Schools CEO seeks expert advice

Incoming Philadelphia School District CEO Arlene Ackerman has commissioned a panel of 24 local and national experts to evaluate the district and make recommendations before the next school year.

The Transition Advisory Team, which began work yesterday, will evaluate the district in several areas, including teaching and learning, safety, public engagement, capacity building, resource allocation, and the outside groups managing nearly 40 of the district's 270 schools.

Among its participants are university professors; the district's two other finalists for the job of chief executive officer; former and current administrators from public schools in San Francisco, where Ackerman served as superintendent; and Gov. Rendell's budget secretary, Michael Masch, long rumored to be in line for a high-level district post.

Ackerman, who was in Philadelphia yesterday, also told reporters that she would:

Create an ombudsman office to deal with district complaints better.

Expand hours for all district offices. Beginning June 2, offices will be open from 7:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Workers' schedules will be staggered to keep costs the same, Ackerman said.

Announce members of her administrative team the week of May 5.

Ackerman, who will begin her new job full-time June 1, said yesterday that the transition panel's main job would be to listen to parents, teachers and other district participants, and review existing reports on the 167,000-student system. Six public forums will be scheduled, along with private focus groups and other sessions.

"This is the first big step in listening and engaging the Philadelphia public, and I'm excited about this," she said. "They're going to help me sort of prioritize what are the things we need to start on right away."

Her theme for the new school year, she said, will be "Engaging Philadelphia Voices: Putting the P Back in Public Education." The effort appears to be a response to advocates who say the district has grown unresponsive to concerns, and to some complaints in San Francisco that Ackerman didn't involve parents enough in decision-making.

The transition-team effort will cost $75,000 to $100,000, which was negotiated when she was hired, Ackerman said. Each panel member will be offered a $1,000-a-day honorarium for the work, which is likely to span four days, she said. About half the participants declined the honorarium, she said.

The panel's local participants include Mayor Nutter's chief education officer, Lori Shorr, and Rendell policy adviser Donna Cooper. National education experts include Linda Darling-Hammond, a Stanford University education professor.

The panel is cochaired by Kent McGuire, dean of Temple University's College of Education since 2003, and Robert Peterkin, director of the Urban Superintendents' Program for the Harvard Graduate School of Education. McGuire was one of three finalists for the CEO job before withdrawing. Peterkin previously held school superintendent positions.

Leroy D. Nunery II, the other CEO finalist and a former executive for Edison Schools Inc., a for-profit education company, also is among the group.

Helen Gym of Parents United for Public Education questioned spending the money when district officials already knew what the problems were.

"It's not a matter of what do we know. It's a matter of what we're going to do about what we know," she said.

In a statement, School Reform Commission chairwoman Sandra Dungee Glenn called Ackerman's approach a "bold step" in helping to raise the district's performance another level.

These are the other members of the advisory panel:

Dan Katzir,

managing director of the Broad Foundation;

Eloise Brooks,

former San Francisco Unified School District chief academic officer;

Patricia A. Harvey,

a former superintendent with the National Center for Education and Economy;

Jeffrey Henig,

a professor at Teachers College at Columbia University;

Michael Rebell

of the Campaign for Educational Equity at Columbia;

Warren Simmons,

executive director of the Annenberg Institute for School Reform;

Lorraine Monroe

of the Monroe Leadership Institute;

Jerry Jordan,

president of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers;

Sheila Simmons

of Public Citizens for Children and Youth;

Michael Casserly,

executive director of the Council of Great City Schools;

James Honan,

educational cochair of the Institute for Educational Management at Harvard;

Myong Leigh,

deputy superintendent of policy and operations for San Francisco schools;

Richard Elmore,

Harvard researcher and director of the Consortium for Policy Research in Education;

Andy Porter,

dean of the University of Pennsylvania's Graduate School of Education;

Lew Smith,

director of the National Principals Leadership Institute;

Karen Mapp,

former deputy of parent affairs for Boston public schools and a lecturer at Harvard; and

Deanna Burney,

a former Philadelphia schools administrator with the Annenberg Institute.