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Good News! Pennsylvania Supreme Court Gives OK to Trial about School Funding!

By dianeravitch
September 28, 2017 //
8

Pennsylvania has one of the worst, most inequitable school funding arrangements in the nation. The legislature has fiddled and done nothing, allowing wide disparities to remain.

But today the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled in favor of permitting a trial on funding inequities. This is a big win for districts who are desperately underfunded.

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court on Thursday opened the door to a lawsuit by the William Penn School District and others asking courts to remedy wide funding disparities among school districts, breaking with decades of precedent dismissing such challenges.

Courts “must take great care in wading deeply into questions of social and economic policy, which we long have recognized as fitting poorly with the judiciary’s institutional competencies,” Justice David Wecht wrote in the majority opinion.

But “it is fair neither to the people of the Commonwealth nor to the General Assembly itself to expect that body to police its own fulfillment of its constitutional mandate.”

The court’s opinion — joined by four justices and accompanied by two dissenting opinions — does not resolve the William Penn lawsuit.

But it enables a trial court to hear arguments in the case, which contends that Pennsylvania’s school-funding system violates the state constitution’s guarantee of a “thorough and efficient system” of education, and its equal-protection provision. Commonwealth Court had dismissed the suit, which lawyers for the plaintiffs said Thursday they would now seek to expedite.

Pennsylvania’s school-funding system has long been a subject of complaint, with some of the widest spending gaps in the country between low- and high-poverty districts and heavy reliance on property taxes to fund schools.

In the William Penn School District — which has some of the highest tax rates in the state, but spends less per pupil than nearby Lower Merion — “we are moving ahead,” a jubilant Jane Harbert, superintendent of the district, said Thursday. “I have to tell you, it just bring tears to my eyes that we’re allowed to go further with this. We’re fighting a battle not just for William Penn but for the whole state of Pennsylvania.”

The first person she called with the news, Harbert said, was former superintendent Joseph Bruni, who spearheaded the suit. In an interview, he said he had waited a long time for this.

Categories Education Reform, Equity, Funding, Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania: How Charter Schools Make Handsome Profits in States Where For-Profits Are Not Allowed

By dianeravitch
September 16, 2017 //
5

Remember that scene in the Dustin Hoffman movie “The Graduate” where a sharp guy whispers to the young Hoffman that the business of the future is “plastics!”

In the charter industry, the profits are not in tuition money. They are in real estate.

Pennsylvania theoretically does not permit for-profit charters. But that doesn’t mean that charters don’t make a handsome profit. It is all about real estate, or leasing the property you own to yourself for a fine fee.

The five-story brick and concrete building overlooking Brighton Road in Perry South features a Propel schools banner over its front door, with signs for the charter network at every approach.

The 99,155-square-foot Propel Northside is owned, though, by School Facilities Development Inc., a nonprofit corporation with a very narrow role: Leasing property to Propel.

SFD’s ownership allows Propel to collect around $322,000 in annual lease reimbursements from the state — money it wouldn’t get if it owned its school buildings. It’s an arrangement that had drawn criticism from the state’s top auditor and is threatened by proposed legislation.

“You’ve created this nonprofit and sort of in a sense, you control it,” said Auditor General Eugene DePasquale, a critic of the state’s charter school law. “You’re getting a lease reimbursement for renting to yourself.”

Since 2004, SFD has spent $32.6 million buying a portfolio of seven schools, comprising most of Propel’s 11 locations. With no employees and just a few volunteers and part-time consultants, the nonprofit receives $3 million in annual lease payments from Propel schools, and after debt payments runs annual six-figure surpluses.

From 1965 to 2006, the Pittsburgh Public Schools owned the Brighton Road building, maintained it and used it as Columbus Middle School. That simple arrangement isn’t mirrored in the charter school world, where specialized nonprofits take on various roles and receive millions of dollars in public money.

“Real estate is held in a separate company,” said Propel Executive Director Jeremy Resnick, recounting the advice he’s gotten from attorneys and financiers during Propel’s 15-year history. “This is how it’s being done.”

