If a student that's going to "JFK Public School" is leaving and going to "Roosevelt Charter School," same kid.
You're educating them at a certain cost here with debt service and with administrative costs and other costs on top, but that child moved from here to there. It's not a new kid in the system, it's not a kid that moved from Pittsburgh, or it's not a kid that came from the parochial schools. One-third, 30 percent of 266 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 those kids in that cohort of charter school kids who are from outside represent new costs. But in my mind -- and it may be that I just don't understand the system well enough -- that kid, John Smith, moving from that school to that school is still the same kid in the same public system.
You're absolutely right. And let me just respond to that because, again, this is the frustration that all school boards around the State are having with charter schools. Ultimately -- I mean, what would make a lot of sense is to say when that child leaves and takes the 5, $6,000, or whatever the amount is -- it varies by district -- and goes to the charter school, that the district would realize some savings. Well, number one, they weren't funded by the state because that student was there in the first place. That dollar amount that leaves with that student is a real loss in the district's budget. I mean, that's a budget expenditure. But the point is that the district's operating costs do not drop by that amount. And so most of those fixed overhead costs that districts are dealing 267 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 with remain the same. And here we run into the state law that affects school districts in terms of being able to furlough staff. It's a very restrictive law. So until you have some substantial decline in enrollment in certain areas that you can say, We can now lay off teachers -- and that's where 9 most of our budget is, as it is for a lot of 10 agencies, it's in staff and personnel costs -- 11 districts' operating costs really don't drop, but 12 that money is leaving the system as kids go to 13 charter schools. And they're entitled to it, 14 that's the way the law works. We're not objecting 15 to that, it's just that there's no savings to the 16 district's budget. 17
Well, they budget 18 some savings, according to the testimony. 19
There's some savings. 20 I'm talking about a net expenditure, I'm sorry. Right. So the --
But the differential to me is what's astounding, and that's why I have a hard time understanding where it comes about. If on one hand you're budgeting 268 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 $10 million in savings relative to the students leaving, some incremental savings, but on the other hand, you're claiming that there's a 60 or a $65 million loss as a result of those kids leaving that system, to me, those numbers don't seem to add up. It's a wide variance, and it's hard to explain that variance.
Well, Councilman, I can tell you that based on our experience not only working with Philadelphia but with all of the other districts in the state that have had charter schools, they've all had a similar experience. Now, the dollar amounts are obviously much different than the other districts, but they are all experiencing this very same phenomenon. There may be some marginal cost savings as some students transfer to a charter school, but that -- the reality of that formula in the law, which dictates how much money follows each students, is costing a number of school districts a great deal of money and proportionately, a significant budget impact, as you're experiencing here in Philadelphia.
Please. 269 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131
Wasn't there once a State formula that did depend on the number of students?
And didn't the State then put a cap on the amount of money that it would pay so that the distorts the amount per pupil?
That's exactly right; you hit the nail right on the head. We had a funding system at one time that was based on the district's wealth, or it's ability to raise revenue -- "the aid ratio," it's called -- the number of students in the district, and a reimbursable amount per student. So every time a new student would arrive in your school district, you got a new amount of money. And I was thinking earlier during this hearing how much different this discussion would be right now if that kind of funding system was still in place, because you would get money as students arrived and you would be paying money out as students leave. The budget impact would not be nearly the same under that kind of a system as 270 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 under the system that we have right now, which is essentially a fixed pot of money that the School District of Philadelphia receives increased slightly each year, but it's not being reimbursed based on the actual number of students.
The other budget issues here deal with the line item expenditures for school districts and the overall cost, but let me move off of that and talk about just a couple of other issues very briefly. There have been that we have seen across the State a number of problems with school districts and their working relationship with charter schools. And by the way, our association has had a very good working relationship with a number of charter operators, including John Skief and others that we've gotten to know over the years, but there is some fundamental problems here, too, in the law itself. School districts are in the position of reviewing and approving charter applications, of having to monitor their performance, and yet it's very difficult oftentimes for school districts to 271 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 have access to the information they need to be able to do that. One of the first problems that often arises, and I've heard it alluded to several times here today, is the application process. Somebody comes before the school board and says, I want to create a charter school. The school district has, we would argue, a fiduciary responsibility on behalf of the taxpayers of the district to ask some difficult questions in the sense of making sure that that applicant is, in fact, prepared to start and operate a charter school. And a lot of districts have taken this role very, very seriously. Now, I understand there's a debate about, you know, which questions are fair questions to ask. But ultimately what we do know is that if a charter fails to succeed, the district is left to pick up the pieces. The district bring those students back, they have to meet them where they are, and sometimes provide remediation. So districts, we think, need to be able to ask those kinds of questions up front. Once charters are approved, we've seen 272 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 around the State a number of difficulties that districts have had getting necessary information from some charter operators -- certainly not all, and there's some terrific success stories out there as well. But some of these reports have been late, some of them have been inaccurate, and it's made it very difficult for districts to monitor the performance of charter schools. We've even seen -- and you are another example of this -- where districts are impacted by charter schools that are created in other places. In a district next to this one, where a charter school was approved by a neighboring school district, it pulled students out of the Philadelphia School District, and your school board had no authority to review that application, no advance notice that it was being considered, but there certainly was a significant budget impact. That is happening in a variety of ways across the State. " There was one passing reference to it a little 273 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 while ago. These are charter schools that are being created entirely over the Internet. These are students who are spending all of their time at home in front of a computer, getting their instruction. The example I gave just a moment ago about the school in Bucks County that opened and drew students out of Philadelphia without any prior notice in effect now is happening all across the State, because we have a cyber school -- one, for example, created by a little district out near Pittsburgh that is now enrolling students from all over Pennsylvania. And those other districts have no advance notice of that. They're receiving the bills in the mail and they don't have any authority to review or pass any kind of judgment on that charter school. So I think what we're going to see is a legislature taking some kind of action not only on the cyber school question, but on the charter schools generally. I thought the testimony from Representative Evans's office was very well done, but I would take some minor exception to the one 274 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES.
