The broken promise of William Penn High School

It was a moment of high drama - the threatened closure of a neighborhood institution, an emotional plea from concerned citizens, an eleventh-hour decision to spare William Penn High School from shutting forever.

That was in 2009, and then-Philadelphia School District Superintendent Arlene C. Ackerman made a pledge at a School Reform Commission meeting: After closing temporarily in 2010, William Penn would reopen in a few years better than ever.

There was talk of a new vocational focus, with cutting-edge science, technology engineering, and a math program that would equip neighborhood teens with skills to make them highly marketable.

"We have a moral responsibility to do the right thing by this community. I'm going to work with this community to give them what others already have," Ackerman said, adding that neighbors had endured years of broken promises from public officials.

Four years later, district officials are saying they simply cannot afford to reopen the school. William Penn is being marketed for sale, and Temple University has signaled it wants the multi-acre site a few blocks down North Broad from its main campus.

Ruth Birchett remembers standing on the sidewalk across the street from William Penn with homemade signs in 2009 protesting the school's closure. The community, she said, must renew the fight now.

"This is a major property in North Philadelphia," said Birchett, a local activist. "For those of us who are still holding on to the hopes of our parents to hold on to our properties, we feel pretty strongly about it. It's part of the identity of our community."

On Thursday night, members of an organization founded in 2009 to battle the closure will meet again to discuss plans for the site's future.

Priscilla Woods, one of the organizers, is unequivocal.

"We were promised a school," Woods said. "That site needs a school."

The William Penn Development Coalition surveyed community members and produced a plan for reusing the building that it will discuss at the meeting, Woods said.

"We need children to be successful on a global scale, and we will focus on that," she said.

The science and math school was always the plan, Birchett said.

After Ackerman promised to save William Penn, there were a few meetings about the site, Birchett said. Officials told community members they would be involved in whatever happened next - major renovations to the school, a total teardown with a new building, or a partial teardown.

"But nothing ever happened. Things just began to drag on. There was a long period of silence," Birchett said. Ackerman left the district in 2011 and died in 2012.

A showpiece with a television studio, Olympic-size swimming pool, and sprawling athletic fields, the building opened in 1974 for 3,000 students. By 2009, enrollment had plummeted to 600, some parts of the school were closed, and William Penn needed millions in repairs to remain open.

Woods said members of the coalition recently met with Superintendent William R. Hite Jr., who told them there was no need for a new career and technical school at William Penn.

The district has received millions in grant money to double the number of students in its career and technical programs, but officials say that money is expanding opportunities at existing schools.

District spokesman Fernando Gallard said a new school was not possible and William Penn must be sold.

"Given our financial situation, we have to make very difficult decisions regarding layoffs and cutting resources to schools," he said.

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