Started in November 2010, daily postings from the Keystone State Education Coalition now reach more than 4050 Pennsylvania education policymakers – school directors, administrators, legislators, legislative and congressional staffers, Governor's staff, current/former PA Secretaries of Education, superintendents, school solicitors, principals, charter school leaders, PTO/PTA officers, parent advocates, teacher leaders, business leaders, faith-based organizations, labor organizations, education professors, members of the press and a broad array of P-16 regulatory agencies, professional associations and education advocacy organizations via emails, website, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn.
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Keystone
State Education Coalition
PA Ed Policy Roundup for Jan. 6, 2021
Coronavirus pandemic
has been a boon for PA's cyber charters
"The current charter funding
mechanism forces school districts to overpay cyber charter schools and overpay
for charter special education costs by hundreds of millions of dollars each
school year"
Cyber charter
enrollment in Pa. has spiked since COVID-19 outbreak
Erin
Bamer York Dispatch January 5, 2021
The
coronavirus pandemic has been a boon for Pennsylvania's cyber
charters, which, some officials say, could further erode the public schools
that ultimately fund them. Statewide, enrollment has increased by more than
17%, or about 25,000, students, since March, said Lenny McAllister, CEO of
the Pennsylvania Coalition of Public Charter Schools. About 168,000 students
now attend a cyber charter, he said, up from 143,000 in March. Supporters
of the cyber charter model say it provides more stability compared to
public school districts, which have developed varying strategies for remote
learning during the pandemic. "Districts don't know how to deliver online
education," said Timothy Eller, senior vice president of outreach and
government relations for Commonwealth Charter Academy. Public school officials
found themselves having reinvent themselves this spring as statewide lockdowns
forced students online. Suddenly, the cyber model was ahead of the curve. For
example, York City School District, which has struggled for years to keep
students from moving to charter schools, responded earlier this year by
creating a cyber charter of its own in an attempt to compete. Cyber charter
schools have been criticized by some public officials, including
Eric Wolfgang, president of the Pennsylvania School Boards Association. In an
op-ed published Dec. 29 in The York Dispatch, Wolfgang wrote the increased
enrollment will have a negative financial impact on public school districts and
should be a concern for taxpayers. "The current charter funding
mechanism forces school districts to overpay cyber charter schools and overpay
for charter special education costs by hundreds of millions of dollars each
school year," Wolfgang said.
Announcing the launch
of the Pennsylvania Charter Performance Center!
PA CHARTER
PERFORMANCE CENTER/PCCY January, 2021
The PA
Charter Performance Center, a project of PCCY, is dedicated to advancing a
Pennsylvania-specific, data-based conversation about charter school quality and
equity. The Center seeks to improve the quality of education, especially for
at-risk students, by producing unbiased, accurate, and timely information that
will build momentum for the adoption of sound state-level charter school
policy. Please join us for our kickoff event on Wednesday, January 13, 2021 at
12:00 pm where we see what lessons we can learn from New Orleans. New Orleans
radically remade its education system in the wake of Hurricane Katrina by
closing nearly all traditional public schools and replacing them with charter
schools. Doug Harris, author of the acclaimed Charter School City, will
describe the outcomes and unintended consequences of this experiment in the Big
Easy. Register today for what will be a lively discussion about charter schools
and the role they play in educating our children. Click here to learn more about the PA Charter
Performance Center and our work on behalf of PA's children.
