Public Education

At a virtual meeting Tuesday night, parents discussed the rocky start of the 2021-2022 school year.

Superintendent William R. Hite Jr. says he’s reached out to Gov. Tom Wolf to ask for assistance with the district’s transportation crisis.

The district has yet to respond to a request for how or if it would penalize its vendor for underperformance on a $4 million annual contract.

Wolf says he’s seen mostly compliance with the mask mandate from districts and parents across the state. Some GOP lawmakers are suing.

As cases of COVID-19 have risen through the summer, parents and school boards have remained divided over mitigation strategies, culminating in heated meetings and threats.

Union leaders say a voice vote Wednesday indicated that members will ratify a new contract, which was negotiated just ahead of the old deal expiring.

A board vote Tuesday comes amid a lawsuit filed by a group of parents upset with the district’s intent to start the school year without mandatory masking.

The board’s vice president, who does not believe in systemic racism, was tasked with reinventing the district’s diversity, equity, and inclusion program.

District leaders urged communities to be vaccinated before the school year starts as evidence emerges about the delta variant’s greater transmissibility.

Educators, administrators, and advocates across Pa. said districts need to use some of the $4.5 billion in stimulus funding for schools to recruit and retain teachers of color

Along with the trauma and isolation of this past year, some students also found a new, and urgent, sense of community.

According to a new study, taxpayers are, in essence, funding racehorses at three times the rate they are investing in students in state universities.

Fund amounts will vary based on the amount of time a student spent in virtual school The max benefit will be about $1,200 per child.

The advocacy from superintendents comes as the financial pressure on districts has increased due to a significant boost in charter enrollment during the pandemic.

The board seems to have become functionally non-existent as important disputes between Pennsylvania school districts and charter schools are in limbo.