Area profs urge City Council to up funding for school district
Nearly 200 area professors are urging City Council to increase funding for the city's public schools.
College educators are getting involved in the local public schools funding crisis.
Nearly 200 professors from the region are urging City Council to provide the cash-strapped Philadelphia School District with more revenue.
"Philadelphia cannot afford to shortchange its children and the health and reputation of our city by underfunding public education," the group, calling itself Higher Education United for Public Education, said in an open letter to council.
"Overcrowded classrooms; bare-bones course offerings; reduced support for English as a second language, special education, and gifted programs; shuttered libraries; insufficient access to counselors and nurses; unsafe conditions: our public school students are suffering."
The group is asking council to:
* Approve the one percent sales tax extension and allocate the first $120 million to the school district.
* Change the property tax millage rate so that the district receives 60 percent of the revenue. The district currently gets 55 percent.
Among the 185 people who signed are 140 registered voters in the city of Philadelphia. A total of 25 colleges and universities are represented. Among them are: St. Joseph's, Drexel, Temple, the University of Pennsylvania, Swarthmore, Bryn Mawr, Harcum, Arcadia, Eastern, University of Delaware, Gwynedd Mercy, The College of New Jersey, Thomas Jefferson, Rutgers-Camden, Drew, Immaculata, University of the Sciences, New Jersey Institute of Technology, Community College of Philadelphia and Bucks County Community College.
The professors belong to departments as varied as chemical and biological engineering, education, English, law, political science, pediatrics and sociology.
Here's a link their letter:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Eb8eN-x7hfkzVTA4NTfhBMrHyWZPo-hQIr9d1ouz-9o/edit?usp=sharing