PA Schools Receive
$1.9 Billion in COVID-19 Emergency Relief Grants
Berks County
BCTV By Office of Senator David Argall Jan 05, 2021
HARRISBURG –
The recently passed federal Stimulus Package contains $1.9 Billion in emergency
relief funds for both public and private schools across Pennsylvania, according
to Senator David G. Argall. This includes 20 school districts and charter
schools in the 29th Senatorial District, which Argall
represents. This news comes after the Senate Majority Policy Committee
heard testimony from educators that raised concerns as to whether school
districts would be able to handle the financial burden placed on them by the
COVID-19 mitigation measures of the Department of Education. “I was very
pleased to hear that the new stimulus bill provides this assistance to our
schools districts,” said Argall. “Our children are our most valuable
resource and ensuring that they have a safe and secure environment to learn in
is of the utmost importance. This new funding will be an incredible asset as
schools continue to grapple with the new reality that the COVID-19 pandemic has
forced upon us all.” These funds will be distributed through the Elementary and
Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund (ESSER), which was established under the
CARES act when it was passed last year. While this is the second time
that these grants have been distributed since the pandemic began, Pennsylvania
schools will be receiving approximately four times as much money this time
around. The money received can be used for a variety of COVID-19 mitigation
measures including purchasing cleaning supplies, coordinating operations for
long-term closures, purchasing educational technology that supports students in
need who are learning from home, and providing principals with the resources
they need to keep their school running smoothly.
Teachers could get
coronavirus vaccine in February, Philadelphia health commissioner says
Chalkbeat
Philly By Johann Calhoun Jan 5, 2021, 9:40pm EST
Philadelphia
teachers could get the COVID-19 vaccine as soon as February, according to the
city’s health commissioner. Dr. Thomas Farley said Tuesday that while plans
have not been finalized, it’s likely that teachers will be listed in the 1B
group with frontline workers. These workers are expected to get the vaccine
once the city’s health care workers have received it. “We still haven’t given
definition to the category of frontline central workers,” Farley said. “I
imagine [teachers] will probably be in there. That group is a large group —
there are many people who fall into that category.” Area hospitals began
administering the vaccine last month. The city’s more than 100,000 health care
workers, in group 1A, were the first to have access to the vaccine. Farley said
once heath care workers are inoculated, those in the 1B group may receive the
vaccine at a combination of pharmacies, health clinics, and physician offices. The
city anticipates beginning to vaccinate the 1B group around February 1,
according to Farley. “But it’s a very large group, so it may take months for us
to get through that entire group,” he said.
https://philadelphia.chalkbeat.org/2021/1/5/22216218/philadelphia-teachers-coronavirus-vaccine
SDL makes plans for 3
learning options, will survey parents before projected Jan. 25 start
GAYLE
JOHNSON FOR LNP | LANCASTERONLINE January 6, 2021
The School
District of Lancaster will survey parents this week on three different learning
environments they may select for their children beginning Jan. 25. This move
comes after Superintendent Damaris Rau on Tuesday night unveiled plans to make
Jan. 25 the date the district will welcome students to return to class if they
wish. Most of the district’s 11,000 students haven’t experienced that since
March. However, board members who will vote next week did not give Rau
unofficial verbal approval for the proposal, which also calls for in-class
learning five days each week and covers the entire educational day, all while
social distancing 6 feet at all times. In addition, board members may consider
alternate back-to-school scenarios that offer half-day instruction or have some
grades return earlier than others. The main goal, Rau said, is to encourage as
many students as possible to return to classrooms.
Citing 'substantial'
spread of virus, Erie School District to stay all-virtual in January
Ed
Palattella Erie Times-News Januaryy 5, 2021
The Erie
School District and Millcreek Township School District are neighbors, but their
respective school boards are not thinking alike on when to reopen schools
during the pandemic. Still wary about the trajectory of positive COVID-19
cases in Erie County, and following the recommendations of state officials, the
Erie School District, with its School Board's approval, is postponing
the start of in-person classes for elementary school students until at
least through Jan. 29. The Erie School District's decision, made Tuesday, comes
two days after the Millcreek School Board voted to override the recommendation
of that school district's superintendent, who wanted to postpone the start of
in-person classes for two weeks due to the number of local coronavirus cases.
