Pedro Ramos

In a surprise move, Gov. Corbett on Thursday nominated Pedro A. Ramos, a Democrat and former city school board president, to the School Reform Commission. Ramos, 46, will fill the seat that opened when David F. Girard-diCarlo, a Republican, resigned this year. If confirmed by the state Senate, he would serve until 2014 in the unpaid position. Ramos - a lawyer, graduate of the district, and public-school parent - sat on the school board from 1995 through 2001. He was president for two years, until the board was dissolved and the district taken over by the state.

Pedro Ramos remembers cramming into a book closet with two other kids for his fourth-grade reading class at Hunter Elementary School because there was no other space for them. He remembers the teacher running out of books in the North Philadelphia school and having to lend him her teacher's edition. "There is no reason why anyone should have to go through any period of time without a book," Ramos said. Ramos, 30, a product of Philadelphia's public schools and a lawyer for the well-known firm Ballard Spahr Andrews and Ingersoll, is the newest Board of Education member.

After Gov. Corbett named attorney Pedro Ramos - the last president of the defunct Philadelphia Board of Education - to the School Reform Commission yesterday, the irony was apparent to some. "I think that he [Ramos] is a nice guy," said Helen Gym, co-founder of the activist group Parents United for Public Education. "But the governor has named someone who was head of the Board of Education when the state decided the board was not capable of governance. "We don't need another political appointee.

After Mayor Street named Pedro Ramos the city's new solicitor earlier this year, the new employee's first stop was at the doorway of the Philadelphia region's U.S. attorney, Patrick L. Meehan. "It's always better to have faces with names, and to have some open channel of communication," said Ramos, who assumed the job amid perhaps the most extensive federal investigation into municipal corruption ever faced by Philadelphia City Hall. A former employee-benefits lawyer with no criminal-law experience, Ramos, two months into his job, is functioning as Philadelphia's top lawyer during an exceptionally busy time.

Pedro Ramos keeps a vase of dried roses in his office that he received a year ago when he became president of the Board of Education. A keepsake, yes. But these days, the roses also remind him of just how much he has been through during the last 12 months. "The roses look better than me," Ramos said last week, pointing out that he has put on weight, thanks to less time on his bike and all too many cookies during the weeks he spent negotiating a new teachers' contract. Ramos may feel somewhat sleep-deprived after a year that saw the loss of a superintendent, the near total remake of the Board of Education, marathon teacher-contract negotiations, and a school-uniform policy.

With a deficit looming and a decision on another contract for Superintendent David Hornbeck just a couple of months away, the Philadelphia school board voted yesterday to keep its leadership intact. The board, by an 8-0 vote, reelected Floyd Alston president. It will be the third consecutive year as president for Alston, 73, who also is president and chief executive officer of Beech Interplex Inc., a neighborhood revitalization company. Also, seven board members - Alston, Christine James-Brown, Dorothy Sumners Rush, Jacques Lurie, David LeVan, Pedro Ramos and Andrew Farnese - reelected Ramos as vice president, also for a third consecutive term.

Wendell Pritchett is now officially a member of the Philadelphia School Reform Commission. Pritchett, chancellor of Rutgers University-Camden and a mayoral appointee, signed the oath on Wednesday, the mayor's office said. Pritchett will attend his first SRC meeting on Wednesday. He joins Commissioners Denise McGregor Armbrister and Joseph Dworetzky. SRC Chairman Robert L. Archie Jr. and member Johnny Irizarry resigned last week; Pedro Ramos, who's widely expected to be named chairman, awaits confirmation by the state Senate.

Tuesday's editorial ("Answers aren't in the past") failed to discern the strong future that Pedro Ramos can help forge as a new member of the School Reform Commission. Ramos' previous leadership of the Board of Education was anything but ineffective. He exhibited courage, foresight, and tenacity by steering the board on a course that shook up the status quo from every angle. His tenure proved not the failure of that particular school board, but the failure of an outdated governing model that expected the commonwealth of Pennsylvania to pay more than half of the city's school bills, while keeping all decision-making a local prerogative.

Pedro Ramos, who spent two tumultuous years at the helm of Philadelphia's school board, was named yesterday to be vice president and chief of staff to University of Pennsylvania president Judith Rodin. Ramos, 36, said that he had not planned to leave his position as a partner with the Philadelphia law firm of Ballard Spahr Andrews & Ingersoll, but that when Rodin approached him about returning to his alma mater, "it was like being asked to join a gold-medal Olympic team. " Ramos graduated from Penn in 1987 with a degree in urban studies.

