The only people any longer that I know at all who don't give their kids an opportunity, by the time they're or years old, to some sort of organized early childhood experience are people who don't have the 2725 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS money to do so.
And doesn't this fact lead to the effect, as a matter of fact, that in some of the youngsters in our city, this lack of monies to provide this type of education leads to some of the clusters having at the 1st grade level a 50 percent left-back rate among those students?
I don't know that there's any cluster that has that high, but there are certainly schools that have significantly high numbers of kids who have failed the 1st grade. And what that by and large means is that they came to school in the first place, which is the point you're making, without the kind of head start that kids in more affluent communities take for granted.
And if you have a higher number in population of students who are being left back in 1st grade, doesn't that then increase the problem later on and increase also the cost of making up for that -- for those things that have occurred?
There's actually 2726 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS research even on that last point that tells us that for every dollar we spend on 3- and 4-year-old pre-kindergarten programs, we will save $7 in later years because the incidence of special education and criminal arrest rates and dropouts and subsequent failure, where you have to do it all over to them one more time, are avoided. So it is a very cost-effective way. It is the single best spent dollar probably, the dollar on a 3 or 4-year-old child, particularly kids who are poor.
It would be very helpful to us here in terms of really putting a strategy together as we go along to know, one, by area and clusters whether kids in the barrio, for example, the Edison, Olney and Kensington cluster, are getting left back at the 1st grade level in greater proportion and also in Southwest Philadelphia, so that we get a clear picture of where it is that money is needed. Because after all, it all comes down to being able to get money in order to get resources. I mean, we -- doesn't it come down to that? Because we're always talking about that we have to 2727 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS do with less, that we have to do with not enough. And my child -- and she goes to a very good school -- has a traveling music teacher, and I believe that that should not be, that we should have art and music programs within the school, not that we have an itinerant troubadour come by every once in a while and teach our children. But the cause and effect, I believe, in terms of the money that is needed I think is best exemplified is shown by those early-grade (unintelligible), and I'd like to see the numbers.
We'll be glad to, by cluster, aggregate numbers that show, for example, failures from the 1st grade. One of things, though, that goes back to your original observation, that people need to understand about the Philadelphia School District is, however, that there are low-income schools, there are lower-income schools, and there are lowest-income schools. There are no wealthy schools. I was struck last year to discover that, at least at that time, the Greenberg School, if you used the criterion of eligibility for free 2728 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS and reduced-price lunch, was the, quote, richest school in Philadelphia, and it had 41 percent of its kids eligible for free and reduced-price lunch. So I would hate for us somewhere along the line in one sense to cannibalize each other when there is desperate need in every part of this city, and there ought not to be a single 3- or 4-year-old in this city who doesn't have the opportunity of that kind of a head start.
I asked a question of State Representative Perzel at that point, and Councilman Kenney actually gave the right answer. He said "no chance," but State Representative Perzel is also the person who voted against the bill to give us the ability to out the abandoned cars from our neighborhoods. So we have to see. I just want to -- because as the City of Philadelphia goes and whether we're going to be a world-class city, as everyone keeps on talking about, it will depend very much so on what type of commitment that we give to the public schools and what type of money we're willing to spend. It really comes down to that at the end, doesn't it? 2729 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
Resources and how you spend the resources you have are critical. The fact that we have virtually the highest achievement improvement rate of any big city in the country suggests to me that we've demonstrated that we know how you to spend the resources. What we don't have are sufficient resources in some of these critical areas that each of the Councilpersons have spoken to today.
Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilwoman Miller.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Dr. Hornbeck, I'm going to ask like three or four questions 'cause you take up all my time with the answers, so. . . (Laughter.)
Actually, one questions around school safety. We had a call -- 2730 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS or actually, a reporter asked me Friday or Thursday if we knew that teachers were required to go through the monitors, that teachers at that particular school and other school personnel. She said she had gotten several calls from teachers, I think, at George Washington High that said that they are having to go through the monitors. That's number one. The textbooks, the purchase of, when you divide the million out amongst the schools, 12 who makes the decision? I think we've talked 13 before, I think it's the principal, the School 14 Council and whatnot. But we have had teachers 15 talk about the fact that they have not been able 16 to buy workbooks -- not the textbooks -- 17 particularly in the elementary grades. 18 And also the paper, the condition of 19 the copier, and all of those things that are 20 needed, you know, at that level -- well, at all 21 levels. 22 The other thing I'd like to know is if 23 you would examine, if your School Board would examine the opportunity for children that are in the desegregation programs that are going out of 2731 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS their neighborhoods to schools, who then cannot participate in after-school programs at their local neighborhood schools. Children -- you know, every high school and every middle school and, I guess, every elementary school too does not have a sports team, so children, particularly those that don't go to the neighborhood school, and again, they're going outside and participating in a deseg. program or whatnot, and then they cannot participate in the sports and athletic programs. And these are all things that we -- what we've heard all week, what we've heard all year is getting more money for after-school care because there's a whole group of children that don't even qualify to go to after-school programs that the School District has.
