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Schools

Reform is the Name of the Game at Philly Schools

School planning, facilities, and program reform were discussed during a meeting at Roxborough High School Thursday evening.

A team touting Philadelphia’s “Imagine 2014” school facility reform program shared some thoughts on the strategic planning program with area residents during a meeting at Roxborough High School Thursday evening.

The discussion opened with one speaker making it clear to all that they were encouraged to actively contribute to and vote on the program through various mechanisms–via regular mail, e-mail, through an online form, or speaking at future meetings.

With the options for constituent participation laid out, the speaker, identified as Tracy Richter, of the DeJong-Richter consulting group, which is working with the Philadelphia School District, took to the floor to begin giving the actual schematics of the program.

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Richter opened by stating that a major aim of "Imagine 2014" is to evaluate and overhaul curriculums from school to school as and where needed. The aim is to balance school classes and programs available from school to school in order to cut back on the need for students to travel to various schools just to get their entire graduating requirements in or the need for a student to pass through multiple schools just to cover all grades of high school.

It is a program that aims to achieve balance in each individual school.

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One means of obtaining this balance after extensive evaluation of each school is to identify when and where to make large-scale capital investments.

Another goal is to identify where administrative surpluses exist and how best to quash such issues district-wide.

Goals of this nature are meant to act as “educational primer,” as Richter called it, where “rational solutions” become easier to concoct.

By creating this level of program and class efficiency from facility to facility where the need for travel is eliminated, a secondary goal that the program hopes to achieve is to give students throughout Philadelphia a greater chance to explore a wider variety of programs within their own schools.

This exploration hopes to provide for students at a younger age in order to better prepare them for later grades.

Also pertaining directly to facility use, the program hopes to address class size.

This would not necessarily set a number for each class or teach/student ratio schools to have to meet, but would make sure that each school is optimizing the potential of their capacity to the most effective and efficient level after extensive evaluations.

The program will also assist in helping schools model some classes toward suiting anticipated areas of career growth in the future, so that students are better prepared for certain aspects of job demand.

The overall plan has nine distinct plans of action, all of which are geared toward overhaul of facilities and programs in order to increase efficiency and effectiveness. The time for accepting suggestions and recommendations from the public is now through October 18, when the final draft of the plan will be presented to the School Reform Commission and, hopefully, go into action.

Numerous meetings are scheduled to take place in the coming months enabling the public to educate itself and have its say.

If the program reaches its ultimate aim, most all deficiencies in any Philadelphia school district will be addressed and corrected by the proposed end date of the program through strategic investment of capital and stringent internal evaluation of all educational facilities, meeting organizers said.

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