010131 comment about the moratorium bill. That is drawing broad bipartisan support in the State legislature because many legislators are concerned about all of these issues that you've been talking about today, and the sense is that maybe we ought to just catch our breaths and take a look at the impact the charter schools are having across the State.
The moratorium bill, in my opinion, would be the additional assistance that families need to move outside the City. While we're catching our breath to see what the effects of charter schools are, those parents are not waiting for us to figure out what's going on; they're going to make a decision to bolt Philadelphia. So in the overall scheme of Philadelphia's economics, the School District included, the loss of those families represent a long-term future detriment to this city like none other, including the condition of the public schools. And the same issue goes with Mosaica (ph.) because my argument -- and I may be wrong, 275 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 but from my perspective, those students that were drawn from Philadelphia into Bucks County to go to school means that those parents most likely will stay living in Northeast Philadelphia or wherever else they're from -- I would assume most of them are from the Northeast -- because not given that option, that option that most of them have been taking over the past 15, 10, 20, years is to 10 pick up their families, sell their houses, and 11 move to Bucks, Montgomery, Chester, and Delaware 12 County, where they can find a school system that 13 they believe supports their needs. 14 So on one hand, I don't dismiss the 15 arguments of the School District and the concerns 16 that they face from their own immediate 17 perspective, but in the larger view of the world 18 of Philadelphia, these lack of options have 19 created a situation where we've lost half a 20 million people in the last 30 years, 25 years. 21 And we continue to lose people at a rate higher 22 than any other major city in the country. If you 23 look at other major cities over the last census 24 period, Chicago, New York, Boston, Los Angeles, 25 Houston, Miami, Phoenix, Arizona, San Antonio, 276 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 Texas, have all gained -- just us and Detroit are the only two major cities in the country that have lost significant amounts of population. And it's not just the schools; there is taxes and crime and other issues. But I think for every time we constrain a family from making a choice, okay, and the government decides that we're going to force you into this square peg in this round hole, they rebel and leave. And that long-term loss of wage taxes, of sales taxes, of buying power, of community involvement, of all the things they bring as good, solid working-class families, are lost to the suburbs forever, and our tax base gets increasingly smaller, our needs-based people get increasingly larger, and the City becomes a life boat with a hundred seats that we're trying to fit 300 people in. And in the, end it's going to be over.
Councilman, if I may just say, I appreciate what you're saying. And as a matter of fact, we believe strongly -- and I want to make sure I emphasize this -- that charter schools are a very important component of school 277 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 reform; we support the effort. One of the things that's particularly important for us all to understand, and I think the reason legislators are talking about this and not just about the moratorium question, I had a meeting recently with a couple of national education groups, and we were talking about charter schools, and they made a very insightful comment. They said, Well, Tom, you know, Pennsylvania is one of the few, if not the only, states where state government is not directly helping to underwrite the cost of charter schools. And I think what legislators are finally starting to say is, this is a worthy experiment, and we need to pursue it, but we need to look at some of these funding issues 'cause they're very real. We need to find a way to enable districts to encourage the formation of charter schools without driving themselves into the ground financially. And I think that is probably where the common ground is, and we're hopeful that that's going to happen.
Mr. Chairman? 278 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131
And isn't there a problem is having a decision made by a school board from whatever part of the State that feels it's losing money if the charter is granted? I have difficulty in believing that there wouldn't be some impact on their decision based upon the -- what they feel is a wrongful impact on their finances. So I'm not sure that the role -- that the appropriate role is to give the school district that's threatened with the loss of the students and the loss of the income the decision-making power to decide whether a charter should be granted or not. Has there been any consideration of that factor?
There certainly was. There was a lengthy debate in the legislature about who the chartering agents should be, who should be authorized to grant a charter. We felt -- I'll be honest about this. We felt and the vast majority of the legislature felt that it should be a local school board because some elected official -- and, of course, 279 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 Philadelphia's an appointed board, but in the other 500 school districts in the State, elected school boards who would be accountable for the expenditure of those funds, you're committing public tax dollars to support an operation -- in this case, charter schools -- and the argument the legislature made was, we want some elected official at the local level, somebody who can be held accountable. Now, there are other states that have different models. You go to Michigan or Arizona or some other places, you can go to a museum or a university, and they can grant charters. But remember, the other differences is in a lot of those other states, state government helps to pay for those charters; in some cases, they pay for all of it. In Pennsylvania, the state government pays for none of it. And so as long as --
I think you've hit the key to the whole question right there.