Plans still uncertain
for Pittsburgh students’ return to school
ANDREW
GOLDSTEIN Pittsburgh Post-Gazette agoldstein@post-gazette.com JAN 5, 2021 6:20 PM
All
instruction options remain open in the Pittsburgh Public Schools as the school
year restarts following the holiday break. Superintendent Anthony Hamlet said
Tuesday during a press conference that the district wants to start bringing
students back into the classroom in late January, but the expected rise in
COVID-19 cases after the holidays leaves that plan uncertain. “We
know in-person learning for our students is the best, but safety is first for
our families, our teachers, our faculty and staff, and our administration and
personnel as well,” Mr. Hamlet said. “That guides our decision-making process.”The
vast majority of city students have not been in a classroom since March when
schools in Pennsylvania closed in an effort to slow the spread of COVID-19. The
district began to bring students back using a phased approach in early
November, but the attempt stopped after a few days because COVID-19 case
numbers spiked at the same time in Allegheny County.
Hamlet: Task force
will examine disparities, biases in safety at Pittsburgh's public schools
ANDREW
GOLDSTEIN Pittsburgh Post-Gazette agoldstein@post-gazette.com JAN 5, 2021 5:17 PM
The
Pittsburgh Public Schools on Tuesday announced the formation of a task force
that will support efforts to eliminate systemic race- and ability-based
inequities across the district. The “Re-Imagine School Safety Task Force”
will examine school safety policies and develop measures that seek to
reduce the harm of punitive measures on students — particularly students of
color — in the new year. “Our district will not bring back our Black students
to live and learn under the same racially biased environment that they left a
year ago,” Superintendent Anthony Hamlet said during a press conference. “We
will no longer set up Black students to fail; the school to prison pipeline and
achievement gaps will end.” The task force emerged from a resolution passed in
September by the school board aimed at increasing the transparency and
accountability of the district’s safety department.
A common sense plan
for high school sports | Opinion
Penn Live
Opinion By Joseph J. Roy Updated Jan 05, 2021; Posted Jan 05, 2021
Joseph J.
Roy, Ed.D, is Superintendent of Schools, Bethlehem Area School District.
On Dec. 9,
with a post-Thanksgiving coronavirus surge on top of the fall surge wreaking
havoc, the PIAA Board held a closed-to-the-public executive session. People
attuned to high school sports assumed that the private session would include
discussion of the frightening virus spread and whether winter sports should be
postponed until after the holidays. To the surprise of many, the PIAA Board
failed to take a public vote on the most important issue facing high school
athletics in the state -- whether or not winter sports should be postponed. The
executive session discussion followed by no vote spared the PIAA board from
making a public decision about winter sports. The following day, it was left to
Gov. Wolf to suspend all sports activities until Jan. 4. The PIAA’s decision
making throughout this crisis does not engender confidence that the PIAA
represents the concerns of schools during this pandemic. Prior to the Dec. 9
meeting, the PIAA Executive Director received letters from both the PA
Principals Association and the PA Association of School Administrators (PASA,
the Superintendents’ group) calling for the PIAA to postpone winter sports. The
PA School Boards Association (PSBA) also supported postponing the start of the
season.
https://www.pennlive.com/opinion/2021/01/a-common-sense-plan-for-high-school-sports-opinion.html
Georgia Senate
runoff: Democrat Warnock wins; second race too close to call
Penn Live By The Associated Press Updated 5:11 AM; Today 2:05 AM
ATLANTA (AP)
— Democrat Raphael Warnock won one of Georgia’s two Senate runoffs Wednesday,
becoming the first Black senator in his state’s history and putting the Senate
majority within the party’s reach. A pastor who spent the past 15 years leading
the Atlanta church where Martin Luther King Jr. preached, Warnock defeated
Republican incumbent Kelly Loeffler. It was a stinging rebuke of outgoing
President Donald Trump, who made one of his final trips in office to Georgia to
rally his loyal base behind Loeffler and the Republican running for the other
seat, David Perdue. The focus now shifts to the second race between Perdue and
Democrat Jon Ossoff. The candidates were locked in a tight race and it was too
early to call a winner. Under Georgia law, a trailing candidate may request a
recount when the margin of an election is less than or equal to 0.5 percentage
points. If Ossoff wins, Democrats will have complete control of Congress,
strengthening President-elect Joe Biden’s standing as he prepares to take
office on Jan. 20.
