He also cautions that the Philadelphia schools also should be wary of losing the capacity to provide any type of service once they do, they are at the mercy of the providers.Ĭharlene Haar, president of the Education Policy Institute, disagrees. Thus, Henig suggests that the Philadelphia schools should limit privatization to short-term projects where an established expertise exists, such as upgrading technology, in order to maintain leverage. Henig notes, however, that many of the larger providers have been buying up the smaller ones, increasing their ability to control the market and the competition. Though, as the number of providers grows, competition generally will ensure good prices, as well as quality services. If the Philadelphia schools are under-funded, like many school districts across the nation, they will not have the resources to collect and monitor their own data, leaving them to rely upon the data provided by their contractors. Jeff Henig, professor of political science and education at Columbia University, believes that effective oversight requires strong and capable government. Nevels believes that all Philadelphia schools privatization contracts require close oversight, as well as periodically reevaluating where the Philadelphia schools district currently stands is privatization working or isnt it? Effective oversight, however, may not be easy to achieve. Across the nation, privatization of public school services has seen inconsistent results. Success of such Philadelphia schools contracts has yet to be determined.

Nevels concedes that such services for the Philadelphia schools have been privatized. The Commission has been mandated to find ways to improve the citys failing schools, which includes contracting out education services. School Reform Commission Chair James Nevels endorses contracting in non-academic areas, because it allows educators to focus on education. School Reform Commissioner Daniel Whelan is willing to contract out any service, operational or educational, where there are providers able to meet the Philadelphia schools criteria, according to the Philadelphia Public Schools Notebook, a nonprofit newspaper.

The Philadelphia schools have been contracting out (also called privatization) many schools services to for-profit businesses and nonprofit organizations for four years and are entering their fifth.

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