Oh, it absolutely is. Yeah, you know, I think I agree with you. If state government were to pay a substantial cost of charter school -- that's another one of the bills 280 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 that's being given some very serious consideration in the legislature -- then I think that dynamic could change dramatically, and then we could look at other chartering mechanisms.
Well, I just want to close by saying publicly that we have, at the state level, benefitted enormously from the experience here in Philadelphia. I want to commend to you the work that the School District has done, not only with us but with the legislature in a very constructive way to talk about some of these issues. And I thank you for the opportunity to come down today.
My name is Melanie Reiser. I am the Executive Director of the Charter School Resource Center.
Please proceed. 281 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131
I want to thank you, Councilman Kenney, for extending us the opportunity to speak about charter schools in Philadelphia. I have attached a brief description of our organization to our submitted testimony, but since this is the first time we have been in front of your body, I'd like to say that we are a nonprofit corporation that's dedicated to the support and development of the charter schools in the Commonwealth. Today, we were asked to address various possibilities for amending the charter school law, but it may be more to the point to discuss what can and cannot be done here in Philadelphia under the law as it stands. What is not permitted is consideration of money, of politics, or of hidden standards; what is permitted is rational public policy. Obviously, the School District is under enormous financial pressure, and there's an effort to avoid anything that adds to the liability side of the ledger. But you can't solve the financial problem by keeping out or driving out children 282 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 entitled to an education, whether they come from home schooling, from religious schools, or from conventional public schools. Equally obvious is the political pressure including from those who Philadelphia Secretary of Education Debra Kahn has characterized as the School District's existing partners and supporters. The District is understandably anxious to avoid conflict with those people but cannot do so in violation of the rights granted by the law. There are several things that can be done, beginning tomorrow morning. First, the charter school law allows for the local school districts to add criteria for the application and evaluation. The Philadelphia School District is currently losing money on charter schools. The theory behind charter schools is that local school districts should not incur additional costs because money should simply be transferred on a per-pupil basis from the public school to the charter school. Resources are merely shifted. But as Secretary Kahn has testified before, this is not the case in Philadelphia, 283 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 because the only way a school district can reduce its costs is if a critical mass of students come from the same grade level at the same school. But the School District can, and should, develop a strategic plan to ensure that critical mass. The School District can determine a target area for charter school development and add to the application criteria that all applicants in a given year must serve that area. That way, students transferring to the charter schools will be in a concentrated area, allowing the District to shut down some of the schools if necessary and avoid additional costs. Second, the School District can support Mayor John Street's plan to use charter schools to retain the City's constantly shrinking middle-class base. Just as competitive preference is extended to applications that serve under-performing or overcrowded public school areas, the same competition -- preference can be extended to applications that exhibit a middle-class marketing plan or state that they are going to locate in an area that is losing its middle-class base. 284 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 The potential for charter schools to improve Philadelphia's neighborhoods is vast, and the physical impact on the traditional public schools is minimal provided that the School District devises a plan for using the charter schools and ads application criteria to ensure that the charter school applicants meet the provision of this plan. This addition of application criteria is allowed within the parameters of the charter school law, it can be done without having to jump through hoops in Harrisburg, and it can go far to alleviate the financial burden that the School District is currently facing with charter schools.
Finally, the School District can also use charter schools as a means of increasing the revenue flow without requiring any changes to the charter school law. The District can be the provider of capital funding and/or become the landlord for charters and realize a profit for doing so. There is no existing capital funding source for charters, and that has seriously hampered their effectiveness. The District can borrow at tax-exempt rates and renovate or finance 285 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 the renovations that charter schools need. And when charters are revoked or not renewed, the assets revert to the District anyway. Also, charters are obligated to go into the marketplace for support services for things like special education and health and so on. The District, if it were willing to do so, could become a competitive provider of such services, and those fees would be a much needed revenue source. Beyond the application process and the changes that can be made without any legislative action, another topic that should be discussed is the way in which charter schools are evaluated. The true impact of a charter school is not how a charter school student fares among the entire school population but how a charter school student's own level of academic achievement improves as a result of the non-traditional education. Thus, we must add developmental tests that measure student improvement to the PSSA, which is currently where most of the charter school performance data is being drawn from. Also, charter schools are unique in 286 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 that their mission often combine academic standards and a special focus, such as entrepreneurship or performing arts. Charter schools need to make sure that their schools are evaluated in a manner that reflects the specialized nature of their missions in addition to test scores. Remember that charter school are not traditional public schools; they embody innovation. Thus, we need to be innovative in our evaluative standards. If parents are satisfied and the waiting lists speak to that satisfaction, isn't the charter school successful? If the charter school is safe and allows students an environment conducive to learning, isn't that school serving a need? What the Western Michigan University report has indicated is that the charter school initiative is simply too new for us to make concrete evaluative conclusions. Therefore, any movement to put a halt to the charter school experiment is premature. So there should be no 24 moratorium on new charter school applications. Either a formal one in Harrisburg, like the one 287 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 that Commonwealth Representative Boyce has proposed or an informal one in Philadelphia akin to the one we witnessed in this last application process. It would with wonderful if the charter school movement had produced undeniable positive results immediately out of the gate, but instant gratification is hard to come by in an education process. The Philadelphia School District is still trying to work out kinks, so we must allow a similar learning curve for our charter schools. I'd like to conclude by saying that the results of the 2001-2002 application process were disappointing. It constituted a giant step backwards for Philadelphia's charters schools and a great blow to the increasing number of families that are seeking educational alternatives for their children. I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you today and I hope that the Council will help shape our public policy in Philadelphia that fosters the broadest possible range of educational options for our children. Thank you. 288 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131