With respect to metal detectors, the Board's policy is that everybody who comes in -- kids, visitors, teachers, principal, everybody -- goes through the metal detector. So what is being reported to you is accurate. And the reasoning behind that is that, frankly, if kids see adults wandering through, they correctly perceive that as unfair. And so 2732 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS the way to address that question of fairness is to include everybody. Secondly, on the textbooks, there is an allocation that is made to the school, and then inside the school, the principal is in consultation with his faculty, the decision-maker. And different schools will approach that -- I mean, the character of the consultation will be different in different places, but the principal is really, in the end, the responsible person there. I would worry, frankly, about -- I have to say it because you mentioned it -- too much emphasis on workbooks, 'cause workbooks are a pretty lousy way to -- they're not a very good part of an instructional program, let me put it this way. And, unfortunately, one of the problems we continue to face in too many instances is reliance on workbooks because it's too easy. You just tear the sheet out, and you don't -- kids don't have to work at it and the teacher doesn't have to work at it. But in any event, that's a kind of editorial on the side about good instruction. But the principal is the moving 2733 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS party. Now, the underlying things like copiers and so on is just the issue of money. And it is true that there are places with respect to some of the office equipment, machinery where there's not enough, and that's true. The after-school thing is a real dilemma. What, in my judgment, would be ideal is if we had enough money, what ought to happen is that the children ought to be able to participate in an after-school program in the school that they go to. There aren't very many, you know, Northeast High School students who want to play on the Bartram High School basketball team. I mean, it just --
There are -- you know, in some of the schools, the issue is travel. That's why they don't have after-school programs.
That would be highly desirable. And then in many, many instances, I 2734 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS mean, for all intents and purposes, in all instances, which is why there's a big number for after school in the budget, is that we don't have enough after-school programs to serve the kids even in the schools that they go to. And every child in this city -- I mean, we've got some humongously large amount of building capital in this system, and every single one of the schools ought to be open until 10 o'clock at night and on weekends and during the summer. And there ought to be the programming capacity to do these things. I don't have a very -- other than making more universal the opportunity, I don't have a very good answer for that.
Okay. Well, can you think about it a little bit? I talked to Bill 19 Epstein, I talked to him several months ago about a particular case or two. And I'll just remind you, Bill, because I do think that we have a whole group children out there that we could serve differently.
Okay, thank you. We will. 2735 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
Councilman Cohen, you're next, but if you're attending to other business, I'll recognize someone else.
Thank you, Madam President. Mr. Superintendent, I will be very quick in going through a couple of items, which I wou8ld actually ask you to forward information to us. If you have some by Wednesday, that would be fine, but otherwise, through the Chair. What is the status of open or acting positions in the upper management of the District, specifically in the Finance Department area or in any of the financial services area? If you could get us information about that, I would appreciate it.
Thank you. Second, are there individuals -- I'll 2736 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS just use this term, it might not be an official School District term, but are there official action plans for the improvement of each particular school, kind of a listing of, This is what we need to do at this school, by way of either teachers, curriculum all of those issues?
Okay. Is it possible to -- I don't know if any of this is -- I can't imagine that it's necessarily confidential, but are there executive summaries of these or -- I mean, is it possible to see what the documents are related to these particular schools that would give a kind of general assessment?
The answer is yes, but so that it's most meaningful or helpful to you, why don't you give me the names of three schools that you would like to see, and then you would not only have a sample, but you would have a sample of three schools in which you have a particular interest and knowledge.
You can give me Barry, Mann, and Levering. 2737 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
Yes. Those are the three quick off the top of my head.
Okay, thank you. If you could -- this is either more an assessment of the system, but what is your belief about the impact of the cluster system and how it has helped to make the improvements that are listed in the various charts 1-A through D in Tab 1?
