Should schools chief have known?

Did Philadelphia Schools Superintendent Arlene Ackerman know her staff was preparing a proposal that would include a controversial "diversity" component in the admissions process for the district's highly competitive magnet schools?

Ackerman, her chief of staff, and her chief operations officer all say no. And they say no emphatically and unequivocally.

But political leaders and educators say there's another equally important question: Should Ackerman have known?

There, the answer is more ambiguous.

In a November report given to Ackerman, a district committee charged by her with shortening the timeline for the admissions process recommended including "a gender and racial balance component" for citywide and special-admission schools, such as Masterman and Central - two of the state's highest performers.

But John Frangipani, the administrator who wrote the report, says now that the language did not refer to a change in admissions criteria.

Ackerman said Saturday that she did not recall that wording in the document or even the document itself.

"The lesson learned here is, I obviously didn't pay enough attention to it," she said. "My big initiatives are in the strategic plan, and that's where I tried to keep my energy."

Chief of staff Tomas Hanna and Frangipani also accepted blame for the miscommunications, which resulted in a proposal to add a diversity component to the high school admission process - which ultimately was squelched by Ackerman after it became public and stirred controversy.

"My job was to correct it, which I did," Ackerman said. "Analyze it with my team - where do we close the loop on this so it never happens again - and move on. This is one that I think we can recover from."

She is not planning any disciplinary moves.

"Ultimately, I have to take the blame because I'm in charge," she said. "I'm sorry that it happened. People make mistakes."

The district's magnet schools as a group enroll a higher share of white, Asian, and female students than the district overall.

The committee eventually developed a draft proposal that would have taken magnet-school admissions out of the hands of principals and their committees and selected students using a central computerized system. Students would have qualified for a lottery based on a 1,000-point system, which would have allotted 200 points for "diversity" as measured by a student's neighborhood or zip code and income level.

The proposal was due to be introduced at a districtwide parents meeting this month, but that was abruptly canceled and the proposal killed by Ackerman.

She said she had no idea the committee had strayed into the area of a point system and a diversity component. In fact, she said Saturday that she was not aware that students were selected for magnet schools by principals and their committees.

The proposal had already been the talk of some parent groups and principals who were concerned such changes would lower the schools' academic standards.

Frangipani disagreed that the language hints at the committee's recent proposal.

The district always has looked at racial and gender equity in special-admit schools, he said. "None of that is new."

Frangipani provided the Nov. 12 document, titled "Placement Timeline Re-alignment Project," as proof that Ackerman only directed his committee to look at shortening the timeline so parents find out in February rather than April if their children are admitted to the special high schools. The committee was activated by Ackerman in response to complaints from parents, he said.

Frangipani said Ackerman did not charge the committee with reviewing or altering the selection criteria.

"I went down the wrong road on this," he said. "I went somewhere I really shouldn't have, and she wasn't briefed. It was an error."

He did so, he said, when he began to research other cities and found that shortening the timeline was linked to changing the admissions process. A centralized system would speed up the process.

On Page 6 of the report, under "Recommendations" is the following bullet: "Establish updated procedures to ensure equity in admission to citywide and special-admission schools."

It calls for reconvening the "admissions criteria review" committee in December 2009 and reads: "Include gender and racial balance component for the admission of students."

Frangipani said that language refers to reviewing requirements in the district's handbook.

He said the committee did not veer into looking at a point system and a centralized process until later.

Hanna also accepted responsibility for the miscommunication, which has played badly for Ackerman in political and educational circles.

"If I were there, I would be troubled that I didn't know," said Phil Goldsmith, a former interim school district chief executive officer.

"It doesn't look good regardless of how it happened," said Zack Stalberg, president of the Committee of Seventy election-watchdog group. "Best case, you could say it looks like she's not in control. . . . Imagewise, there's been damage that's been done here."

Hanna said he knew Frangipani and his committee were exploring changes to the selection process, which was not the original charge, and he did not tell Ackerman.

"I should have done it. I didn't do it. Won't happen again," he said.

Hanna said they had planned to air the proposal with parents, principals, and others and then go to Ackerman.

"That process should have been flipped," he said.

Hanna also said he misjudged how volatile the issue could become, even though former Superintendent David Hornbeck faced fierce opposition during his tenure in the mid-1990s when he proposed similar changes.

"I should have picked up the fact that this is a hot-button issue in this city," he said.

Added Frangipani, former principal of Masterman: "I know how sensitive of an issue this is. I should have been more astute as to what was coming."

Ackerman spoke publicly in favor of shortening the application process for the magnet schools after a research report was issued in February by Research for Action, a Philadelphia think tank.

Research for Action criticized the admissions process, saying there is scant information for students and lack of seats in the 19 magnet and 11 citywide-admission high schools. As a result, disadvantaged students are shortchanged and most of them end up in the neighborhood schools, the report said.

In a statement at the time, Ackerman said she agreed with most of the report and had "asked my executive team to fully review the recommendations in the study and to provide me with a comprehensive action plan by early March that will detail how we should move forward to improve our students' transition into high school."

Now, as a result of the work by Frangipani's committee, the high school selection timeline will be shortened and officials are looking at ways to inform students about high school options earlier in their elementary- and middle-school years.

One member of Frangipani's committee who asked not to be named said there had been concerns about the selection process. Parents would question why their child was not admitted to a magnet when he or she met all the objective criteria, such as test scores.

Because more qualified students apply than there are seats, the selection committees make decisions based on other less concrete factors such as the interview, the committee member said. There have been concerns that students with influential or otherwise connected parents may get an edge over a disadvantaged student who has no help.

A centralized lottery would have taken the subjectivity out of the process, the member explained.

Ackerman, Hanna, and Frangipani, however, emphasized that the issue is dead. "It is off the table," Hanna said.