Commission asked to delay approving new charter schools
No new charter schools will open in Philadelphia if the School Reform Commission heeds the advice of its Office of Charter Schools.
No new charter schools will open in Philadelphia if the School Reform Commission heeds the advice of its Office of Charter Schools.
The commission yesterday was advised to put off approving the 15 charter school applications up for a vote next week.
With a looming budget crisis, a new chief executive, and explosive growth in charters in the last nine years, the district should take a new, more strategic approach, Cathy Balsley, the office's director, said at a commission meeting.
Balsley recommended that the district invite the 15 charter applicants - of which four applied this school year and 11 were deferred from 2006-07 - to apply to manage some of the 70 district schools that have repeatedly failed to meet state standards and must be restructured.
The would-be charter schools, plus outside providers who apply, could run the reconstructed schools as soon as the fall of 2009, Balsley suggested.
Should the charter applicants decline to apply to restructure existing public schools, they may go through the traditional charter application again starting this summer.
Balsley said her staff would work to expedite the process for approving charters and groups that might apply to run restructured schools.
There are 30,000 students in charter schools in the city. This fall, two new charters will open and some existing charters will add students, bringing the total to 32,200 students.
The city's traditional public schools educate 167,000 students.
Timothy Field, assistant director of the charter school office, said that a step back would help the district support existing charter schools.
"We've gone from zero to 61 in nine years," Field said, referring to the number of operating charter schools in the city. "We need additional infrastructure in place."
Sandra Dungee Glenn, commission chair, said she wanted feedback on the new strategy from the charters before the commission votes next week.
Commission member James Gallagher said he liked the idea of asking charter providers to restructure city public schools.
"This is the only vehicle that allows us to be innovative," said Gallagher, who emphasized the district was still keen on green-lighting charters.
He said there were likely to be 50,000 students in charter schools "in the near future. They are a wonderful complement to public schools."
The 15 would-be charters range from a high school for older students to a kindergarten-through-eighth-grade school emphasizing science and technology.
Among the applicants is Oxford Academy Charter School, which has been proposed by Brien N. Gardiner, the embattled founder of the Philadelphia Academy Charter School, the Northeast K-12 school that is the subject of two investigations.
Board members from the Arise Academy Charter School, an applicant from this school year, were dismayed by the news. They will lose grant money if their application is denied, they said.
"We need that charter now," said board member Tommy Davis, a clinical psychologist.
The school hopes to educate 200 Philadelphia youths currently in foster care.