The cluster system has had the benefit of serving this principle that small is better, and it has given greater access to the staff as well as to parents in the wider community to people in genuine decision-making roles. That's one piece. Secondly, it has contributed, because of the continuum that has been created of K to 12. So there's a connection that didn't used to exist. Third, we have been able, to a 2738 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS significant degree, to place the clusters in the position to being an instructional leader and keeping the issue of instruction versus administration in front of the schools in important ways. All of those things, I believe, have been a part of a constellation of things that have resulted in this dramatic achievement improvement, and the interesting thing that we've discovered, because of a recent proposal that the number of clusters be reduced from to 11, is that the -- 13 generally, this isn't an absolute rule. But 14 significantly generally, the smaller a cluster is 15 -- the 11 smallest clusters' achievement is 16 significantly better than the 11 largest clusters. 17
And I wouldn't want to 19 submit that to, you know, some highfalutin' 20 research double-blind study kind of a process. 21
But it is clearly a part of several things that have contributed to the improvement.
With regard to 2739 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS those same charts, are you able to project forward at a minimum what your goals are for -- well, I'll refer to the chart specifically. 1-A is showing steady growth, 40 percent since 1996 in students scoring at basic level and above across all grades and all subjects. Chart 1-D is 4th grade scoring at basic and above in all subjects. Chart 1-C is 8th grade. And chart 1-D is 11th grade. Is the District in a position, based on either where things are now, taking into consideration the financial circumstances, the realistic financial circumstance of the District, are you able to project out over the next five years at a minimum where you would like things to be? What's a reasonable goal? What could we expect to see even next year in these same numbers as compared to the charts that are in front of us today?
What we have done, Councilman Nutter, is to set a -- back in 1996, we set a goal of 95 percent of our kids achieving at the proficient level, which is a notch above the basic level. 2740 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
By 2008 -- we chose 2008 because that was one student generation. That is, the 1st graders in 1996 would be 12th-graders in 2008. We then establish the individual performance targets for each school based on that goal for each two-year period of time. So there's a very specific target that every school is expected to meet --
-- during that period of time. Last spring, after three years of the twelve years, and the three years contributing to the 40 percent, etc., that you referred to there, 164 of our 259 schools were ahead of where they needed to be after three years. And if they kept on that pace, then they would be where they need to be at the end of twelve years.
Okay. Well, either for Wednesday or sometime shortly thereafter, I guess, if you could show us by way of the graphs where it is today, what you had projected it to be 2741 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS three years ago, and where it has gone essentially ahead of projections, based on what you laid out three years ago.
Chart 2-A in the same Tab 1 is, the School District has cut its number of administrative jobs, and your chart is showing 364 fewer administrative jobs since the '90-'91 school year. Are you able to lay out what those positions were and where those personnel were operating from?
To some extent, that's very, very difficult, though, because in some of those instances, positions in terms of what they did have gone through two and three sort of metamorphoses.
So that number comes from, what did the budget say we had in 1991 and 1991, and what does it provide today. And it's not a kind of tracing of individual positions. So I guess the answer really is no. It would be very, very difficult, if not -- in fact, 2742 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS I don't even know how we would do it.
So you're just taking a gross number of administrators in 1990-'91 versus the number of administrators in '99-2000.
We have a lot less but I don't -- I can't do it position by position.
Okay. Lastly, I received a response to a recent inquiry from Dr. Stephanie Childs (ph.). It had been inquired of us and we wrote to the District regarding the District's bus policy for kindergarten student. And the response was, the District doesn't provide transportation for kindergarten students. And I just wanted to better understand that. And what are the issues involved in that and why?
We do not provide transportation for kindergarten students. We have found that, generally speaking, at that age, parents get there kids to school. It arises, in 2743 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS part, because we're only now, whatever it is, four years into everybody gets full-time full-day. And it's been one of the additional expenses that we have simply haven't undertaken either for our own children, or if we were to provide busing for kindergarten kids, then there would be a significant additional expense for all of the non- public school kids.
So it's really a resource issue more than any other single thing.
All right, but I mean, it's not that you don't think bus transportation is appropriate for kindergartners or an age level issue; it's a financial resource issue?
Actually, we think in the name of fitness, they should be walking at that point. But no, it is -- I'm sorry, it's a resource issue.
'Cause some of the neighborhoods that some of the kindergarten students might have to walk through, I'm not sure if I would want to walk through them. 2744 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
No, I agree. It is a resource, not a policy issue about thinking kindergarten kids should walk.