Democrats decry
‘farce’ as PA Senate descends into chaos over swearing-in
PA Capital
Star By Elizabeth
Hardison January 5, 2021
What was
supposed to be a routine and ceremonial meeting of the Pennsylvania state
Senate devolved into chaos on Tuesday, as Republican lawmakers moved to block
one Democrat from being sworn in to his seat, and ousted another from his
position as their presiding officer. The floor of the Senate chamber was
engulfed in shouting for minutes on end Tuesday after Republican lawmakers
motioned to delay the inauguration of incumbent Sen. James Brewster,
D-Allegheny, whose 69-vote victory in the Nov. 3 General Election is being
challenged by his Republican opponent Nicole Ziccarelli. Pennsylvania’s
Secretary of State has already certified Brewster as the winner in the race for
the 45th Senate District, which includes parts of Allegheny and Westmoreland
counties. The state Supreme Court last month rejected Ziccarelli’s
request to toss hundreds of mail-in ballots on technical grounds. Ziccarelli
has now brought that argument to federal court, and to the Senate itself in a
petition contesting the election results and asking Senators to consider her
the victor. Republicans on Monday announced
their intent to block Brewster’s swearing-in while
they consider Ziccarelli’s petition. That didn’t stop Democrats from mounting a
protest. And on Tuesday they moved to put off inaugurating all 25 recently
elected senators until a federal judge issues a judgement in Ziccarelli’s court
case.
Republicans in
Congress are about to object to Pennsylvania’s election results. Here’s what
you need to know.
Congress
will convene a joint session today to count the Electoral College votes from
the presidential election — with Pennsylvania in the crosshairs.
Inquirer by Jonathan Lai, and Jeremy Roebuck Published 3 hours ago
Congress
will convene a joint session Wednesday to count the Electoral College votes
from the presidential election — with Pennsylvania in the crosshairs. More than
100 Republican House members and a dozen senators have pledged to contest the state’s results and those
from other battlegrounds, turning what’s normally a pro forma affair into what
President Donald Trump and his allies cast as their last chance to reverse his
loss. Their efforts have essentially no chance of stopping Congress from
signing off on President-elect
Joe Biden’s victory — the last procedural step before his
inauguration on Jan. 20. “At the end of the day, Congress is going to count 306
electoral votes for the Biden-Harris ticket,” said Derek T. Muller, an
election-law professor at the University of Iowa and an expert on the process.
“The only question is, how do they get there and how long does it take?” Here’s
what you need to know.
Dozens of GOP
lawmakers, including many from Pa., to reject certifying Biden as president
PA Capital
Star By Ariana
Figueroa| Laura
Olson January 5, 2021
WASHINGTON — The
final step in a turmoil-filled 2020 presidential election is set for Wednesday,
when Congress will certify election results showing that Joe Biden defeated
President Donald Trump. But a series of objections from GOP legislators is
expected to stretch that routine process into a much lengthier one — and one
that is dividing the Republican Party between those who back Trump’s baseless
claims of election fraud and those who do not. Those claims have failed
repeatedly in dozens of lawsuits brought by Trump’s legal team. At least 12 GOP
senators and dozens of House Republicans say they intend to object to the Electoral
College results as those votes are read, state by state, in a joint session
that begins at 1 p.m. ET Wednesday. The positions of every Republican member of
Congress from States Newsroom’s 20 states are collected here—as well as the
names of the many Republicans who have not yet disclosed whether they will vote
to certify Biden as the president-elect.
Congress set to
confirm Biden’s electoral win over Trump
WHYY By Associated Press Lisa Mascaro and Mary Clare Jalonick January
6, 2021
President
Donald Trump’s extraordinary effort to overturn the presidential election is
going before Congress as lawmakers convene for a joint session to confirm
the Electoral
College vote won by Joe Biden. The typically
routine proceeding Wednesday will be anything but, a political confrontation
unseen since the aftermath of the Civil War as Trump mounts a desperate effort
to stay in office. The president’s Republican allies in the House and Senate
plan to object to the election results, heeding supporters’ plea to “fight for
Trump” as he stages a rally outside the White House. It’s tearing the party
apart. The longshot effort is all but certain to fail, defeated by bipartisan
majorities in Congress prepared to accept the results. Biden, who won the Electoral College 306-232, is
set to be inaugurated Jan. 20. “The most important part is that, in the end,
democracy will prevail here,” Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, among
those managing the proceedings, said in an interview. The joint session of
Congress, required by law, will convene at 1 p.m. EST under a watchful,
restless nation — months after the the Nov. 3 election, two weeks before the
inauguration’s traditional peaceful transfer of power and against the backdrop
of a surging COVID-19 pandemic.