Jeremy Resnick–founder of the Propel Charter Chain–is the son of the esteemed education researcher Dr. Lauren Resnick of the LRDC at the University of Pittsburgh.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Pennsylvania, Privatization

Pennsylvania: Debate about School Choice, September 19

By dianeravitch
September 6, 2017 //
6

Here is an event you won’t want to miss:

CONSIDER IT: SCHOOL CHOICE AND THE CASES FOR TRADITIONAL PUBLIC EDUCATION AND CHARTER SCHOOLS

September 19 @ 5:00 PM – 8:00 PM Hilton Reading

Berks County Community Foundation
Panelists:

Carol Corbett Burris: Executive Director of the Network for Public Education

Alyson Miles: Deputy Director of Government Affairs for the American Federation for Children

James Paul: Senior Policy Analyst at the Commonwealth Foundation

Dr. Julian Vasquez Heilig: Professor of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies and the Director of the Doctorate in Educational Leadership at California State University Sacramento

Karin Mallett: The WFMZ TV anchor and reporter returns as the moderator

School choice has been a hot topic in Berks County, in part due to a lengthy and costly dispute between the Reading School District and I-LEAD Charter School.

The topic has also been in the national spotlight as President Trump and U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos have focused on expanding education choice.

With this in mind, a discussion on school choice is being organized as part of Berks County Community Foundation’s Consider It initiative. State Sen. Judy Schwank and Berks County Commissioners Chairman Christian Leinbach are co-chairs of this nonpartisan program, which is designed to promote thoughtful discussion of divisive local and national issues while maintaining a level of civility among participants.

The next Consider It Dinner will take place Tuesday, September 19, 2017, at 5 p.m. at the DoubleTree by Hilton Reading, 701 Penn St., Reading, Pa. Tickets are available here. For $10 each, tickets include dinner, the panel discussion, reading material, and an opportunity to participate in the conversation.

https://bccf.org/event/consider-it-2017/

Categories Charter Schools, Education Reform, Pennsylvania, School Choice

Pennsylvania: Haverford School Board Opposes Charter “Reform” Legislation

By dianeravitch
June 19, 2017 //
1

The Pennsylvania legislature is considering a bill to “reform” charter schools, but it still allows charters to drain resources from public schools without reimbursement, and it still preserves the low-performing cybercharters that milk resources from public schools with providing a decent education to any students.

Many grassroots groups oppose this bill, and the Haverford School Board just voted 7-1 against it.

The board of school directors recently joined Education Voters of Pennsylvania, the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers, Pennsylvania School Boards Association, Education Law Center and other school districts around the state that have voiced opposition to provisions for charter school reform in House Bill 97.

School directors voted 7-1 to adopt a resolution opposing the bill, which they allege “fails to establish meaningful change” from the state’s 20-year-old Charter School Law.

Approved by the state House in April, HB 97 is currently in the Senate Education Committee where amendments are under consideration, said school director and chair of the Delaware County School Boards Legislative Council Larry Feinberg, the resolution’s sponsor.

The resolution states that charter schools that are “publicly funded and privately operated institutions governed by non-elected boards …not accountable to taxpayers, yet paid for with local school district funds….”

Larry Feinberg said that while Haverford has no brick and mortar charter schools, the district has spent $2.4 million since 2012 on historically underperforming cybercharters, with $90.9 million spent county wide for “something that doesn’t work.”

And, “I have grave concerns about accountability,” Feinberg said, recalling Pennsylvania Cyber Charter founder Nick Trombetta’s diversion of funds to make lavish purchases for himself, his girlfriend and family members.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, For-Profit, Fraud, Funding, Pennsylvania, Resistance

Lisa Haver: It Is Time to Establish Democratic Control of Philadelphia’s Public Schools

By dianeravitch
June 9, 2017 //
7

For many years, the public schools of Philadelphia have been drastically underfunded by the state of Pennsylvania. This created a series of fiscal crises, which should have produced equitable funding, but instead gave cause for a state takeover, thus blaming the city for the state’s failures. The state established the appointed School Reform Commission in 2001. The SRC appointed Paul Vallas to run the district, and he launched the nation’s largest experiment (to that date) in privatized schooling, handing over some 40 schools to private, for-profit, and university management. The experiment was an expensive failure, and he left the city with a large deficit, bound for New Orleans to push an even bigger experiment in school privatization.

The SRC has continued the Vallas tradition, closing public schools, opening charter schools, and leaving public schools in desperate straits.

To sum it up, state control has been a disaster for the children of Philadelphia.

Lisa Haver wrote an article in the Philadelphia Daily News outlining the secrecy that surrounds the deliberations of the School Reform Commission. Even the budget is hidden from public view until the SRC has made all its decisions, without considering the voices of parents or teachers.

She asks and answers questions about the role and lack of transparency of the SRC.

She concludes like this:

“Should the SRC schedule a meeting in which it plans to decide on renewals of 23 charter schools with less than a week’s notice?