Thank you, Madam President. I want to talk about -- what I have in mind is that I think there ought to be a vast public campaign led really by you and SEPTA for public support for private funding as well as for public funding. It's not your responsibility, I believe, to provide the funding, I don't believe it's SEPTA's responsibility to provide the funding, in either case, out of already inadequate funding that both public bodies have. But I do think it is the responsibility both of the School Board and of SEPTA to lead the fight for this. Because a public transportation 2745 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS system, I think, has no justification for existing if it doesn't take care of that part of the population that needs it most. I wouldn't expect a for-profit company to be concerned, but I would expect a public service agency to be considered that it is unable to furnish transportation where most needed, and I would feel that a school district ought to be most concerned. I'm told there are 20,000 school children, 30,000 who need help financially to get to schools, and that 10,000 are already provided for by some program, which leaves 20,000 in this case of need. And you were eloquent when you spoke about a child not having to miss school, one of two children for $9 a week. Sometimes both have to miss if there's to be food or heat or some other necessity provided. I think it's just unconscionable for Philadelphia to talk about this being "The Year of the Child" or by the remotest standards even thinking about being a world-class city with a world-class stadium, and I'm not sure that was a mispronunciation I just made 'cause I don't know, so few Philadelphians can afford to go to the 2746 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS sports teams that it seems to me that Philadelphia may be becoming just a business enterprise in providing stadiums and using a lot of its wealth to try to bring in other people, like any other business, to attract more income. But I do think there is a very heavy public duty, and I don't think it's satisfied, with due respect, Superintendent Hornbeck, because you know I respect your policies very strongly, even were I to disagree with any of them in particular at any given time, nothing can becloud the fact of your deep dedication to the school stem, and at times, you're almost the only person I know who's really fighting for quality education in a meaningful way and subjecting yourself to all sorts of abuse as a result of it. But I think this is one area where you can perform such an enormous public service, you can bring 20,000 children into the orbit of being first-class citizens in Philadelphia and of having the right to really a public education. So on that issue, I don't ask for any comment, but I would urge you to communicate with SEPTA. Frances Egan, who is now -- the former 2747 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS Licenses and Inspections Commissioner is now with SEPTA, and in response to a question from Councilwoman Blackwell with respect to certain problems at 52nd and Market, and the issue isn't important, but she said that SEPTA would be willing to undertake corporate leadership and develop a sense of corporate responsibility for participation in the funding necessary to help achieve a very worthwhile goal, I'm sure it is, at 52nd and Market. It's that kind of leadership between SEPTA and the School District that I think can produce results. I am so concerned about this that I am planning to introduce an amendment to withhold financing from SEPTA until they come forth with a program that will provide free tokens for everybody, whether they use tokens or passes. Other cities have it, and I think Philadelphia may be the only major city in which there is no 21 assistance, but I can't vouch for that. Some people have so asserted and I don't know whether it's so or not.
But I don't see how we can feel we're really carrying out a struggle to educate all of 2748 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS our kids unless we solve this very concrete simple problem -- and not at the cost of other very needed service. I just wanted to do leave that message on that, but I think it's got to be an immediate campaign. I think by the fall, every kid in Philadelphia, regardless of income of the family, regardless of ability to pay, ought to be able to ride to school. Otherwise, I don't think we have public education in Philadelphia. The other question I have -- and maybe, again, this may not require an answer -- I don't know how principals are selected for the school system. I don't know whether it's tied into the union contract or not. But I believe that the principal in the school is the driving force, that you can take two very difficult situations, and you put in a principal who just refuses to believe that kids can't be educated, and that undertakes -- I can't think of the name. Marcus Foster, was that the name of the principal at Gratz High School, who used to go around and get his teachers, some of them at least, to go with him to visit families at home, 2749 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS who was shot, unfortunately. It was in San Francisco where he went some years ago. I think the results at a school depend so heavily on a principal. He turned Gratz High School around, and he set a foundation that others that have followed after him have been able to build on. And I would hope that if it's involved in union negotiations, so be it, but I think we've got to find a way to be able to have the kind of inspired leadership by principals. And as a strong -- maybe the strongest labor figure that's ever been in City Council, labor supporter, I believe public service unions have goals other than the wages and working conditions that maybe private unions have, where they're dealing only with taking a share of the profit from the employer and have it be divided. I think a public service union has public responsibilities and that they have to understand, you know, that they're serving the public. And I think there ought to be no 23 problem making sure that we can get the kind of leadership at every local school, because I do share the hope that we're going to get to the 2750 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS point where parents of public school children think about their schools in the same way that parents come here and argue for charter schools. All public schools -- and the charter schools are public schools. All public schools ought to be able to develop that feeling. Thanks, Madam President and Madam Chair.
Thank you, Councilman Cohen. Councilwoman Blackwell? Is Councilwoman Brown here?
Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. Superintendent, you use the phrase "social promotion" to be replaced by "standards-driven promotion." How is the District getting the message out that students will have to work harder, study more, and reach toward a concrete goal? When you introduced academic rigor, you implied that students will need to do some independent reading and study. Peer pressure often mitigates against this. Therefore, time management is crucial. 2751 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS In other words, what counsel is being given to students to prepare them for independent study/reading for leisure as well as completing special projects?
