Study offers mixed reviews on school closures in urban districts
Urban school districts who look to rolling school closures as a means to save money--much like the logic that city schools CEO Andres Alonso pitched last month--see a very limited cost savings relative to their budgets, have mixed results on academic impact, and can spur major political fallout, a Philadelphia research group has found.
A study published by the Philadelphia Research Initiative last month looks at the pros and cons of consolidation methods in urban school districts, including Philadelphia, which will undergo a series of school closures in the next two years. A couple of weeks ago, Alonso told The Sun that he will propose to close a slew of schools by 2014 to "right-size the district."
Alonso maintained that not only would the school system be able to save money by vacating school buildings, but also run more efficiently (more than 40 buildings have 250 students or less) and more effectively for its 84,000 students. The schools chief also said that by closing and consolidating schools, the district could devote more money and resources to renovating and upgrading remaining school buildings.
As school officials campaign for billions of dollars to improve the system's infrastructure, Alonso said the district also needed to demonstrate to lawmakers and private funders that the school system is using its current resources as efficiently as possible.
Baltimoresun.com's 
Comments
Erica,
Go dig up copies of Facilities Solutions and understand that we have been here before. When a school was closed under Facilities Solutions, control of the building reverted to the city. A cost saving for the school system was reported in the justification for the closing. The current CEO closed schools but maintained control of the buildings to allow for quicker expansion of the accepted reform models.
They shut down Walbrook and gave the community BDJ and CIVITAS but the system spent millions renovating a building that it gave up control of. Also look at the cherry deal given to City Neighbors Middle-High, $1.00 a year. Winston Middle School was shut down and held for the fashion school that is only slated to be in the building for two years.
Fiscally, the current CEO is a victim of his own biases and will now have to suffer the wrath of affected communities. He cannot stand on firm ground that a school needs to be closed when at the same time the Baord is entertaining offers to open six new small schools.
Also rumor has it that the POLY mascot's head was taken after the Poly-Dunbar game. Has anyone seen a large blue and orange parrot head around town?
Posted by: OverTheTop | November 4, 2011 7:00 AM
OTT - Poly Parrot was out in full feather at Satruday's (123rd) meeting of city and poly at M&T stadium.
Posted by: parent14 | November 7, 2011 1:49 PM
It was new outfit, the head was different and the tail was shorter. It was a good game so doesn't really matter. Now if we can work on getting the City mascot a better costume... what was with the old dude in orange Chuck Taylors and the low budget armor?
Posted by: OverTheTop | November 9, 2011 5:56 AM