Philadelphia’s public pools are closing this week and back-to-school sales are everywhere, but the first day of school is still a ways off for the 140,000 students in the School District of Philadelphia.
Students in many of the city’s public charter schools, however, are already in class. In fact, some – such as KIPP and Global Leadership Academy – opened in early August. This is because charter schools have more autonomy than traditional public schools over their academic calendar as well as their curriculum, staffing, and budget decisions.
That autonomy – specifically the freedom to spend dollars differently than traditional district schools – is the focus of a new report from the Pennsylvania School Boards Association (PSBA), an advocacy group of traditional school districts, criticizing charter school spending.
Charter schools do spend money differently than traditional district-run schools. And that’s the whole point! What traditional district-run schools have been doing isn’t working when it comes to serving students from low-income backgrounds in Philadelphia.