The -- two answers. One is, it goes back to all these communications that we've already undertaken with parents. And additional ones like your good suggestion that we want to follow up on with the newspapers to do, to see if we can't do get them to do an insert.
But even more important is the way in which this has been emphasized with the students themselves. In one sense, we tried to send this message really strongly last summer, when we began for the first time in ten years to tell kids they had to come to summer school, and that began to send messages to them. Then this year, we have, through the their classes, one on one directly, we have -- we have sought to make clear to them the kinds of standards they're going to have to meet. I think, frankly, in the final analysis, however, the message will not ultimately 2752 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS get through with children anymore than it does with us adults, that until the moment finally comes and sort of the crisis is there and I'm going to fail or I'm going to go to summer school or I'm going to go into one of these transaction programs, somehow we human beings are put together in ways that these messages don't penetrate. So I think the value of summer school last year was at least partial value, but we hadn't eliminated social promotion then, and it will come at the end of this year.
It seems to me that if we start young enough, we have a chance. That's why I always believed in a 12-year program, so you can start the little ones on up. Because I still believe that if you tested an 11th-grader and that child or that teenager can't pass the test, that there's very little you're going to do and that it would serve him or us no purpose in keeping in that.
That's a very important point. And social promotion is eliminated this year, in effect, only for the 4th-graders. We're tightening up otherwise, but it's not -- it's not, 2753 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS you know, sort of the final deal. And one of the reasons we're doing that is because we want to, in a sense, phase some of this stuff in.
In a way that gives kids and teachers sort of forewarning that this is coming.
Absolutely. Because some students -- if older kids, even middle school age, no matter how much they panic, they can't do it. And a gentleman just stopped me in the hallway and asked me about vocational ed. his opinion was that we're doing so much with computers, we don't realize that we can train plumbers and other students in vocational fields, and more programs in our schools are equipped for them in this modern world. Where are we on vocational training?
Well, we have, of course, the several good vocational technical high schools that are still providing very strong and even better and better support simultaneously with that. And we're -- we decide what to teach in 2754 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS those schools based on where jobs are.
We attempt not to have programs for areas for which there are no jobs. Secondly, however, as we move into the first part of this new century, it's increasingly clear that most students are going to have at least six jobs and be in at least three careers during their lifetime. And so it's very important -- it is essential that we successfully have youngsters who know how to read and do math and do science so that they are able, in effect, to learn to learn, so that they can accommodate these changes that are going to -- without any question, they're going to face during the course of the years. And so the School-to-Career Program that both gives them the opportunity to be engaged in worksite learning opportunities in a hands-on sort of way, together with upgrading their skills that give them a shot at jobs where they can actually earn a living and support a family, is very much a greater part of the program. The final thing I would say about this 2755 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS is that one way to measure the health of vocational education is to determine how many kids we have in programs for which we are reimbursed by federal money. And in the last five years, we have gone from something in the neighborhood of 7 to 8,000 youngsters who were in programs for which we were reimbursed to something over 17,000 in vocational programs for which we were reimbursed. So we have escalated significantly the participation of kids in vocationally-recognized programs.
How do we determine how we use that space in schools? A lot of folks who are my age and older remember in all of your high schools, you have vocational programs, so they see that space there or unused space or not -- or reconfigured space and feel that we're lacking in not using it that way because we don't talk about it.
Well, we all need, whether we're in a school system or Council or someplace else, to constantly try to bring people up to speed. I mean, for example, the Cisco 2756 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS Programs, to which I spoke to a little while ago, these certification programs place kids in places that they can make as much as $35,000 to start, right out of high school. Those places that those kids are doing their certification program are not traditional vocational technical school -- Dobbins, you know, Bok, Mastbaum. There may be a Cisco place in those, I'm not saying they're not, but they are also in places that are not vocational place. And so we have to help people understand not just to look at a space that used to have a wood lathe in it and see that the wood lathe isn't in there anymore and assume that we are no longer doing vocational education. We need to have them understand that, in fact, we've doubled the number of kids that are in these kinds of programs. They're just in different kinds of programs, because what it takes to get a job is just very different in the year 2000 than it was in the year 1966.
My final question is, the SAT-9 tests, there has been talk, or always is, has been, over the years about 2757 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS minorities not testing well. And I understand there is something that the School District is trying to do so that these children are tested better and in a way that is fairer to what they can or cannot do. And what's the status of that? Can you tell me a little bit about that?
