A closer look at the alternative plan to reform Philly schools
by Bill Hangley, Jr.
Photo: Harvey Finkle
Philadelphia Federation of Teachers' secretary, Freda Sydnor-Joell, addresses the crowd outside the School District building on Dec. 13, the day the school closings plan was announced.
The report released Tuesday by the Philadelphia Coalition Advocating for Public Schools (PCAPS) is ambitious to say the least: it represents an attempt to push back vigorously against almost all of the current trends in city and state education policy.
The immediate villain as PCAPS sees it is the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), whose privately-funded collection of reform recommendations was unveiled with great fanfare by District officials last spring.
While the District has since distanced itself from some of BCG’s more controversial proposals, PCAPS’ report asks officials to effectively deep-six the entire BCG framework, which it calls “deeply flawed.”
But more broadly, the PCAPS report, funded by private donations and coalition members (which include the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers, the Philadelphia Student Union, the Philadelphia Home and School Council, and other labor and community organizing groups), calls on local leaders to push back hard against the education agenda of Governor Tom Corbett and his allies, who strongly support current funding levels and BCG-endorsed reforms like charter expansion.
Among the funding and policy trends PCAPS wants to see reversed:
- The District faces a five-year deficit of over a billion dollars; PCAPS calls for significant increases in per-pupil funding, putting the city on par with its surrounding suburban counties.
- The District has been laying off teachers and support staff and reducing