“The district’s budget shows that it will spend $894 million — about one-third of the budget — on charters next year. Shouldn’t the SRC allow enough time for those paying the tab to read the reports? They may want to ask why schools that have met none of the standards are being recommended for renewal.

“Should the SRC publicly deliberate before voting on significant financial, academic and policy resolutions?

“The SRC approved contracts totaling $149.2 million at its February meeting; it spent $173.1 million in March. Resolutions are voted on in batches of 10 or 15, with little explanation of why.

“How do we reform the School Reform Commission? By abolishing it. Philadelphians have the right, as all other Pennsylvanians do, to decide who will represent them on an elected school board.”

Categories Budget Cuts, Charter Schools, Democracy, Education Industry, Funding, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia

Pennsylvania: How the State’s Charter Law Cripples Public Schools

By dianeravitch
May 3, 2017 //
4

I don’t begin to understand the complexities of Pennsylvania’s formula for allocating dollars to public schools and charter schools, but this article explains how the formula cripples public schools.

Chester Upland School District keeps raising taxes to overcome its deficit but it can’t keep up.

Chester Upland spends about $16,000 a year on average for each special ed student in its traditional district schools. But the state’s formula has forced it to pay more than $40,000 per student to charters, regardless of the child’s level of disability.

Those payments crippled Chester Upland so badly that Gov. Tom Wolf and the courts stepped in.

But this is far from just an issue in Chester Upland. Newly analyzed state data show that a combination of quirks in the charter law have caused a statewide problem, because charters across Pennsylvania are enrolling a greater share of the least needy, least costly special ed students.

The special ed funding formula’s intricacies are infamous. But the problem in a nutshell is this: when the neediest students concentrate in district schools, that drives up the per-pupil payments that districts must pay charters.

It’s a paradox that can drain the budgets of traditional school districts while infusing charters with cash. And it creates incentives for districts like Chester Upland to do what they can to keep special ed students from migrating to charters and cyber-charters.

Categories Accountability, Budget Cuts, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Funding, Pennsylvania, Privatization, Special Education

Pennsylvania: More on the Disastrous HB 97 for Charter $$$$$

By dianeravitch
April 25, 2017 //
2

Lawrence Feinberg of the Keystone State Education Coalition writes about HB 97, which is being considered today:

HB97 is on the House calendar for today.

Instead of insisting on an omnibus charter reform bill, the legislature should consider a stand-alone, separate bill creating a charter school funding commission modelled after the successful Basic Education Funding Commission and Special Education Funding Commission, with a task of work limited to charter school funding issues and comprised solely of legislators and executive branch members.

This would be a significant first step in untying the Gordian knot that PA charter reform has become.

HB97 would stack the state’s Charter Appeals Board in favor of charter proponents.

HB97 would increase the terms of charter authorizations and renewals; shouldn’t taxpayer’s elected officials be able to review and approve the expenditure of tax dollars annually?

HB97 does virtually nothing to address the total lack of transparency for public tax dollars spent by charter management companies.

Pennsylvania’s 500 school districts never authorized the 13 chronically underperforming cyber charters and many districts offer cyber programs at significant savings to taxpayers yet all 500 districts are required to send tax dollars to cyber charters.

The legislature should consider a separate piece of legislation dealing solely with cyber charter issues.

#HB97 None of Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman .@SenatorBrowne’s school districts ever authorized a cyber charter.

In 2015-16 they had to pay over $19.5 million in cyber charter tuition.

Not one of Pennsylvania’s 13 cyber charter schools has ever achieved a passing score of 70 on the School Performance Profile.

Many school districts have in-house cyber programs that are able to serve students at considerable savings over cyber charter costs.

#HB97 None of House Appropriations Committee Chairman .@RepStanSaylor’s school districts ever authorized a cyber charter. In 2015-16 they had to pay over $3.8 million in cyber charter tuition.

#HB97 None of gubernatorial candidate .@SenScottWagner’s school districts ever authorized a cyber charter. In 2015-16 they had to pay over $11.9 million in cyber charter tuition.

#HB97 None of Senate Education Committee Minority Chairman @SenatorDinniman’s school districts ever authorized a cyber charter. In 2015-16 they had to pay over $13.4 million in cyber charter tuition.

#HB97 None of House Education Committee Chairman Eichelberger’s school districts ever authorized a cyber charter. In 2015-16 they had to pay over $11.6 million in cyber charter tuition.

