Marchers take their case to SRC
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| About 100 protesters found themselves temporarily locked out of the School District… (CHARLES FOX / Staff Photographer ) |
A shouting and chanting crowd of hundreds told officials Thursday night exactly what they thought of a Philadelphia School District plan to close 37 schools and change grades and shut programs at dozens more.
"SOS! Save our schools!" hundreds yelled as they marched up North Broad Street toward district headquarters. "Whose city? Our city! Whose schools? Our schools!"
It was a dramatic stand against the planned closings of one in six city schools, announced last week. Closings were not on the agenda of the School Reform Commission's voting meeting, but they quickly became the hot potato of the evening, with students, teachers, parents, and community members demanding answers.
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"How do you sleep?" parent Linda Crowder asked the SRC. "What were you thinking? Or are you thinking?"
No final decisions have been made on which schools will be shut, and the SRC is not scheduled to vote until March.
But new Superintendent William R. Hite Jr. has said that without large-scale closings, the district -