Why Isn't Closing 40 Philadelphia Public Schools National News?

[Judi Lynn]

Why Isn't Closing 40 Philadelphia Public Schools National News?
Thursday, 10 May 2012 09:30 By Bruce A. Dixon, Black Agenda Report | Report

In what should be the biggest story of the week, the city of Philadelphia's school system announced Tuesday that it expects to close 40 public schools next year and 64 by 2017. The school district expects to lose 40% of current enrollment to charter schools, the streets or wherever, and put thousands of experienced, well qualified teachers, often grounded in the communities where they teach, on the street.

Ominously, the shredding of Philadelphia's public schools isn't even news outside Philly. This correspondent would never have known about it save for a friend's Facebook posting early this week. Corporate media in other cities don't mention massive school closings, whether in Chicago, Atlanta, NYC, or in this case Philadelphia, perhaps so people won't have given the issue much deep thought before the same crisis is manufactured in their town. Even inside Philadelphia the voices of actual parents, communities, students and teachers are shut out of most newspaper and broadcast accounts.

The black political class is utterly silent and deeply complicit. Even local pols and notables who lament the injustice of local austerity avoid mentioning the ongoing wars and bailouts which make these things "necessary." A string of black mayors have overseen the decimation of Philly schools. Al Sharpton, Ben Jealous and other traditional "civil rights leaders" can always be counted on to rise up indignant when some racist clown makes an inappropriate remark about the pretty black First Lady and her children.

But they won't grab the mic for ordinary black children. They won't start and won't engage the public in a conversation about saving public education. It's not because they don't care. It's because they care very much about their funding, which comes from Bill Gates and the Gates Foundation, from Wal-mart and the Walton Family Foundation, from the corporations that run charter charter schools and produce standardized tests.

More:
http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/9043-why-isnt-closing-40-philadelphia-public-schools-national-news

[madrchsod]

1. i have no idea...oh wait

maybe no one cares?

thanks to obama and duncan this is a perfectively ok thing to do.....

[southernyankeebelle]

2. It is on Big Ed show. He even had a teacher from Philly on his show last night.

It doesn't effect the rich areas. Only low income areas. The teacher said next year he'll have 47 students in his class. How the hell can a kid have a chance.

[msongs]

3. because schools are being closed all over the place and its not special? nt

[DCKit]

4. Ensuring a steady supply of ingnorant, young, strong and healthy workers...

for the for-profit prison system.

[frazzled]

5. "The black political class is utterly silent"

Kind of an odd statement, given that the Mayor of Philadelphia IS black. And yet his name is not mentioned once in this article. This article needs more detail and a little less proselytizing. I'm concerned about all these school closings, too, but I don't think turning it into a racial issue is all that helpful. There are arguments to be made all over the place, and for some African Americans of the "political class," the feeling has been that the system has been in many ways failing urban black children. I'm making no judgments here; I only want to say that discussions of these things should be focused on kids and not slinging around politicians' names.

[midnight]

6. I was aware of schools in Chicago being closed, but not this many.... This is why public schools

should not receive funding from private entities. These private entities should pay their fair share of taxes so that all children can receive the tools they need regardless if the Gates, or the Waltons approve funding...

[limpyhobbler]

7. The issue certainly deserves more news coverage than it gets.

[Igel]

8. It's a rant.

Questions that should have been addressed include funding and performance.

If the schools are being closed, what's up with the funding? Are the charter schools receiving the funding that the public schools got? Are they, then, public schools, but with a different kind of contractual and pay scheme?

What's driving charter school enrollment? In the states I've lived in, parents decided whether to send their kids to charter schools. Seldom did a school close, putting 1500 kids out of the classroom, only to have a charter school suddenly spring up to house them.

The kids I've known who have gone to (or come from) charter schools were sent to charters only for a very few reasons. They were failing and the charter school would paper over their deficiencies and let them advance a year or graduate. The charter school was believed to be in a position to do a better job (sometimes it was so, sometimes it wasn't). Or there was a religious or moral reason, the parents wanted to put the kids in a church school (or some charter identified with some other ideological/ethical movement or cause).

[edcantor]

9. Look into PA's Republican Governor and his budget cuts.

Hundreds of million to education, including local schools and colleges.