In advance of a critical budget session next week, City Council members pressed the School Reform Commission Thursday to back away from a warning that the city schools may be unable to open next fall without $94 million in new funds from city real estate taxes. But the commission chairman, Pedro Ramos, politely stood his ground. "We're at a crossroads … and it feels like there's a big pile of cans sitting there in the middle of the road, and it's every can that's been kicked down the road to this point," Ramos told Council members.

THE SCHOOL Reform Commission last night emphasized the Reform in its name, hiring a "chief recovery officer" to lead Philly's school district out of a financial abyss for the next six months and demoting two top-ranking officials. Former PGW head Thomas Knudsen was named to the new post. He will have the authority of the superintendent and the chief financial officer, SRC Chairman Pedro Ramos said. Knudsen has agreed to a half-year, $150,000 contract that will not pay him benefits, Ramos added.

HARRISBURG - Newly confirmed to the Philadelphia School Reform Commission, Chairman Pedro Ramos said he would focus on reestablishing the "robust oversight role" state law intended the panel to have. A key part of that oversight is stabilizing the Philadelphia School District's shaky finances, Ramos said in an interview. The state Senate confirmed Gov. Corbett's nomination of Ramos on Monday. "From the outside, it looks like the strategy is to defer, to pray that the economy improves, and to borrow," he said of the district's finances.

Pedro Ramos, a lawyer and partner in the firm Trujillo Rodriguez & Richards L.L.C. in Philadelphia, is a former city solicitor and managing director. He served on the Philadelphia School District's Board of Education from 1995 to 2001, including two years as president. In June, Gov. Corbett nominated Ramos to the School Reform Commission. Still awaiting state Senate confirmation, Ramos, 46, spoke to staff writer Melissa Dribben about his prospective role as a member of the commission, which has had quite a stormy year.

Wendell Pritchett is now officially a member of the Philadelphia School Reform Commission. Pritchett, chancellor of Rutgers University-Camden and a mayoral appointee, signed the oath on Wednesday, the mayor's office said. Pritchett will attend his first SRC meeting on Wednesday. He joins Commissioners Denise McGregor Armbrister and Joseph Dworetzky. SRC Chairman Robert L. Archie Jr. and member Johnny Irizarry resigned last week; Pedro Ramos, who's widely expected to be named chairman, awaits confirmation by the state Senate.

Tuesday's editorial ("Answers aren't in the past") failed to discern the strong future that Pedro Ramos can help forge as a new member of the School Reform Commission. Ramos' previous leadership of the Board of Education was anything but ineffective. He exhibited courage, foresight, and tenacity by steering the board on a course that shook up the status quo from every angle. His tenure proved not the failure of that particular school board, but the failure of an outdated governing model that expected the commonwealth of Pennsylvania to pay more than half of the city's school bills, while keeping all decision-making a local prerogative.

Until Gov. Corbett nominated him to serve on the Philadelphia School Reform Commission last week, Pedro Ramos was billing $325 an hour as an outside attorney for the School District - one of the highest rates the district pays lawyers. During the current fiscal year, Ramos' seven-member firm of Trujillo Rodriguez & Richards L.L.C. has collected more than $300,000 in fees from the district, according to information obtained under the Pennsylvania Right to Know law. Only the large firms of Blank Rome and Ballard Spahr have been paid more this year by the district, which faces a $629 million shortfall.

Been there, done that. No one should fault Philadelphians for having that reaction to Gov. Corbett's nomination of corporate lawyer Pedro Ramos to fill a vacancy on the city's School Reform Commission. Ramos was a member of the city's old Board of Education from 1995 to 2001, and was the board's president in its final two years before it was dismantled and replaced by the SRC. Give Ramos credit for standing up once again when asked to serve Philadelphia's schoolchildren, but he really shouldn't have been asked.

In a surprise move, Gov. Corbett on Thursday nominated Pedro A. Ramos, a Democrat and former city school board president, to the School Reform Commission. Ramos, 46, will fill the seat that opened when David F. Girard-diCarlo, a Republican, resigned this year. If confirmed by the state Senate, he would serve until 2014 in the unpaid position. Ramos - a lawyer, graduate of the district, and public-school parent - sat on the school board from 1995 through 2001. He was president for two years, until the board was dissolved and the district taken over by the state.

After Gov. Corbett named attorney Pedro Ramos - the last president of the defunct Philadelphia Board of Education - to the School Reform Commission yesterday, the irony was apparent to some. "I think that he [Ramos] is a nice guy," said Helen Gym, co-founder of the activist group Parents United for Public Education. "But the governor has named someone who was head of the Board of Education when the state decided the board was not capable of governance. "We don't need another political appointee.