The school district is proposing major changes to its schools that could dramatically impact neighborhoods in our city. District officials say this is all in an effort to address lower enrollment, dilapidated buildings, and overcrowded classrooms. But are the concerns of parents, students, and teachers being heard?
Carly Sitrin, bureau chief at Chalkbeat Philadelphia, sat down with City Cast Philly host Trenae Nuri to explain all the shifting parts of the school district's plan. This is a lightly edited excerpt from that conversation.
Last month, the school district came out with a tentative plan to close 20 [later amended to 18] of Philly's public schools by 2027. … This is all part of a larger plan that needs to be approved by the Philadelphia Board of Education. Can you give us an overview? How did we get here?
“This is a long time coming, and a long process to get to where we are today. … It’s reflective of what's been happening both in Philadelphia and across the country as well. The district has lost about 17,000 students over the last decade. So enrollment declines have really hit Philly public schools hard. A lot of that is due to a declining birth rate, but also the rise of charter schools and cyber charter schools in particular, and just an overall shift in the way that people are using and attending our public schools.
“And that means that we've got a lot of really old, big buildings that are half empty and cost a lot to maintain and upkeep. It also means that in some regions of the city — the Northeast, especially — there are classrooms that are bursting at the seams and schools that are not big enough to hold all of the students and give them the opportunities that they need. … District Superintendent Tony Watlington has been clear that to him this is a chance to sort of reorganize and reset. He's called it a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to sort of design the district that best fits the needs of the students that we currently have.”
What about teachers and education advocates? What have you heard from them?
“It's pretty resoundingly, 'No, don't close our schools.' It's pretty loud and clear on that front. … The Philadelphia Federation of Teachers union president, Arthur Steinberg, called the plan an abomination. He has said — and folks from the other unions have said — it's gonna force people to look elsewhere for jobs. It creates this feeling of instability that our schools could be ripped out from underneath us at any point. It's harder to sell working in the public school system in our city as a good and stable job. And the unions have said it's really gonna tank morale. ... [But] Watlington has said he doesn't anticipate people will be losing positions from this.”
It's not just the closures either, right? Because some of the schools are going to be merging and some of the schools are supposed to get upgrades. So there's no one that's excited for this?
“I'm sure there are folks who are excited about the modernizations. I'm sure there are aspects of this plan — things like, the Academy at Palumbo might get new bathrooms, I've covered the state of how awful their bathrooms are before — so there are aspects of this plan that people genuinely do need and do want. So I don't want to cast the whole thing as a big negative. But the closures themselves are sort of the big looming shadow over everything that is sucking up a lot of the air in the room. And people for very good reasons do not want them to take their schools away, do not want the district to close their schools.
“And so right now that is where a lot of this energy is. It's not so much looking forward to the changes that could benefit folks, as the superintendent has pointed out. But there's a lot of fears and concerns about what this is going to do to the community. [They say things like:] ‘I love my school. I love the community that we've built. It has meant a lot to myself, to my kids, to my family members. We've got generations of legacies here in Philadelphia.’ Folks do not want to go quietly into the night on this.”
🎧 This is an excerpt from a conversation with Sitrin. Listen to the full episode on City Cast Philly.