I'm pausing because I'm troubled by the entire discussion. It seems to me that we're ruling out as impact on what happens to a child in school. There's so many other factors that have such influence, and we're talking as if the only thing that is involved in the education of a child is the school experience, when we don't talk about the poverty that many Philadelphia kids live in, the fact that the goals which we say motivate most people in schools, somehow we eliminate the question of goals and say we daren't talk about the fact that there are no 18 job opportunities or very limited job opportunities for most of the students in the minority areas of the City. We don't talk about the fact that the home circumstances are often such that they don't help the child, often hurt the child. We don't talk about -- we think we're bold here when we talk about school tokens and say it's wrong for kids to have to stay home because 289 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 there's no money in the family to pay for the kids to go to school, and we say, ooh, isn't that terrible. And then we fail in a thousand different ways. We continue to fail to even address that one aspect of the problem. Aren't we -- I guess I'm raising this question. Aren't we demanding of the schools impossible achievements? How do you overcome all of the impediments that exist to fair and equitable education for all children unless you deal with all of the other factors. We act as if the only thing that will help educate or not educate a child is what happens in the school, but is that a fair test? I raise that question because I'm getting increasingly disturbed. I don't hear anybody indicate that maybe one of the factors that causes kids in certain neighborhoods not to be interested in school is because the model of employment is the drug dealer, and that would not seem to require school education. And there's so much unemployment. When the statistics come out the unemployment in the minority community is much higher than in the overall population. We know 290 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 how bad the housing is in areas, you know, where income is low. Is it fair, I guess I'm raising, to expect the schools to be able to achieve a quality of education in such a background? And why aren't we also talking about these other issues? Why is the discussion so limited to just what happens in the classroom, as if that's the only thing that impacts on the ability of a child to be educated. In my judgment, sure, the schools are important as a factor, but I don't think it's the only factors that results in the education of the child. Mr. Gentzel, I would ask of you -- you identified yourself as, you know, working in a statewide area in this. Has your group given any thought to that?
Just for one issue of clarity -- and while I don't disagree with you and will certainly await his answer, the scope of the hearing was the discussion between the issues of charter schools and public schools in the process of application and denial. It was very narrowly focused, but certainly that type of 291 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 discussion is germane to it, but it was, so you understand, the resolution was one of a very narrow focus.
Well, I agree completely that there are a lot of variables that affect a student's performance and the ability of a district to react. But let me answer the question quickly in the context of the charter school discussion, which is where you wanted to focus on. We need to look at some of those other factors in terms of how charter schools impact districts because we have some districts that -- one that's on the empowerment list -- actually, there are a couple that are on the empowerment list at the State level that are dealing with very significant budget problems right now and are getting hit with charter applications because of the current funding mechanism that is having dramatic impact on that district's ability to even provide a basic education for students in traditional public schools. So all of those things are important, 292 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 but they do have an effect on the discussion here today as well directly, charter schools.
But I also think a lot of charter school popularity, again as testified today, that there are as many people on the waiting list as there are in some of these individual charter schools, is the total lack of confidence that parents of all economic backgrounds have in the ability of the public school to deliver an education to them, to their kids. And, again, this has been an institution has that's had a monopoly, an absolute monopoly on government educational financing for the past 40, 50 years. I mean, and all of sudden now, well, you know, that there's a competitive force there, it's Well, we don't really want to compete because it's not a fair competition, but something created this need and desire for the competition, and that was the inability or the way in which educational services are being provided through the public schools. I mean, there are people who have just rejected that finally and I think what the charter 293 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 schools do for Philadelphia is that the real response that people who are upset with the educational system have had over the past years 5 or so has been to leave. 6 If this in some way even, if we work 7 out the kinks and work out the issue of funding 8 and expense, if it at least allows them the 9 opportunity to stay here, it's going to serve 10 those poor and needy areas of the City much better 11 than having lost that economic tax base that we're 12 continuing to degrade because of this issue of 13 school choice. 14 I mean, I can understand public school 15 professionals being upset about this particular 16 happenstance that's going on since 1997. But in 17 some ways, there was a total monopoly for all that 18 time. Nobody ever questioned or thought of any 19 other way of doing it, and they still weren't 20 doing it up to the satisfaction of people who, obviously, are now flocking to these charter schools because they feel that it's the only opportunity they have to get a good education for their kids. I mean, they really had no monopoly. The only competition was, people paid private 294 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 money to go to parochial schools, as I am a product of or, or they went to private schools. But for many, many, many years, federal state, and local dollars all went to one group to provide educational resources for our kids and now parents are saying, We don't want that anymore. I mean, it's not like we made them do it. They're voting with their feet and they're voting by flocking to charter schools, that they want an option, that they're not happen with what's going on in public school education in the past 40 years.
