“Blame the School District, Blame the School, and Blame the Teacher”
Notes from the Field
Submitted by Frank Murphy, on January 31, 2012
I started the new year cautiously optimistic about the future of education in our city and state. My hopeful spirit was quickly dashed. Shortly after I posted “To a Better School Year in 2012”, a wave of bad news washed over area schools. First the Archdiocese of Philadelphia announced plans to close forty-nine schools in the next school year. The Chester Upland School District, which is tottering on the verge of bankruptcy, scrambled to find additional monies in order to keep its schools open. And in Philadelphia, members of the School Reform Commission announced more bad news regarding the district’s budget. It was revealed that a $61 million budget gap still exists for this current school year. Even worse news was the possibility that a $269 million shortfall in next year’s budget could continue to hobble the district’s effort to provide educational services to the city’s public