Let me say three things. . One is that the improvement that our children have achieved has cut across racial and language lines and income lines so that kids in racially-isolated schools, as well as kids in desegregated schools, as well as concentrations of Spanish-speaking kids, as well as -- I mean, they have all participated in the growth of achievement. Secondly, the kinds of things that you see in the Fair Opportunities to Learn, the pre-K, the extra help, the tutoring, and all of those kinds of things are in there because we believe those things are necessary to help those kids with whom we've historically failed, which were disproportionately minority kids, to in fact 2758 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS achieve. The third thing that we've done is to work with the testing company to create what we refer to as "culturally sensitive test items," so when kids take the test, they will also more frequently also see themselves in the test. So that the test questions are constructed around both racial and language minority kids to a greater extent than was previously the case. And we started that piece not -- I think it was last -- I guess it was last spring was the first time -- maybe it was two years ago.
Have we assessed how it is that it is more racially sensitive to minorities? Have we made that assessment?
Well, as I say, the kids in the racially-isolated schools, kids in the language concentration schools, like Potter-Thomas is what I mean, where the vast majority of kids are Latino kids. In fact, Potter-Thomas, now that 2759 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS I'm thinking about it, is a tremendous example. And I want to say Ferguson because her name's Linda Ferguson -- I mean, Linda Hall at Ferguson is a great example of a racially-isolated school where the kids have done really exceptionally well. So the answer is yes. I mean, we are seeing the product of this work. And one of the reasons we want these Fair Opportunities to Learn is that we think that if we don't have that opportunity, we may end up with kids being sort of at status quo, stagnating, not moving forward, and continuing the progress that we've made.
Councilman Blackwell, you've had like eight minutes.
All righty. I was finishing up that last question on racially- sensitive material. Thank you. Whether or not we've made that assessment and compared it, the material. Thank you, Madam Chair. 2760 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
Thank you very much. There are three areas I overlooked, so I misspoke when said that I was done. Another discovery we had when the City departments came before us is that there's a lot of great partnerships between some City departments and some schools. Example, Fleet Management has a wonderful co-op career path program and so does the Water Department. Are you aware of any other partnerships with City agencies that are working? And are you interested in pursuing greater opportunities with City agencies that currently don't exist but you would like to see happen?
We are always enthusiastic about those partnerships that increase the productivity of our work. Among the ones that come immediately to my mine are the family centers with DHS.
Okay. 2761 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
The 117 partnerships we have with the Rec. Department and the partnership that we've developed over the last two years with CBH and Mental Health Services, particularly in the Audenried and the Olney cluster and now being expanded to seven other clusters. So we're always looking for those opportunities to strengthen both agencies by increasing, and we've got lots of them.
And you're saying there's student participation in those departments you just mentioned, DHS and CBH?
And family centers serve students. The other thing that we do with the departments is, we have -- we've had thousands of our youngsters in work site learning opportunities.
Yes, that's what 2762 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS I'm referring to.
And lots of them are in City agencies, so that there are -- I don't know what the number is, but there are lots of 'em spread across probably every City agency that there is.
Well, then that's a good thing. If we can achieve 100 percent, that's good. I was just curious to know if there's an opportunity or a potential out there that we have not yet put in place.
Well, the other thing that has happened recently that Council will be interested in following, just not from that perspective, but it's really important, is that the federal law changed a year ago, that used to be JTPA and the PIC and all of that.
And now it's PWDC and the Workforce Investment Board. And one of the 2763 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS spin-off things of the Workforce Investment Board is something called the "Youth Council," and the Youth Council has focused on the expenditure of about or $9 million worth of youth funds that 6 are designed to help kids move productively into 7 jobs when they get through high school. 8 And what we've done in an effort to do the kind of collaboration you're talking about is that three or four members of my school-to-career staff, who are these people that give great leadership --
-- are the head of the staff now and are paid 30 percent by this Philadelphia Youth Network, so that the School District and all of these agencies of City government who are in the Workforce Investment Act end of the business all do our business all together, so that it's -- it's not -- it's not the School District's kids over there and somebody else's kids over there. It's our kids in Philadelphia.
That's encouraging. 2764 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS Transportation. On of Section 3 of your document, you speak about the 4 reimbursement or the funding end of transportation. I'm curious to know a couple things. One, how are contracts handled with school buses companies, and what policy is in place for school bus companies or a school bus driver that doesn't show up at a bus stop or at a series of bus stops? What kicks in to let parents know that that's the circumstance for that morning or that week? And this is related a couple of constituent matters that have come up in my office.
Well, each one will end up being different. I mean, if the bus has a flat tire, then there will be instances in which because every bus has a communications system, that they can say to the dispatcher, I had a flat tire, or, you know, whatever it is, that word can be gotten to the school. And to some extent, there is an ability to communicate with the homes, but it's pretty limited because you've got as many as 60 kids out 2765 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS there standing on street corners someplace and parents who have gone off to work.
