We were not able to make it to the Superintendent’s Roundtable on Thursday night when Arlene Ackerman addressed parents and community members to talk about the issues facing the district, including proposed state budget cuts and school closings.

Luckily Amara Rockar from the West Philly Coalition for Neighborhood Schools attended the meeting and was kind enough to pass along a report on the meeting. This was originally posted on the coalition listserv. We have put bullets next to Amara’s main points. The meeting also took place as the Philadelphia Inquirer published an in-depth series on violence in Philadelphia schools.

Here is Amara’s report:

There were several hundred parents, children and staff in attendance. Martin Luther King and another school had brought in buses of parents (curiously, none of them brought up the charter debacle in the question section). Prospective parents and community members should feel comfortable attending in the future. The next roundtable is scheduled for June 2nd.

• Ackerman told a story of her son acting up in class and her showing up at his school and sitting in the back (without him knowing) and watching him misbehave. She followed him from class to class for the rest of the day. She encouraged parents to visit their child’s classes unannounced and said there was no district policy that you have to make an appointment first. During the Q&A section, several parents told of being turned away and one of being allowed inside the classroom but then the teacher refusing to teach in front of her. The superintendent referred these parents to her staff members so that they could contact the principals.

• Earlier in the program, the school climate person, Greg Shannon, went over a flyer about how to support safe schools but it was not very impressive (since the Philadelphia Inquirer articles says these methods are not used consistently or often properly). Parents had many stories of students with behavior problems disrupting school and then being allowed to return to the school. One at Childs Elementary in South Philly was allowed to return to take the PSSAs and then set a girl’s hair on fire during testing. Ackerman said that consistency and good instruction will triumph over disruption. She also reminded everyone that the district is still responsible for teaching all children, even those with behavior problems. Again, she had her staff get the information from the parents with specific concerns to see if more could be done. I was surprised no one mentioned the Inky’s allegations of underreporting of incidents by schools but I guess the parents’ concerns were more direct.

• Several parents had concerns about cuts to the special education programs. Ackerman said that they are not going to do things that would violate Individual Education Plans (IEPs) but that some extras would be eliminated. A couple parents of Autistic children expressed frustration at teacher turnover and good teachers being hounded out by teaching assistants who didn’t like that the good teachers made them work harder. Another parent was frustrated that her principal did not seem to have basic knowledge of Autism and Ackerman said that they would include something in the next principal education/training.

• Everyone was worried about the budget cuts and asked a lot of questions. Ackerman’s response was to encourage them to get involved and go to the rally on April 5th and/or write letters to representatives, the governor and the press. She also asked that people with family members in the suburbs that are represented by Republicans ask their family members to lobby as well (since most state reps in Philly are already on board with opposing the cuts). Given the history of people in West Philly moving out to the western suburbs, thought that was an interesting idea.

• As for school closings, Ackerman said there would be no closings for 2011-2012 and there would be a whole year of discussion. It sounded like some annexes or other facilities may get closed this year. There were several questions about specific dangerous buildings with parents actually advocating for repair or closure.  As I said earlier, full day kindergarten is in the 2011-2012 budget but other items will have to be cut as a result.

I left at 9 p.m. and Ackerman was still there answering questions and it looked like she was going to stay until she answered all of them. We often think of the district as something to be overcome or avoided if possible but the roundtable made it clear that the district is sometimes necessary and even helpful. There were a lot of parents who were not getting their concerns addressed by the principals and teachers of their schools.