Councilman, I respect your position and I agree with you. To the extent that I think charters schools have injected an element in the public school system, I think, is likely to remain, which is some form of choice. I just want to make sure that it's clear on the record that what we've seen in Philadelphia, we've also seen around the State, which is, these local school boards, and for the reasons -- you might argue intuitively that no 24 school board in this state -- given the funding situation that we have and the way this law is 295 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 structured, no school board in this state would ever have granted a charter. Why would they ever do that? And yet, we have 35 of them here in Philadelphia, we have over 70 of them statewide, most of them granted by school boards. So I would say to you that --
But in fairness to that particular position, if you look at the ones that have been approved, for the most part, they've had, for want of a better term, "political juice" that has gone along with them, that they didn't want to offend anybody who had other decisions to make on other levels of government. So, I mean, when a Dwight Evans or a Vince Fumo or this or that guy decides that they're going to start a charter school, the board may be less likely to say no because they got to deal with them down the road on other issues. So a lot of the successful charter schools -- thank God too. I mean, I don't think that's a bad thing, but a lot of those decisions were made also based on the fact of who were the people promoting them, because the School Board and the City didn't want to wind up at odds with powerful people who 296 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 could hurt them down the road on other areas. So there's an element of that in there too, and I think there may have been an element of that in the last go-around of approvals, frankly, for the last three that were approved. I mean, there was certainly a lot of political juice in those three applications that were approved and the other denied. So that's part of what 10 brought about this hearing in the first place. 11
Well, I might be dumb but 12 I'm not stupid. I won't try to debate what 13 happens in Philadelphia since I don't propose to 14 know that, but I think the reality is, and I guess 15 the point I want to make is that there are a lot 16 of school officials around the State and I think 17 some who were sitting at this table earlier from 18 the School District who I think genuinely support 19 the concept of charter schools. 20 And we're trying to find a way to make 21 that work in the school system. There may be some 22 within our organization that don't like this concept at all, but they clearly are in the minority, and we'd like to try to find a constructive solution. 297 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131
Thank you. Thank you very much. Do you have anything else?
Yeah. I wanted to respond to the Councilman's comments about job opportunities and students who simply don't want to learn. I think that the charter schools are making great strides in these other areas beyond just the classroom. I had the opportunity last week to go out and look at the Charter High School of Architecture and Design. And that's a school that serves students who, in a traditional school, might be deemed the ones who don't want to learn 'cause they think differently. They are the creative types who learn visually. And now they are in a school that, after having a rocky start when they opened, is a very hands-on learning environment that has an extensive mentoring problem. Students are involved with watching their construction and design process of Kimmel, they are taking a college-level course at the University of Pennsylvania in city planning, which is opening up 298 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 the possibility that, you know, I might have it within me to go to college. They are mentoring top designers in furniture design, top architects, at the fabric workshop. Charter schools give -- serve the specialized the population, the students who don't necessarily learn well in the other schools and show them those opportunities. There's a student, Antonio, who was made fun of in his public school because he was a creative type, he danced after school. And when (indiscernible) went recruiting for students, they -- he immediately signed up midway through his sophomore year to get out of a somewhat violent school and come into a place where his creativity would be celebrated. He took a summer program at Lehigh University in industrial design, and he's now looking at colleges, preparing his college portfolio because he wants to go into furniture design. And as long as we can come up with a way to solve the financial disincentive that the School District has on charter schools, whether it be by coming up with more of a strategy rather than just scattering charter schools throughout 299 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 the City, but concentrating in areas and then moving on to a new area once we've stabilized and gotten over the feeling that we have to have all of the public schools running in addition to all of the charter schools.
Is that kind of what has been discussed lately through Mr. Gamble and Representative Evans as far as looking at cluster or a region together from a charter standpoint?
Yes, right. And it leads into what you were saying about, like, holding on to this tradition of public schools and not wanting to close them down. And it is sad when you lose any part of your city's history, but if the public schools aren't necessarily working and we can come up with a way to concentrate the charter schools in a given area and close down a school or two if necessary to -- what's going on right now is that charter school students are coming like a few students from each classroom, and the reason why the School District is losing money is because they aren't cutting down their overhead costs. 300 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 They can't get rid of teacher because they've lost two students. But if they lose a grade level to a charter school that's in that area, then we can start making some real make real cutbacks. And that's how the tradeoff is minimized.
My name's Jennifer Lowman and I'm a staff attorney with the Education Law Center here in Philadelphia. I appreciate the patience of Council.
I appreciate the opportunity to testify in front of Council this afternoon. The Education Law Center is a not-for-profit public-interest law firm that has been located in Philadelphia for the past 22 years, and we represent children and families, 23 including many families in Philadelphia, on issues 24 involving public education. Our mission is to 25 ensure that all children in Pennsylvania have 301 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 access to a quality public education. And a good deal of our work resolves around operating an intake system through which we provide free legal advice to probably close to 6,000 people a year now. We believe that we have a unique perspective on the effectiveness of some of Philadelphia's charter schools because of those calls and those people that we represent through our intake system. I can probably say in all fairness that I have either spoken to or talked to everyone who's on every side of the charter school issue, because our mission is to make sure that all kids have access to quality public education. So we don't have a stand on whether or not we think charter schools are good, bad, or indifferent as far as an educational reform strategy. We want to make sure that if they're out there as public schools, all kids -- and I mean all kids -- get an opportunity to take advantage of those schools.
