Allentown School District: Citizen Committees Critique Superintendent's Cuts in Classes and Teachers

[JPZenger]

http://www.allentownsd.org/allentownsd/lib/allentownsd/Academic_Task_Force_Report_-_full_report.pdf

Corbett has put many lower income urban school districts in a very difficult situation, with a 15% cut in their state funding. Numerous state grant programs have been eliminated - including even the reimbursement for the charter schools they are required to approve.

The Allentown School District serves 17,000 students. It is likely that over 200 employees will be laid off, including many teachers, although no official numbers have been released.

At the same time, the new Superintendent has proposed massive changes to the curriculum. Some of those changes are necessary to justify the layoff of teachers under State law. However, others are much harder to justify. The changes were proposed in secrecy, with no opportunity for input by teachers or parents. In response to public outcry (including by over 100 high school students at a board meeting), two meetings were held to invite citizen input.

The thoughtful conclusions of those sessions are at the above link. (The District also posted a summary, which doesn't say ANYTHING of substance.)

The changes are scheduled to be approved Thursday evening at a meeting at the South Mtn. Middle School.

[JPZenger]

1. Highlights of Academic Task Force Conclusions

Here are some highlights of comments from the Academic Task Forces. See the full report linked above:

- What is the purpose of spending $12 million on a building at 4th and Allen if there is not a clear purpose for it?

- Will adjunct community college instructors be hired to teach classes who have no experience or training in teaching high school students?

- Will there be flexibility so that students can take a mix of regular, honors, dual enrollment and AP classes, depending upon their abilities, or will they have to choose all or nothing dual enrollment?

- How will students prepare for taking college college classes in 11th and 12th grade if many honors levels classes are eliminated for 9th and 10th graders?

- Why is so much attention being focused on providing a second way for top students to gain college credit, when the real need is dealing with the poorly performing students and the drop out rate?

- Why are important classes such as Public Speaking, Parenting, Anatomy, Criminal Justice and Economics being eliminated?