PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — The Philadelphia school board is taking a new tack starting Thursday night. Instead of concentrating on operations and contracts, the panel will focus on whether students are learning.
It was estimated that the old School Reform Commission spent only 10% of its time talking about student achievement. The local school board running Philadelphia schools for the last 2.5 years is out to change that, said board member Mallory Fix Lopez.
"We used to get very caught up in what is happening, where publicly we were never getting to, now what are we going to do about it?" Fix Lopez said.
Starting at Thursday night's meeting, the board will take a monthly deep dive into its goals for student performance, asking questions like who's struggling the most, and why do some strategies work and not others.
It's an effort to hold Superintendent William Hite accountable, and to determine how the board can support him.
Board president Joyce Wilkerson said the administration will not get a pass because of the pandemic.
"We're expecting to see progress. We are doing a lot of professional development trying to provide a lot of support to students. We're not willing to write this off as a lost year, a lost year and a half," Wilkerson said.
The board's goals include standards for reading, math, and college and career readiness.
