Thanks for your post Al. While I agree with your observations about the CEO of our school district I also feel we are choking on a gnat and swallowing a camel.
The bloated bureaucracy of centralized school districts was supposed to be relieved by the corporate/educational accountability movement and the further entrenchment of charter schools in public districts. Instead we have reaped a bitter harvest of "get-rich quick" political schemers and the selling of the the districts assets to the highest bidder with nothing to show for it. For instance what happened to the Art Collection that was sold? Now buildings are being targeted for sale as schools consolidate under "rightsizing". Ackerman et.al. are carrying out a much larger agenda which will result in the destruction of public schools in the US for poor, inner-city children. They are but small players on a huge stage built by right-wing entities such as The Broad Foundation, The Walton Foundation, The Philanthropy Roundtable, Americans for Prosperity and the 30 year-old Freedom of Choice movement. These big shots are seeking to control more public money and institutions for their private gain. Talk about spending other people's money ow about appropriating other people's money as one's own and giving nothing in return or any opportunity for redress. We are now in the final stages of this corporate fascism and it will expand to exclude anyone who is not a member of that very small exclusive club. From: "krf...@aol.com" <krf...@aol.com> Reply-To: "krf...@aol.com" <krf...@aol.com> Date: Sat, 14 May 2011 08:14:55 -0400 (EDT) To: UnivCity listserv <UnivCity@list.purple.com> Subject: Re: [UC] FW: In catchment or not, Penn Alexander will be forced to turn new ... In a message dated 5/13/2011 6:25:15 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, wil.p...@comcast.net writes: > > Ostensibly, any public school who receives funding from taxpayers should > never be able to turn away applicants who reside within the school's > neighborhood boundaries. Of course, economic reality rears its ugly head. And one of the sad economic realities in Philadelphia (probably lots of other places, too) is that the management of the school district is, er, "profligate" might be a polite term although I can think of others. Dr Ackermann and her cohorts spend other people's money like it's, well, other people's money. And even by cutting the numbers reportedly being laid off from the central administration of the school district (ostensibly without any negative (and likely positive) impact in whatever passes for productivity up there, I understand it will still be top-heavy. Further firing people who sit at their computers and play solitaire and battleships all day for lack of any real work doesn't affect the culture of entitlement at the higher levels. The school district may not have some of the personality problems that afflicted the Housing Authority, but there are obvious strong parallels. I wish I were able to propose a practical solution. Certainly putting more control in the hands of City Council would be -- if not a step from the frying pan into the fire, than from the fire into the frying plan. Cynically yours, Al Krigman
