Public Education

Southeast Delco School District residents have organized a chapter of a national group founded to support and strengthen public schools. It is the first district in Pennsylvania to embrace the association, Parents for Public Schools. The nonprofit, grassroots group is committed to restoring and sustaining parental involvement in public schools. Nancy Larson, a parent organizer for the chapter, said the group wants to unite the four district communities and their residents, and improve the district's reputation.

A school playground should be one of the safest places in the world for a 6-year-old. But for Aniyah Trippett, the playground at McDaniel Elementary School, in South Philadelphia, was the worst place to be last Wednesday. A bullet from a heartless shooter ripped through her leg, sending her in pain and shock to Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. As senseless and dispiriting as that traumatic event was, what happened later was nearly as senseless and disheartening: relatively few parents showed up at the school for a special meeting on the incident.

Twenty percent of America's public schools are excellent, about 35 percent are mediocre, and the rest are in very bad shape, with many getting even worse. That's the view of Ernest L. Boyer, president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, based in Washington. Boyer, who served as U.S. commissioner of education in the Carter administration, spoke on the future of education Monday at a Widener University community lecture series. "In spite of this mixed report card, we hear our political leaders call our schools a failed system.

Creating a better Pennsylvania is no less an urgent task because the country is at war in a faraway land. Here at home, youngsters still dream of what they want to be when they grow up. Unfortunately, low-income children in the commonwealth find it harder to achieve their dreams - thanks, in part, to state governors and legislators from both parties through the years. Pennsylvania is one of only nine states with no state-funded preschool. Forty-one others have heeded studies showing that without an early boost, children from poor families are six to 18 months behind their middle-class peers academically when they enter kindergarten.

The recent effort to implement a school voucher system in Pennsylvania had its counterpart in Delaware County 158 years ago, when local citizens battled over the very law that led to establishment of statewide public education. The Free School Act of 1834 was drawn up by a state Senate Education Committee headed by George T. Smith of Upper Darby. Smith was a physician as well as president of the Upper Darby school board. Opponents of that act were labeled as anti-public education, as were proponents of the recent one. And like last year's effort, it, too, went down to defeat.

Everyone will tell you Mayor Richard M. Daley is a practical man, not someone given to grand theory, romantic ideas or crusades. But when he sits down in his City Hall office and starts talking in his clipped, rapid-fire way, he sounds like a romantic when it comes to education. He has a theory about the Democratic Party and has ideas Washington politicians could use to improve the quality of life - a phrase that, of course, never passes his lips. First, the ideas: Make public education work; get the feds to be as eager to build and repair schools as they are to build and repair highways; help parents who worry about what their kids are doing between the time school lets out and the time the workday is done; and control guns.

Let's stipulate it from the get-go: No, simply throwing money at a problem won't solve it. But, while we're at it, let's mention another truth underlying the court case on Pennsylvania school funding that began trial yesterday: Spending too little money on a problem isn't a good way to fix it, either. Pennsylvania's way of paying for public education doesn't work anymore. The fix will involve more than tinkering with the arcane school-aid formula. It will require the state to resume paying at least half of school costs.

Gov. Ridge says he urgently wants to fix a public school system that is failing, statewide, to prepare students adequately for the duties of work and citizenship. But instead of making things better, Gov. Ridge's school-choice plan, embodied in the state budget now being debated in Harrisburg, will widen disparities between rural and urban, black and white, poor and affluent schools. And it's not clear it will do anything for the huge number of moderate- income parents whose first choice would be to send their children to quality public schools in their neighborhoods.

The day Anita Porter's grandchild, Ahnyay Porter, was born was both a time of joy and fear. An unexpected birth, Ahnyay was born two months' premature in December 1988 to Anita's 19-year-old daughter, Chelese Porter. Seven days and numerous medical tests later, doctors told the Porter family that Ahnyay had Down syndrome. "The doctor said she (Ahnyay) would never walk or talk, and my daughter started crying. Immediately the doctor said, 'If you don't want her, we can institutionalize her,' " Anita Porter said.

It is troubling to hear state lawmakers tout as "historic" the package of legislation adopted early in July that includes legalization of slot machines, property-tax relief, and a school-budget referendum. Good Schools Pennsylvania was formed in 2001 by people alarmed by the state's declining investment in public education, the corresponding deficit in educational resources available to children in poor communities, and the resulting, disappointing levels in student achievement.