#HB97 Neither of House Speaker .@RepTurzai’s school districts ever authorized a cyber charter. In 2015-16 they had to pay over $1.8 million in cyber charter tuition.

#HB97 None of Senate President .@senatorscarnati’s school districts ever authorized a cyber charter. In 2015-16 they had to pay over $9.4 million in cyber charter tuition.

#HB97 None of Senate Majority Leader .@JakeCorman’s school districts ever authorized a cyber charter. In 2015-16 they had to pay over $5.1 million in cyber charter tuition.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Education Industry, Pennsylvania, Privatization, Virtual Charter Schools

Pennsylvania: Call Your Legislator at Once to Stop “Horrible” Charter Bill

By dianeravitch
April 25, 2017 //
3

Pennsylvania’s state auditor said not long ago that the state has the worst charter legislation in the nation.

It is about to get worse if HB97 passes. Public school advocates at the Keystone State Education Coalition say the bill is in trouble and can be defeated. If you live in Pennsylvania, get on the phone at once and contact your legislator.

EdVotersPA: PA House Poised to Ram Through Horrible Charter Bill

Education Voters PA

We need your help to stop HB 97…

We had hoped that the PA House would work toward charter reform that would protect taxpayers and students and improve PA’s system of public education.

Our hopes were misplaced.

On Tuesday this week, members of the House Education Committee passed HB 97 out of committee on a vote of 17 to 10. Before they voted, lawmakers were assured that HB 97 was a work in progress and would be amended to address many significant problems and deficiencies in the bill.

That didn’t happen.

During the House session on Wednesday, Republican leadership and most Republican lawmakers opposed nearly every substantial amendment that was introduced to fix HB 97.

Tell your state representative to oppose HB 97. The House will be in session next week and is poised to ram through HB 97 without any further improvements.

· HB 97 does not address the $100 million profit (and growing) that charters reap off students with disabilities each year from the broken special education funding system.

· HB 97 does nothing to address the continued abysmal academic performance of the state’s cyber charter schools — none of which have met the minimum proficiency standard on the state’s school performance profile.

· HB 97 creates separate performance standards by which to evaluate charter/cyber charter schools and district schools, making a comparison of education quality between the two sectors impossible. Cyber charter performance won’t look as bad if cyber charters are compared only to other charter schools, many of which are also very low-performing.

· HB 97 strips local control from school boards. If HB 97 becomes law, local school boards would be prohibited from requesting any information from charter applicants beyond the information in a state-created application form; local school boards would be subjected to the whim of charter operators to amend their charter; and local school board decisions regarding charter applications and renewals would be at the mercy of the state’s Charter Appeal Board, which would be stacked with charter school supporters.

HB 97 improves ethics and transparency standards for charters and temporarily makes very small reductions in school district payments to cyber charters. In exchange for these modest modifications to the current law, legislators are handing charter lobbyists their wish list with a bow on top.

Making charters play by similar rules as other publicly funded entities should not earn the PA legislature high praise. These are necessary and important changes to the PA legislature’s broken law that should have been made years ago.

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Pennsylvania, Privatization

Mark Miller: How Pennsylvania Charters Cash in

By dianeravitch
April 24, 2017 //
10

The Auditor General of the state of Pennsylvania once declared that Pennsylvania has”the worst charter school law in the nation.”

Mark Miller shows how hard it is to fix that law. Operators of charter schools and cyber charters are reaping huge profits. One cyber charter founder was found guilty of tax evasion on his huge profits. A charter owner built a massive mansion in Palm Beach.

Yet the legislature can’t rein them in. Every dollar they collect means a dollar less for public schools.

http://www.markbmiller.com/2017/04/20/charter-deform-made-its-way-to-pa-house-floor-today/

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, Pennsylvania, Privatization, Virtual Charter Schools

Latest Charter Farce from Pennsylvania

By dianeravitch
April 19, 2017 //
6

From a correspondent in Pennsylvania:

“The latest charter reform farce is on its way to the House floor in Pennsylvania before lunch.

“Among all the poor elements, tied for the dumbest are:

“1. Families with multiple children enrolled in a cyber-charter may now opt not to receive a second or third computer. I mean really, what wouldthey do with them. They don’t really devote any time to learning. This saves money for the cyber charter. Two or three full state tuitions, and the corporations gives out only one computer.

“2. Charter Schools will now be compared to each other instead of public schools, thus assuring at least half will automatically be performing “above average,” instead of all PA Charters constantly being ranked as
“failing.”

Categories Accountability, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Pennsylvania, Privatization
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