City of Philadelphia - File #: 140621

• File #: 140621
• Version: 0
• Type: Resolution
• Status: ADOPTED
• File created: 6/19/2014
• In control: Committee on Education
• Title: Authoring the Committee on Education to conduct public hearings to examine the status, growth, achievement, and policies of Charter Schools throughout the City of Philadelphia.
• Sponsors: Councilmember Reynolds Brown, Councilmember Bass, Councilmember Jones, Councilmember Goode, Councilmember Greenlee, Councilmember Oh, Councilmember Johnson, Councilmember Tasco, Councilmember O'Brien, Councilmember Kenney, Councilmember Squilla, Councilmember Quiñones Sánchez, Councilmember Henon

Date	Ver.	Action By	Action	Result	Tally
6/19/2014	0	CITY COUNCIL	Introduced and Ordered Placed on This Week's Final Passage Calendar	Pass
6/19/2014	0	CITY COUNCIL	ADOPTED & REFERRED

Title
Authoring the Committee on Education to conduct public hearings to examine the status, growth, achievement, and policies of Charter Schools throughout the City of Philadelphia.

Body
WHEREAS, Charter Schools are independently operated public schools that are funded with federal, state and local tax dollars; and

WHEREAS, The legislative intent of Charter Schools are to improve pupil learning, increase learning opportunities for all pupils, encourage the use of different and innovative teaching methods, and create new professional opportunities for teachers, provide parents and pupils with expanded choices in the types of educational opportunities that are available within the public school system; and

WHEREAS, Philadelphia is currently home to eighty-six (86) brick-and-mortar Charter Schools along with four (4) Cyber Charter Schools which together educate approximately sixty-thousand seven-hundred and seventy-four students (60,774) or thirty-one percent (31%) of all students in the School District of Philadelphia; and

WHEREAS, Of Pennsylvania's one-hundred and seventy-six (176) Charter Schools, Philadelphia is home to ninety (90); 51.13% of all Charter Schools throughout the Commonwealth; and

WHEREAS, During the fiscal year 2015 budget hearings, it was pointed out that Charter Schools have the ability to re-classify students as "special-education" regardless of whether the student was previously classified as such by the School District; and

WHEREAS, In May 2014, Pennsylvania Auditor General Eugene DePasquale released a report titled Pennsylvania Charter School Accountability and Transparency: Time for a Tune-Up which analyzed the current state of Charter Schools throughout Pennsylvania; and

WHEREAS, Within his report, Auditor General DePasquale concluded that "The funding formula for Charter Schools' basic education tuition rates and special education tuition rates charged to school districts are seriously flawed"; and

WHEREAS, ...