Some charter schools, one that has been mentioned here today actually, has -- in its admissions application, they ask specifically, Do you have a child who has an individualized education program? That means they're asking, Do you have a child who's in special ed.? and that's on the admissions form. That's not a legal question. And what we have been hearing from people is that certain charter schools are basically selecting people out. For example, Harambee says that if you don't take our four-hour parent orientation, you can't even apply to our school. That's not a legal application criteria.
It may not be a legal application criteria. What is your personal opinion on the requirement that Harambee would like to have their parents engage forcibly if necessary in what's good for their kids?
But you want to try 303 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 to stop it.
No, I want to make sure that it's not used as a mechanism to keep out certain kids who might be difficult for charter schools to serve. Because what we have been experiencing is, we've been getting a lot of phone calls -- and I'm telling you, I'm up to my neck in phone calls from parents in charter schools.
Special education is one of them; that's the biggest issue. They say, I go to the charter school, I go to enroll, and I hand them my child's special education documents. A year and a half later, my child has still not been provided with special ed. services in this charter school. I'm not saying shut down charter schools, that's not my message. Our message at the center is that City Council and the Board has to look very carefully at these charter schools that are already in 304 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 existence and the charter schools that are going to apply because those charter schools are not exempt from federal special-education law, they are not exempt from state law that requires schools to take certain procedures before they kick kids out. The other kinds of calls that we get a lot are -- let me just give you an example, 'cause I talked to the charter school operator about this one because I couldn't believe the parent was telling me the truth. We received a phone call from a parent who was told that the charter school that withdrawn her already-enrolled child who had been there for almost a year and had returned the child to their neighborhood public school because no one at the charter school liked their child, and they were glad to see them go. I called the charter-school operator, and she confirmed that yes, indeed, she was very happy that this child was gone. I said, did you provide him with any kind of expulsion proceeding? What did he do for you to remove him? Well, he was annoying, nobody liked him, he was complaining and whined. I mean, these are the 305 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 kinds of calls that we get. Charter schools, I don't think, have an understanding -- or some charter schools don't have an understanding that they have to take and serve all kids.
How many complaints have you received in that regard out of the 6,000 people you serve?
From just Philadelphia, 'cause remember, we're statewide too.
Yeah, Philadelphia charter school complaints about special ed. and discipline.
Out of 14,000 students that are involved in the system?
It's a lot because these are particularly egregious cases. They are cases where kids are just told, Leave, we don't want you here anymore. There are certain charter schools, I will tell you, that are repeat offenders, if you will. And that's why I'm saying that we support efforts, honestly, for the board -- and it's not unprecedented for school boards to take 306 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 close looks at charter-school applicants. In fact, what I've attached to testimony are quality indicators for reviewing charter-school applications that the Charter School Project, actually, at Duquesne University has developed that has been used by the Pittsburgh School Board, which, I think, is a good idea because it's out in the open, actually, and it's not hidden as to what school boards are going to look at when they're going to review charter schools, 'cause I do think it's fair to charter-school applicants; they have to know what it is they're being expected to provide. And I think one of the things is that -- the reason I'm saying this is we get -- those 250 are some of the oddest -- I mean, believe me, we sue the School District of Philadelphia. That's one of the reasons -- you know, that's one of the things I do sort of on a regular basis.
We sue the School District of Philadelphia a lot on special-education issues. You know, it's not that I'm here, you 307 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 know, to necessarily support everything Philadelphia does or the Board does. But I guess my ultimate point is that operating a charter school is not like operating a produce stand. You have got kids' lives at stake, and you better be darn sure that your principal or your chief administrative officer isn't going to disappear on you, 'cause I think we should expect more, quite honestly, from charter schools, I think we should expect more.
Well, I think we should expect more from public schools.
When kids are raped in the classroom or the hallway or there's violence constantly in the hall and in the classroom, when teachers are assaulted, when staff are assaulted. Have there been lawsuits that you've filed against the School District to make the classrooms of Philadelphia's public schools safe?
Because, I mean, 308 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 there's -- a lot of what goes on -- a lot of why people are fleeing is because of the inability of the School District to discipline, to remove, to segregate kids who are causing trouble within the school system primarily because of a lot of federal case law that basically ties their hands.
How would you feel if your child was in a classroom with a child who -- in the public school system who is physically abusive, continually disruptive, was wrecking the environment for learning, and there was nothing that the district could do to remove that kid because they can't be removed? I mean, what do we tell the parents of those students who are in that classroom who want to learn? Basically just put up with it?
We get calls from both parents, okay, and let me tell you what --
Has ELC sued the school system over the lack of ability to maintain discipline and order in the schools?
What we've sued the School 309 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 District over is their lack of ability to provide appropriate services, because a lot of times, those disciplinary problems are caused by kids who are in 9th grade, for example, who are sitting there and can't read. So what they start to do is, they --
They start kicking the kid in front of them, then they start acting out, because if you're a 9th-grader and you can't read, what impetus do you have to sit there and participate in class, quite honestly?
Well, that may be one kid out of 33. How about the other 32? Do they have rights to have a decent classroom?
Well, that's my point. It's access to a good level of education. However, we'll allow one or two to disrupt the educational opportunities for all.
