Alliance for Philadelphia Public Schools
A grass-roots organization of parents, community members, and school staff, fighting to defend public education. We work together to provide analysis and demand accountability from the School District of Philadelphia to provide students with a high-quality education.
At a March 16th public meeting, the Education Nominating Panel approved eighteen additional nominees for the new school board to replace the SRC on July 1. Mayor Kenney will consider these, along with the initial twenty-seven approved two weeks ago, to come up with a nine-person board. He is expected to announce his final selection by April 5.
Lisa Haver and Deborah Grill
As promised, APPS researchers have completed the independent profiles of the first round of nominees chosen by the Education Nominating Panel. Mayor Kenney, in response to community protests about the possible conflicts of the nominees, and the dearth of educators on the first list, reconvened the Panel on Friday, March 16. APPS members Barbara Dowdall, Lynda Rubin and Lisa Haver testified, again decrying the lack of public deliberations and the ongoing violations of the PA Sunshine Act. The Panel voted to send eighteen more nominees to the Mayor. The Mayor has twenty days to choose nine of the forty-five submitted as his final choices.
We will be releasing our extended profiles on the additional candidates later this week.
Please review our first report, as important updates and links have been added.
Lisa Haver and Deb Grill
Click here to see the second installment of biographies
and APPS analysis of School Board nominees.
As APPS members and followers know, we have been fighting to open up the process for the selection of the new school board.
Mayor Kenney has taken control of the process, raising questions about how independent the Nominating Panel has been.
The Nominating Panel is a governmental body; its members are City officials. The Panel is obligated to follow all laws, including the PA Sunshine Act.
The Sunshine Act stipulates that citizens must be able to witness and have an opportunity to speak about actions taken by government officials, whether elected or appointed. Only two of the Panel’s meetings were held in public; all of the vetting of candidates was done behind closed doors.
The Mayor and the Nominating Panel, Chaired by former SRC Commissioner Wendell Pritchett, also ignored calls to release the applications. Thus, there was no way for the public to know who was being considered or to have anything to say about them. We believe that the public has a right to know who will be representing them as public officials. The school board will be overseeing a $3 billion budget and making decisions which will affect the future of our city and our schools.
What follows is the first installment of reports on the twenty-seven candidates chosen by the thirteen people on the Nominating Panel. The italicized paragraph is the official bio released by the Mayor’s office. What follows is what we were able to find by doing a basic Google/LinkdIn search. If you see any outdated or incorrect information, or you have additional information on any of the nominees, please contact us at philaapps@gmail.com.
Please follow our posts as we will be updating with information on other nominees.
–Lisa Haver and Deb Grill
This video is supporters of public education speaking before the School Board Nominating Committee on February 26, 2018.
Timestamps for speakers
Barbara Dowdall, APPS 0:00
Lisa Haver, APPS 2:25
Karel Kilimnik, APPS 4:17
Alan Foo, teacher 6:52
Diane Payne, APPS 9:20
Maureen DiStefano 11:20
Alliance for Philadelphia Public Schools 