Stories tagged: transportation
Parents protest loss of bus service to South Philly magnet school
Submitted by David Limm on Thu, 10/18/2012 - 13:40 Posted in Latest news | Permalink
The loss of bus service to a successful and highly competitive school in South Philadelphia brought parents, students, and the school band out to protest during Wednesday night's School Reform Commission meeting.
The Girard Academic Music Program (GAMP), which serves grades 5-12, will lose yellow bus service for its 500-plus students starting in the fall of next year. Younger students already enrolled will, however, retain service until they reach the 9th grade. Everyone else will move to using SEPTA TransPasses.
Report detailing Boston Consulting Group findings and recommendations released
Submitted by Dale Mezzacappa on Thu, 08/02/2012 - 07:35 Posted in Latest news | Permalink
By Dale Mezzacappa and Benjamin Herold
The School District released a 119-page document on Thursday that summarized the analyses and recommendations of the Boston Consulting Group, an outside firm retained at private expense to help the District avert a financial meltdown by radically overhauling its business operations and delivery of education.
The document details BCG’s work and thinking on hot-button topics ranging from charter expansion to labor negotiations. It also includes the previously unreleased analyses behind controversial District proposals to close dozens of schools and reorganize those that are left into decentralized, independently managed “achievement networks.”
SRC moves to outsource 3 management jobs in transportation
Submitted by Katie McCabe on Tue, 07/10/2012 - 12:26 Posted in Latest news | Permalink
By Katie McCabe
The School Reform Commission voted Monday to outsource the three top management positions in its transportation department, but recessed until Wednesday to allow more time for talks with the labor union representing bus drivers, mechanics, and other blue-collar workers whose jobs could be facing a similar fate.
Behind the scenes, Boston Consulting Group has been a driving force on labor talks, school closings, and charters
Submitted by Benjamin Herold on Mon, 07/09/2012 - 12:56 Posted in Latest news | Permalink
by Benjamin Herold for the Notebook and WHYY/Newsworks
The Boston Consulting Group has identified up to 60 Philadelphia school buildings as potential candidates for closure and helped line up private vendors willing to replace the School District’s unionized blue-collar workforce at a $50 million discount.
These steps are just part of the blue-chip consulting firm’s far-ranging behind-the-scenes effort to help the beleaguered city school system rethink how it does business.
The broad scope of BCG’s efforts this spring are detailed in previously unreleased “statements of work” obtained by the Notebook/NewsWorks under Pennsylvania’s Right to Know law.
Read the documents:
Study questions savings in outsourcing transportation
Submitted by Dale Mezzacappa on Tue, 03/13/2012 - 16:56 Posted in Latest news | Permalink
A new study by the Keystone Research Center says that contracting out student transportation has increased costs for Pennsylvania school districts instead of saving them money.
"Handing the reins over to the private sector is not always a good bargain for taxpayers," said Keystone executive director Stephen Herzenberg, a co-author of the study with labor economist Mark Price.
SRC finalizes SEPTA loan for free student TransPasses
Submitted by thenotebook on Thu, 02/23/2012 - 19:24 Posted in Latest news | Permalink
by Oscar Wang
The School Reform Commission Thursday finalized a $37 million loan from SEPTA to underwrite this year's free student TransPasses, a move that has helped it close its budget gap.
The program assists more than 55,000 public, charter, private, and parochial students who ride public transportation for free to and from school daily.
Layoff notices hit 848 blue-collar workers
Submitted by Paul Socolar on Wed, 09/14/2011 - 18:34 Posted in Latest news | Permalink
For a second time this month, the School District has responded to a union's rejection of a giveback proposal by announcing a mass layoff: 848 members of District 1201 of SEIU Local 32BJ, which represents transportation, maintenance, and custodial workers, are receiving notices that they will be laid off in 12 months.
At the SRC
Posted in November 2010 NEWSFLASH | Permalink
At its October meetings, the School Reform Commission:
Teachers need World Series ... for contract help
Submitted by Samuel Reed III on Tue, 11/03/2009 - 20:25 | Permalink
Hopefully, SEPTA and the Transport Workers Union Local 234 will be able to “play ball” and resolve their pending contract negotiations. I give credit to the transit union for leveraging the Phillies and Yankees World Series while it was in town.
Why we're worried: District's limited budget options
Submitted by Helen Gym on Tue, 09/29/2009 - 12:19 | Permalink
At last week’s School Reform Commission hearing, in addition to the grilling of District staff that proved that Commissioner Heidi Ramirez might very well be the smartest person in the room, was – finally – a presentation on the School District budget.
It should be noted that through an entire summer, while the state education budget was clearly unraveling, the SRC did not hold a single budget briefing until Wednesday – after delaying their September meeting for two weeks and after the media reported a $160 million deficit that apparently may still be growing.
The District’s budget document is a snapshot of what the District is thinking now that it’s finally acknowledged a devastating gap of at least $160 million. If there’s any indication of how significant a figure this is, the District’s expendable budget (the money that’s not legally obligated) is only about $1.6 billion. That means that a budget gap of $160 million or more is at least a 10% cut.
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