Education advocates and elected officials gathered on the steps of the Pennsylvania Capitol in Harrisburg on Wednesday, Dec. 15, to call for full and fair funding of Pennsylvania schools.
Activists from Bucks, Montgomery and Chester counties representing POWER Interfaith handed out apples to passersby with a tag saying, “Apple for the teacher? Fair funding is better!” They were in Harrisburg to call attention to the case in Commonwealth Court, which charges that the legislature and state administration are violating the Pennsylvania Constitution’s requirement for “a thorough and efficient” system of public education.
State Rep. Perry Warren (D-31) explained how there is unequal funding among the school districts in his legislative district, including Pennsbury, Council Rock and Morrisville. He said, “We need to create a system that fully and fairly funds public education for all 501 school districts in Pennsylvania … Only through a great public education do our communities maintain the economic viability they have today and to increase the standard of living for this and future generations.”
According to state Rep. Joe Ciresi (D-146), schools in Pottstown – a district with largely minority students – is underfunded by $13 million this year, and has been underfunded for years. He said, “No school district should send 75 first graders to a bathroom with only one toilet, or in another district where the bathroom doesn’t have stall doors or toilet paper. These buildings would have been condemned in other districts.”
Educator Becky Logue-Conroy, of Warrington, who has two children in Central Bucks, stated that children’s zip codes should not dictate the quality of their education. Pediatric physical therapist Melody Katz, of Langhorne, described her work with severely disabled children and the disparate support they receive in their respective school districts. Public school grandparent Patricia McBee, of Newtown, declared that her family members are educational refugees who moved to Bucks County when the School District of Philadelphia was unable to provide services for her disabled grandson. She said they left behind so many other children who needed support services, but who could not move out to better schools.
Mark Fitler, of Paoli, held up a sign that said how the Plessy v. Ferguson case was in 1896 and Brown v. Board of Education was in 1954, but school funding is still unfair and racially-biased. John Barnett, of Chester Springs, reminded the group that Sen. Scott Martin scheduled a hearing on Senate Bill 123 to enact 100 percent basic education funding by the state’s fair funding formula and then postponed it. He urged attendees to contact Martin and demand that he move the bill forward.