https://whyy.org/articles/congress-set-to-confirm-bidens-electoral-win-over-trump/
Fall School
Reopenings Didn’t Dramatically Increase COVID-19 Hospitalizations
Education
Week By Stephen Sawchuk — January 04, 2021 6 min
read
For the most
part, school reopenings in the fall did not appear to contribute to increased
hospitalization rates due to COVID-19, according to research released on Monday. The finding adds to a growing body of
evidence suggesting that schools did not play much of a role in fueling
infections when community transmission rates remained relatively low. It is the
first study to use hospitalization as its key health measure, a research
advance that avoids some of the problems with using test-positivity counts as a
proxy for COVID-19 spread. But in places where community spread was higher, the
researchers found that the link between schooling and health effects grew
murkier, with no clear pattern in the results, a red flag of sorts as schools
consider expanding in-person learning options in the midst of a third surge of
record-breaking rates of COVID-19 from coast to coast. “Given the recent spike
in hospitalizations in recent months, policymakers should be cautious. It may
not be safe to reopen schools where the virus is already widespread,” said Engy
Ziedan, an assistant professor of economics at Tulane who studies health care
and a co-author on the study, in a statement. Nor does it address what could
happen if a new, more contagious strain of COVID-19 already identified in three states takes root across the United States.
PSBA Webinar: New
Congress, New Dynamics
JAN 14, 2021
• 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM
The 2020
election brings significant changes to the 117th U.S. Congress. How will the
newly sworn-in senators and representatives impact public education? What
issues will need to be addressed this session? To become an effective
legislative advocate you’ll need to understand the new players and dynamics. Our
experts will profile key new members, discuss what big trends you can expect
and highlight the issues that will be debated over the next two years.
Presenters: Jared Solomon, senior public advisor,
BOSE Public Affairs Group
John Callahan, chief advocacy officer, PSBA
Cost: Complimentary for members.
Registration: https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_CQkk1Sd0QmOhdJ3VmlSzGg
https://www.psba.org/event/new-congress-new-dynamics/
Adopt the 2020 PSBA resolution
for charter school funding reform
In this
legislative session, PSBA has been leading the charge with the Senate, House of
Representatives and the Governor’s Administration to push for positive charter
reform. We’re now asking you to join the campaign: Adopt the resolution: We’re
asking all school boards to adopt the 2020 resolution for charter school
funding reform at your next board meeting and submit it to your legislators and
to PSBA.
Resolution for charter funding reform (pdf)
Link
to submit your adopted resolution to PSBA
337 PA school boards have
adopted charter reform resolutions
Charter school funding reform continues to be
a concern as over 330 school boards across the state have adopted a resolution
calling for legislators to enact significant reforms to the Charter School Law
to provide funding relief and ensure all schools are held to the same quality
and ethics standards. Now more than ever, there is a growing momentum from
school officials across the state to call for charter school funding reform.
Legislators are hearing loud and clear that school districts need relief from
the unfair funding system that results in school districts overpaying millions
of dollars to charter schools.
https://www.psba.org/2020/03/adopted-charter-reform-resolutions/
Know Your Facts on Funding and Charter Performance. Then
Call for Charter Change!
PSBA Charter Change Website:
https://www.pacharterchange.org/
The Network for Public Education Action Conference has
been rescheduled to April 24-25, 2021 at the Philadelphia Doubletree Hotel
Any comments contained herein are my comments, alone, and do not
necessarily reflect the opinions of any other person or organization that I may
be affiliated with.
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