NEWS . The City Paper/YPP Project

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The City Paper/YPP Project


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Published: Apr 18, 2007

This is the fourth installment of a collaboration between City Paper and the local political blog Young Philly Politics . Over the past two years, YPP has become a place where politicians, activists and other present and future leaders go to discuss issues. In the run-up to the May 15 mayoral primary, we've asked YPPers to brainstorm solutions to some of the city's problems, which we'll publish here in consolidated column form. This week's topic is the school district, and your writer is Gaetano Paul Piccirilli, a YPP regular.

—Doron Taussig

Each of Philadelphia's mayoral candidates has declared that education will be a priority in his hypothetical administration. But the next mayor will have his work cut out for him keeping this promise.

Philadelphia's School District is controlled by the School Reform Commission (SRC), three of the five members of which are selected by the governor. Though the mayor appoints the other two, he will be a minority partner in choosing the CEO who succeeds the soon-to-depart Paul Vallas.

Because the next mayor will be constrained by this reality, I felt the appropriate questions to put to the Young Philly Politics community about education in the mayor's race were not about the many policy proposals the candidates are making but about the bigger, structural framework the winner will have to work with. To wit: What recommendations do you have regarding the future of the SRC, and should the city take back control of the School District?

"School-Community Connectivity"

YPPers believed the goal of Philly's school administration should be, as commenter Jeff Friedman put it, "School-Community Connectivity." "My main take is that what really, really doesn't work about the public school system in Philadelphia is that it's generally disconnected from the communities and the citizens [it] ostensibly serve[s]," Friedman wrote. He defined school-community connectivity as a mutual accountability that gives "a local community ownership of its school" and "compels [the school] to be more responsible to the community [it] serve[s]."

Response to this suggestion was positive. Commenter "D.E.II" pointed out that one criterion for "connectivity" is smaller schools, which could incorporate parents into the administrative structure, allowing them to assist with discipline and help schools develop "creative and relevant curriculum[s]." But what about at the administrative level? How can Philly foster connectivity between parents and the SRC?

An Elected School Board?

Fishtown neighborhood activist A.J. Thomson suggested that connectivity could be fostered by a publicly elected school board because the current system makes it too "easy for all involved to shuffle blame around." State Rep. Mark Cohen seconded this notion: "My sense is that elections for school board members create more involvement and awareness in educational matters than do non-elections." Several commenters cited other cities and even townships neighboring Philadelphia where elected school boards seem to stimulate public interest and provide parents with a voice in their children's education.

Friedman supported the idea, but added a caveat: The size of the voting districts must be small enough for the board members to be truly close to their communities. A district the size of a councilmanic district — roughly 150,000 people — would, perhaps, be too large.

Yet there was not wholesale support for an elected board. K.W. Parker argued that when it comes to doing so, theory and practice often diverge. "It breeds corruption, nepotism and cronyism; politicizes decisions that [are] based squarely on educational research and practice; and discounts teacher expertise," Parker wrote.

Overall, though, the idea of an elected local school board was greeted relatively warmly by the YPP community.

Back to Reality

None of the five Democratic mayoral candidates has proposed an elected school board, and perhaps it's a progressive fantasy. But the candidates are talking about the school district's structure.

Michael Nutter and Tom Knox want to bring the schools back under Philly's control. Chaka Fattah and Bob Brady want to balance out the SRC, allowing the mayor and governor to appoint three members each. And Dwight Evans, who helped orchestrate the state takeover, has consistently said he believes it should continue.

So, which of these formulas fosters the greatest connectivity? I can't speak for the YPP community on this point because the candidates' plans were not discussed in great detail. But it seems that the first condition for connectivity is proximity — for officials to be accessible to the people they serve. While the mayor-led school system that Nutter and Knox prefer does not guarantee this, it certainly comes closer than a remote governor (who at present hails from Philadelphia, but doesn't have to). If the city can't take the district back, then tweaking the SRC so that the mayor gets an equal say in its composition — as Fattah and Brady recommend — is preferable to no change at all.

Throughout the YPP thread, commenters emphasized the importance of things like additional funding, smaller schools and smaller class sizes, all of which are essential to successful schools, and all of which our mayoral candidates are promising. But, we shouldn't forget how hard it will be for the next mayor to deliver on these promises if the schools aren't accountable to him, and him, in turn, to us.

—Gaetano Paul Piccirilli