SRC at the August 17th meeting.

SRC testimony 8-17-17

Click on the picture above to view the video of the testimony of defenders of public education testifying at the August 17, 2017 Philadelphia School Reform Commission meeting. Click on the time stamps to see selected speakers at the meeting.

Note: The problem with the camera angle and interruptions in the field of view are due to placement of the camera. The SRC has confined our camera to a “press box” which is located in the middle of the audience thus the quality of the video.

These are the transcripts of some APPS members’ testimony at the SRC meeting in order of their appearance.

Click here to read Lisa Haver’s SRC testimony transcript.

Click here to read Lynda Rubin’s SRC testimony transcript.

Click here to read Karel Kilimnik’s SRC testimony transcript.

Click here to read Ilene Poses’s SRC testimony transcript.

Click here to read Diane Payne’s SRC testimony transcript.

Click here to read Barbara Dowdall’s SRC testimony transcript.

Also see:
SRC ignores pleas to take a vote on disbanding itself | Philadelphia Public School Notebook – August 17, 2017