So it's incumbent upon the bus driver to access the communications system and make his or her circumstance known.
And then we have a dispatch process that either comes out and fixes the bus or, in some instances, will put a replacement bus out on the road. But that's invariably a process that results in a lot of down time. I mean, it's not an instantaneous thing.
We gave a lot of discussion to school violence and school safety, and how SEPTA or lack of SEPTA tokens contributes to absences from school. This question is around truancy and the new pilot program that's in place. What would be your response to the 2766 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS suspicion, if you will, that for this to work, it's going to take the School District and the District Attorney's Office to work together to make this program real? One, I'm won't to say "allegation." One concern that's been raised is, the School District has to be concerned about reimbursement. The School District does better when it does not report the number of truancies because that impacts the dollar reimbursement, yet the truancy project is only going to work to the extent that it is able to address those young people who are truant from school.
Well, we've taken lots of actions to reduce truancy, the Truancy Courts, for example --
-- that we've done in partnership with the Family Court has been very successful. The Police Commissioner and we have launched the initiative that has resulted in picking up tens of thousands of kids off the streets and taking them to their respective schools to reduce that. 2767 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS So truancy, in a sort of symptomatic way, is a really important thing. And it's -- there are a number -- I mean, one of the reasons we do the Truancy Courts is that it permits relevant agencies to come together to work together with the teacher, the kid, and the parent on designing a process to get the kid --
-- into school. The -- so that there's no small amount of effort and extra effort that goes -- that goes into that. And, in fact, we have increased attendance at school over these -- over these years. 'Cause if you can't get the kid into school, you're going to be hard-pressed to teach him to read.
So it's not too early to measure the effectiveness of this new initiative.
No. I mean, it's not a single new initiative. There are several major efforts that we -- I mean, another big piece of this is that we put student attendance into the performance index on the basis of which we are 2768 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS evaluated and rewards are given to schools and penalties are meted out to schools. So we've taken a multi-pronged approach to this and look forward to the cooperation of other agencies in that process.
Thank you, Madam Chair. Dr. Hornbeck, let me briefly follow up on the discussion we had this morning and focus a bit more directly on the governance at the individual school level. I'm not talking about the future so much in terms of contract negotiations in the new board, but under existing, what are principals empowered to do? Are they empowered to hire and fire, are they empowered to promote as they choose, are they empowered to make 2769 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS budgetary decisions, are they empowered to make curriculum decisions? What exactly are they empowered to do under the current system?
They are empowered to make curriculum decisions, they make decisions about professional development, about the instructional programs that are going to go on in the schools. They have a great deal of authority around the use of the school building and the assignment of kids and the assignment of teachers once they're in the building. The primary limitation on the power of the principal is in the hiring of teachers. The way in which a teacher comes to a particular school is, for the most part, is a consequence of seniority, and to a very large extent, it is automatic. And in terms of firing, the principal has not only the right but has the responsibility to rate teachers, and it is through the rating process, if there should be any discipline to be meted out, that that would occur.
So ultimately, they don't decide who comes to their school or who 2770 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS leaves; is that correct?
Well, they don't decide very much about who comes. In the framework of the rating process, they play a decisive role or a very important role in who leaves. A more important part of who leaves, though, has to do with the transfer process. And transfer, at the moment, under the terms of the contract, is governed again by seniority. If there is a vacancy in School X and you are in School Y and you have enough seniority, you can go to School X.
With respect to the -- we don't have many department heads anymore. But with respect, for example, to the assistant, principal, the principal by and large makes that determination.
And there are no 25 decisions beyond that, there's just a general 2771 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS teaching staff?
Well, there are -- I mean, there are librarians and counselors and so on. But I think all of those positions are, again, governed by the contract, and they are considered to be teachers. I mean, the librarian is a teacher, you know. So all of that is governed in much the same way that I described the teacher.
And lastly, what powers of principals would you seek to expand?
Well, those are the things that, at the moment, I think need to evolve out of the contract negotiations. And it's really something that would be inappropriate for me to -- but that was a --
But that was a good way to ask that original question. What are the facts now?
Thank you very much. 2772 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
Okay, thank you Councilmember Goode. Councilmember Rizzo?
Thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Superintendent, this weekend, I had an opportunity to speak to a man named Peter Cursio of Junior Achievement. And in Chester Pennsylvania, they're going to be building a facility that will exchange students into this program where they actually operate a little mini city hall, a bank, and other businesses. I'm wondering if the School District is aware of this Junior Achievement initiative.
