School Bells Sound Early Start for Philly Students

It is a fresh start to the school year for students, parents, teachers and administrators in the Philadelphia School District. For students and their parents today's opening of school finds classes resuming for the first time in recent memory before Labor Day. Traditionally classes resumed in the public schools the day after the holiday weekend but there has been a trend in elementary and secondary schools as well as colleges to return to class prior to the holiday.

Philadelphia area parochial grade and high school pupils are set to return to classes next week in the five-county Archdiocese.

The former state-controlled School Reform Commission made the move to the earlier start of classes last year in what many observers say follows the trend across the country but also ensures as many uninterrupted
weeks of instruction as possible. School Superintendent William Hite notes that class interruptions due to holidays often get in the way of education and the move to the earlier start facilitates an uninterrupted first week to get the semester off to a good beginning. The earlier start to classes will mean an earlier summer vacation with Philly kids looking to end the school year on June 4th. The jump start to the fall term also gives the district a bit of wiggle room in the school calendar in the event of snow days and other unplanned interruptions.

The new school calendar will also give students and their parents a two-week grace period to get school uniforms together.

For teachers and staff many were back to work earlier this month in preparation for the start of the fall term. This year not only marks the start of classes in Philly public schools before Labor Day it also marks the
beginning of the new Philadelphia School Board in charge of the city schools.

The start of the semester returns local control of the city schools back a local school board with members appointed by the mayor. A nine-member panel is now in charge of the public schools after the state-run
School Reform Commission moved to disband and turn control over to local officials. It marks the return to local control for the first time in nearly two decades.

The new school year will also feature enhanced classrooms with the district spending more than $38 million to spruce up more than 250 pre-K through third grade classrooms. The improvements include replacing poor lighting, old paint and fixing structural issues. However close to 9,700 classrooms around the district are still in dire need of repairs and at least a coating of fresh paint.

Some of the other improvements awaiting the district's 128,000 students arriving for classes today are expanded art and music programs at all 215 schools and an increase in ninth-grade academies to 28 high schools up from 19 last year.

As for classroom environmental concerns that bubbled up last year, Superintendent Hite says those issues have been addressed and are constantly being monitored. Work crews were diligent through the summer removing asbestos and mold in effected buildings and the problem of peeling paint has been rectified. In those schools where more work is needed Hite says students will not sit in classrooms while painting is being
done. Rather he says some classes may have to be relocated to other parts of the school building while work continues. The superintendent assures parents that students will not be sitting in rooms that are
still being painted.