PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — An unreliable heater at a Germantown elementary school has broken down again. This time, there was a lingering odor after the repair, so students were briefly relocated. Parents were not immediately notified, and at least one mother thinks that's not acceptable.
Students at Fitler Academics Plus attended class with their coats and hats on last week. Trouble with the heating system has annoyed staff and students since they returned from winter break.
A mechanical failure caused the boiler to fail again Monday morning. It was repaired, according to the School District of Philadelphia's chief operating officer. Residual oil in the boiler was causing an odor, and it needed to be burned off.
Students had been in school for only a brief time before they were relocated by bus to Martin Luther King High School for the rest of the day. A notification was sent to parents about an hour after the kids were already at the other school.
Syreeta from Germantown says her son told her about the move (he contacted her from the school bus en route to MLK High) before the school did.
"Where was the permission slip, if they got to go on a school trip? Don't they need a permission slip? Y’all didn't send any notification or anything out to let the parents know that y'all were taking their kids from one school to another school,” she said.
Syreeta says the school district must get better at communication. Just last week, she said her son called her to tell her he was “freezing cold” before the school informed her and other parents.
“You gotta let parents know. You can’t just do that to children. Some children are not going to speak up, but as a parent, I’m going around there to see what’s going on,” she said last week.
Reached on Monday, she said: “What if they had doctors appointments, and you go up to the school to get your child early, thinking that you have to go somewhere, and they aren't even there? Nobody was informed that their children were leaving the building on school buses.”
The students were dismissed from the high school and taken back to their elementary school at the end of the school day.
Fitler students will continue in-person learning at Martin Luther King High School on Tuesday. They are asked to report to Fitler at 9 a.m. to be transported to MLK High for the school day. At the end of the day, students will be shuttled back to Fitler for their normal dismissal times.