But it's all kids, and I think what we're seeing with all schools -- and 310 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 there is this zero tolerance, that we need to get them out.
Well, your belief of what zero tolerance is and mine must be completely different, because moving one kid from one school to another without telling the school what that kid did or what that kid's problems are and putting him right back into another environment so they can be as disruptive in that school as they were in the one they just left to me is not serving that kid, nor the population that that kid comes in contact with.
I think the difficult thing is that there are lots more kids nowadays who are difficult to serve. You know, look, let me tell you.
We used to call them delinquent; now they're difficult to serve. I understand.
Delinquent. Okay, they're a pain in the ass, I'll say it. 311 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 (Unintelligible, parties talking over each other.)
I went to a public school in Pennsylvania. I don't know if you ever had this experience but I sat in a public school cafeteria with a thousand kids and had some kids come up behind me and slap me behind the head, so you can't tell me that I don't know what it's like, okay?
No, I don't disagree with you there. I'm saying what you used to be able to do to that delinquent and what you can do now is, a lot of it's based on the inability of the school district to respond in an appropriate because of case law on the federal level that's kept them from responding.
And my point is that that case law is in there for a good reason, because before we had federal special ed. law, for example, the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act -- and I'm talking --
Could we distinguish -- see, part of the problem with the 312 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 special ed. issue is that -- and I'm, again, not a professional educator, nor am I an advocate or an attorney. But special ed., when I was growing up, were kids problems that had problems reading, hearing, walking, speaking, seeing. They were not necessarily who decided they like to beat people up every day. So in many ways, special ed. kids are more now than they used to be. They used to thugs, now they're special education students. And the difference is that the thugs used to go to Slayton Farms and to Delaware County to Glen Mills and those places where the staff there dealt with them in a physical way. Now I have a teacher who's in a classroom for 14, 15 years, or maybe even or years, who has no ability to do anything to that kid other than to put up with what they do.
And that's our point, this is our point. And one of the things that we've been working for is more equitable financing for all school systems because the reality, I think, as Councilman Cohen said, was that you're getting kids who come from backgrounds that you never got 313 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 kids who come from. You know, the entire family is drug-addicted, they've been living in poverty for many, many years, they've been living in conditions that you and I could never imagine, they've been moving around every other week, living with relatives or friends or, you know, people -- things we could never even begin to imagine their life has been like. So they bring those problems with them to the public school system, and the school system, whether they like it or not, is going to have to deal with the reality of the fact that they've got to somehow address these kids, because we can put 'em in Slayton Farms, we can build more prisons or --
Not prisons. Glen Mills is a beautiful -- I'll tell you what, I've been to Glen Mills and I'd like to go to school at Glen Mills. I wish my school looked like Glen Mills. It's like going to the University of North Carolina.
But my point is that you can either kick them out, you can put them in alternative education settings or you can hand 314 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 them over to the delinquency system or you can try to work with the kids.
Or you can leave them in the classroom where they disrupt everybody's education.
And I'm not saying that's necessarily the best thing to do, but my point is that these charter schools do not -- they see themselves as private schools, a lot of these charter schools, and they're not; they're public schools. And, you know, I am the prototypical middle-class person that you are hoping will stay, continue to be a resident and work in Philadelphia.
Okay. Do you have children, if you don't mind my asking?
No, I was just 315 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 going to ask you where your kids went to school.
And I am deeply committed to public education. I told my husband -- my husband went to Catholic school and I told him there's no way in the world my kid is going to a private school, a Friends school, a Catholic school. If we live, you know, and it's McCall or it's Jenks or it's Henry, wherever it is, that's where they're going. Like it or not, he can find another wife. But I'm deeply committed to public school education. And my point is that all kids, all, and I mean all, the difficult tough kids to serve, because who's going to end up educating those kids if charter schools discourage them from coming, from applying? It's going to be the School District of Philadelphia. And you better be prepared for that. If charter schools aren't encouraged to embrace kids who are difficult, if you will, or who they term to be difficult, then those kids -- because charter schools know there's always an escape valve: you can always go back to your regular public school. If you don't like it, you 316 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 can vote with your feet, but it's really not a vote because, as one operator told me, we don't want you here, we don't like your kid, so you can go back. I mean, the other kinds of examples we've been getting is, we saw a letter from a charter-school operator to certain parents that they needed to find a new school for their child ASAP because they didn't fit the criteria for continued enrollment at the charter school. We refer to that as the weakest-link letter, you are the weakest link, good-bye. So we've also -- we've worked with students who have been just completely kicked out. Not even like a letter to their parents saying, you know, your child did such and such, whatever. They're just told, you know, don't come back. The parents don't know why, they don't what their kid has done, they don't know --
Perhaps if their parents were required to go to the school on a regular basis, they'd know what their kids were doing and it wouldn't be a surprise.
My other point is that all 317 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 charter schools are not created equal.
As a matter of fact, I think if parents were required to go sit in the classroom with their kid who was a troubled person to serve, that maybe they'd see firsthand what it is that their child wreaks on --
My point is that all parents -- all schools are not created equal, 'cause some parents have tried to go to charter schools, some charter schools.
