Video: SRC member told kids they attend failing schools

Last month, student activists from the Philadelphia Student Union - pupils at city public schools - staged a protest at a screening of the film "Won't Back Down," held at school headquarters and hosted by School Reform Commissioner Sylvia Simms.

Students present at the event said that as they were chanting to disrupt the film, Simms yelled at them, telling them they "probably attend failing schools."

Simms, in an Inquirer interview after the event, denied the charge. She said that she has "noticed we have a lot of failing schools. It's my job to try as fix as many schools as I can."

She said she could not remember exactly what she said that night, but said that she asked the students which schools they attended.

But a new video released by the Student Union Wednesday shows that Simms did say that the students were "probably in failing schools." Another adult present at the film screening, not an SRC member or district employee, began chanting: "lock them up" at the students.

Philadelphia School District spokesman Fernando Gallard on Wednesday said that Simms was not clear about her message.

"She was not degrading the students," Gallard said. "She was trying to say, 'You are probably going to one of these failing schools we're trying to fix."

Simms has taken major public heat for her comment. At an SRC meeting held shortly after the protest, she did not address the controversy, but Chairman Bill Green did.

"Commissioner Simms is one of the most powerful voices for students in Philadelphia," Green said.