Pa. bill would expand overhaul of schools | Philadelphia Inquirer | 02/08/2010

Pa. bill would expand overhaul of schools | Philadelphia Inquirer | 02/08/2010:



Low-achieving schools could be turned into charter schools or handed over to outside management. Underperforming charters could be closed. Elected boards would be replaced by appointed ones in failing districts.


Hundreds of Pennsylvania's public schools could be affected by these measures if legislation introduced last month by State Sen. Jeffrey E. Piccola (R., Dauphin) is enacted.


Piccola's Education Empowerment Act is the latest legislative attempt to improve low-scoring schools. It would replace a more limited law of the same name that expires in June.
The legislation is part of new efforts to recalibrate how states and districts overhaul struggling schools. It would not apply to the Philadelphia district or its charter schools because a 2001 state-takeover law gave the city's School Reform Commission similar powers.


The current empowerment act, an early effort at identifying the most academically and financially distressed schools and putting the worst under state control, provides extra funding to the most troubled districts. Piccola's proposal would not do that, but would focus on giving local boards more power to change how schools operate.


"We have assessments and curriculum and data systems in place. Now we need to apply these new tools to districts that are struggling," said Piccola, chairman of the Senate Education Committee. "The opportunity to get something significant accomplished is at hand."
There's no timetable for when his proposal might get to a vote, but hearings in the Republican-controlled state Senate are already under way. While the bill has drawn criticism from the state school boards association and the largest teachers union, all sides say they are hopeful an accommodation can be reached. James Roebuck (D., Phila.), chairman of the House Education Committee, said he might introduce his own version of the bill.


Piccola said much of his proposal builds on academic gains in Philadelphia during the last decade, which he attributed to opening dozens of charters and turning schools over to education-management organizations.


But Timothy Allwein, assistant executive director of the Pennsylvania School Boards Association, said, "I don't think you will find a whole lot of research that turning a school into a charter or turning it over to a management company has led to a lot of progress."


Several studies say children in Philadelphia charters and schools run by management groups scored no better on tests than those in district-run schools. Supporters contend that charters and management companies often work with the lowest-performing children and have helped them make big gains.


Jim Testerman, president of the Pennsylvania State Education Association, the state's largest teachers union, also has problems with Piccola's proposal.