School District of Philadelphia superintendent details new plans to combat gun violence, overall success

PHILADELPHIA - FOX 29’s Shaynah Ferreira spoke with Dr. Tony Watlington, Superintendent of the School District of Philadelphia on the future of the district as he prepares to give the first state of public education address. 

Dr. Watlington has been serving as superintendent of the largest school district in Pennsylvania since 2022 and says his vision for the School District of Philadelphia is simple. 

"We absolutely aspire and desire to be the fastest improving large urban school district," said the superintendent. 

The District plans to introduce the Accelerate Philly plan to increase all markers of success.

"In this address we want to get right to the point and say here is the outcome. So far, the School District of Philadelphia is improving, we are accelerating," said Dr. Watlington. "Teacher attendance is up. Student attendance is up. The 4-year cohort graduation is up and, equally important, we’ve increased student performance on standardized tests."

However, Dr. Watlington says the district has a long way to go speaking candidly about some of the long-standing challenges facing Philadelphia schools including gun violence.

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In April 2023, he says the district reached a "gruesome milestone" as at least 100 students fell victim to gun violence, 33 of which paid the ultimate price and one incident that occurred on school grounds. 

"We’re expanding safe path programs in those school communities that have an uptick in violence. Number two, we are replacing analog cameras in up to 150 schools that work is underway already and there's an effort to increase the budget for facility upgrades for those schools," he said. 

Plus, asbestos remains an ongoing issue in the aging buildings across the city. 

"In a school district, the nation’s 8th largest and one of the oldest cities in the country where the average school building is 73 years and most of our buildings are well over 100 years, we're getting better," said the superintendent. "We’re doing a much better job of being able to move children from one school building to another."

Realistically, all of these strategic plans in motion have a cost attached to them and the district is already facing a serious $407 million deficit. 

"The school district of Philadelphia has a $4.5 billion budget. $1.2 billion of that budget we’ve received over the past three years when the pandemic hit. Congress allocated those dollars to help districts mitigate the impact of COVID," said Dr. Watlington. 

Which brings the budget down to $3.3 billion. 

Kathryn Epps Roberson is the CEO of the fund for the School District of Philadelphia. Her team has launched a new five-year campaign to raise $40 million for the district, 87 percent of which goes directly to meeting the needs of the district.

"The vast majority of every single dollar we raise at the fund goes directly into the district," said Roberson. "Directly into classrooms, facilities and various programs across the district…it’s really important that we invest in our students because our students are the future of this very fine city. Everything we do, has to be funded. We have some bold ideas and we need.. And we’re not just asking for bold extra money but constitutional funding."

There will be more to come on the state funding when PA Governor Josh Shapiro gives his budget address in February.