We are. We cooperate with them, I serve on the board of Junior Achievement. Junior Achievement is a good program. It exists in a lot of our schools. And we also engage in similar kinds of instructional ventures that are Junior Achievement and are not Junior Achievement. 2773 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS The sort of simulation process that Junior Achievement does is really, in my judgment, an excellent -- for example, in contrast to workbooks, to really, in a sense, construct the knowledge by being a shopkeeper or being the Mayor or a Councilman or, you know, whatever, and operate an entire city, in fact, is a really good instructional device.
In response to a question earlier about what Chicago does, I'm wondering, you have a lot on your plate, and I would seem that there would be an organization within the School District -- research, planning -- that would be out there looking for what works and what doesn't work. It kind of surprised me -- well, I don't want to use that word. It -- what do you do to look at other cities on what they're accomplishing and try to bring back the good things and not make the mistakes that they made? Is there a responsible individual in your organization that's out there doing those things that you heard mentioned this morning, and not have to hear it here in City Council? 2774 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
The answer is yes. It's in our Leadership and Learning Unit. And it is -- it's not so much looking at whole cities. There are a variety of instructional practices, which, research tells us, if used faithfully, have a greater impact. I referred earlier in response to a different question to a program called "Success For All," for example. That's the single-most widely used successful program in the United States, and it has a lot of research backing. Reading Recovery was the other one I mentioned. New Zealand became the highest reading country in the world about ten years ago because they developed Reading Recovery. We have a homegrown version that is referred to as the "100 Book Challenge," which you may have encountered in your travels around the City. I began to emphasize three years ago the adoption of what I referred to as "research- based instructional strategies." For the first couple of years, they were voluntary. Last year, they became mandatory, that every school, faculty, and principal were to examine these various 2775 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS opportunities and choose one. And one of the ways that we helped people know how is that, you know how in Consumer Reports, there are those little round balls, and if it's really good, it's all red, and if it's half-good, it's half-red. And it's a consumer guide to lawn mowers or televisions or whatever. Well, we produced a similar consumer's guide to research-based instructional strategies across the United States, and we set out some criteria that made 'em good or bad. And then we put in little red circles and half circles and clear circles so that people could see, in relationship to their own needs in a school, which is better and which is worse. And we will continue to update that kind of thing on at least a biannual basis.
Thank you for that. And, finally, in reference to being a good neighbor, our schools being a good neighbor, for years and years and years, we have restricted parking around the perimeter of many of our schools. I assume that's done for safety reasons. I recently have gotten letters and 2776 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS people have asked that since families are growing, two cars, three cars, could you reevaluate the need for restricting the need for restricting the parking around many of our schools? The teachers in many cases have the ability, and I hear some principals work with them and some don't, where they're able to park where conditions permit inside the school yard for security reasons.
But to restrict parking -- and I might be wrong even bringing this up, but at least it should be looked at to see the need to prohibit parking on all four sides of a school, especially when parking is so valuable today in many of our neighborhoods. Could you ask for some research?
Or at least some rationale? I assume it has to do with fire and safety.
Well, I think safety more than anything else so that as kids come pouring out, there are not cars to walk between, but we'll have a look at the policy. 2777 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS
Well, if they're doing hopefully what we want them to do, cross at corners with school crossing guards, that may not be -- this has been a practice that's been around I think forever.
And I'm thinking that maybe that should be reevaluated, and I think that if we can't come up with a good, solid reason, I speculated it the same way you did, that that's the reason, I think the community would love to have some additional parking back in their neighborhoods.
I certainly don't doubt that, especially around Jenks, there's a problem that --
And in many cases, the signs have been removed, gone, and people are parking at these locations. So I think we need to reevaluate all of the building, reevaluate the need for that, and then make a decision whether we should allow the public to park back in those locations.
We can have a look at 2778 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS that policy.
I'm sure that will take a long time to accomplish that decision, but I would like to be able to know and have that eventually addressed.
Certainly the examination of the policy won't take very long. Any individual examination of each of the 259 schools may take a little while, depending on how we come at the policy.
I'd like to thank the School District of Philadelphia for your presentation and testimony today. And this hearing is recessed until tomorrow, at 10 a.m., March 17th -- I mean, March 7th.
Thank you very much, 2779 3/6/00 - OPERATING BUDGET CONT'D - SCHOOLS Councilwoman Miller.
Thank you. (Adjourned at 2:34 p.m.) - - - 2780 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 Monday, March 6, 2000, were reported fully and accurately by me, and that this is a correct transcript of same. RE: COUNCIL COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE BILL NO.'S 7, 8, 9 __________________________________, JOSEPHINE CARDILLO, Registered Professional Reporter