And the charter schools have called the police on them when they feel like the parents have become too disruptive. And that's what I thought Mr. Skief had to say was that we welcome all parents, I thought that was a good point, because some charter schools only want bake sales.
But Mr. Skief is in violation of the law too, isn't he?
Despite how intelligent, committed and successful he is, he's in violation.
But the problem is, you 318 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 don't know if that's being used to -- like I said, another charter school that sat up here today, a large charter school, does not have one kid with special ed. needs -- learning disability, hearing- impaired, visually impaired. Why is that?
And that's -- one of our points is that, are these schools really open up to all children? I mean, that's what our major concern is. Are they willing and open to serve all children, even ones who might seem different, who might seem problematic. And certainly some are and some are doing an excellent job of it. I mean, that's the thing, is we only obviously hear from people who are having difficulties. But all I can say is that we do support criteria, careful criteria being established for reevaluating charter schools, and I think that it's important that these things are thought through so that charter-school operators know what they're getting into and prospective charter-school applicants know what they're getting to. 319 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 And like I said, it's not unprecedented. I don't know if Philadelphia's had any communication with the Pittsburgh School District, but they've been doing this, they've had very careful oversight.
But the Pittsburgh School District, in all fairness, as a result of recent House investigation, expels three times as many children as the Philadelphia public schools do, with probably about a third of the population. So, I mean, Pittsburgh as a model, Pittsburgh does other things that we refuse to do, and maybe their conditions in their schools are better because they bite the bullet and do what's necessary to remove troubled kids -- not troubled, but disruptive kids from their system.
I think that that's two separate things, quite honestly. And I think one of the reasons why Pittsburgh has taken a more sort of measured look, if you will, or a more open look in the sense that that charter-school applicants know what to expect when they're applying is that there is something out in Pittsburgh called "The Charter Schools Project at 320 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 Duquesne University." That's a free service to all charter-school applicants, which we do not have here in Philadelphia. There is Foundations Technical Assistance Center, but Foundations is not free, it's fee for service, and it's really --
Duquesne went out and got grants, private grants, so that the charter schools in the western part of the state have access to that free.
So a Temple or a Penn or someone may be able to do that.
Potentially, yeah. But that's -- I see that as a void that's missing here in the eastern part of the state, because my colleagues in Pittsburgh say, Well, you know, we have really encouraged the charter schools to work with the charter schools project, and they're willing to do it because they don't have to pay for it. You know, one of the difficulties is that, you know, even though Foundations has a lot to offer folks, they do have to pay for it. One of the other difficulties, which we 321 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 recognize as a real problem, is the economies-of-scale issue. Each charter school is their own little individual school system under the charter school law, and it is difficult when you've got one child who might need physical therapy to go out -- you're not going to get a physical therapist on staff. So one of the things that we've really been trying to work with and, you know, encourage charter schools to do is to come together either as an entity like charter schools in Washington D.C. Have actually done. They've formed a consortium where they pool whatever extra resources they have together and they share services basically. And that's something that the District itself could facilitate. One of the difficulties about the District acting as sort of a competitive service-provider, if you will, for charter schools is that unfortunately, the District itself doesn't have enough service-providers to go around. So, I mean, they could try to -- they could potentially try to do that. I mean, there are a lot of sort of creative ways that charter schools could pool 322 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 their resources. And then the final thing we would urge is that the District and the charter schools together work actually together to encourage Harrisburg, because as everyone -- I think as Mr. Gentzel had stated, it's true actually that Pennsylvania is one of the very few states in which the state itself kicks in no money at all for charter schools, they just don't do it. And in almost every other state where they have charter schools, the state contributes at least some money to the per-pupil expenditure for children who are at charter schools. And then I think one of the difficulties that, you know, that I'd say is that -- one of the difficulties that I've had is trying to encourage the State itself actually to provide more support services for charter schools. They provide some technical assistance. , but actually to help the charter schools find those actual services is something I think the State itself would need to do. Because, like I said, we're not here to condemn charter schools. I know kids who have had 323 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 a lot of really good experiences in charter schools, and their parents come to us 'cause they want their kid to stay in the charter school 'cause they've had some really good experiences. For example, Franklintown, Dr. Waiters, who spoke, we actually represented a child at an expulsion hearing at Franklintown Charter School, who for the first time in his, you know, educational career had finally started to achieve some success for the few months he was at Franklintown, and his mother desperately wanted him to stay, and the board actually voted not to expel him, and he's there and he's learning Spanish and he's doing really, really well. So I wouldn't want you to take away the message that we're anti-charter school. I think what our message is, that we want to make sure that charter schools are able and willing to serve all kids who want to take advantage of what the schools have to offer.
Okay, thank you. No other questions? Thank you very much for your attendance and your patience. This hearing is adjourned. 324 5/1/01 LEG. OVERSIGHT/EDUCATION RES. 010131 (Adjourned 3:55 p.m.) 325 C E R T I F I C A T E I HEREBY CERTIFY that the foregoing proceedings of the Council of the City of Philadelphia of Wednesday, May 2, 2001, were reported fully and accurately by me, and that this is a correct transcript of same. RE: JOINT COUNCIL COMMITTEES ON LEGISLATIVE OVERSIGHT AND EDUCATION RES. NO. 010131 __________________________________, JOSEPHINE CARDILLO, Registered Professional Reporter