Parents plead to keep 2 schools open

PARENTS, STUDENTS and staff from two schools slated for closure pleaded their cases Monday night to the School Reform Commission in an effort to keep the schools open.

Superintendent William R. Hite resubmitted a school-closure plan in February that reduced the number of closings from 37 to 29, but added two new ones: Beeber Middle School in Overbrook and M. Hall Stanton School in North Philadelphia. The vote on the plan is scheduled for April 18.

Frustration was evident throughout the meeting from both sides. When the SRC discussed Beeber, many of its representatives yelled out "Keep it open!" When Hite told commissioners why the district chose Stanton to close over another school, some in the audience said "that's not what you told the media."

Beeber's student population has been declining, and the school now has a 26 percent utilization rate, school officials said. Fifty percent of its students score proficient or advanced in the Pennsylvania System of School Assesment math test, while 38 percent score at the same level in the reading PSSA.

Stanton also has seen a decline in enrollment and has a 45 percent capacity rate, district officials said. Twenty-eight percent of Stanton students score proficient or advanced in the math PSSAs, and 22 percent scored at proficient or advanced in the reading PSSAs.

Sheena Beckton, who called herself a "proud parent and consistent volunteer" at Stanton, held back tears as she told the SRC of the impact the school's closing would have on its special-needs students, such as her child.

"We ask how and who will be responsible for their continued development when our special-ed teachers are already overwhelmed," Beckton said.

After the meeting, Stanton's dean of students, John Coates, said he opposed all school closings.

"In my 27 years [at Stanton], we've had 17 different principals and 17 regional superintendents," Coates said. "There has been no true stability in that area."

The district plans to reconfigure Overbrook High School, where Beeber students have been reassigned, but many parents at the meeting were opposed to the idea of younger middle school students in the same area as older high school teens.

"I don't want to go to a big school with big students," said student Maia Muchison. "I don't want to get hurt."