Dr. Eric Becoats, who testified Monday in the school funding trial, began working as the superintendent of William Penn School District, a petitioner in the case, in May 2020. Becoats, a graduate of Baltimore City public schools, has worked as an educator for 28 years, most recently serving as an assistant superintendent in the School District of Philadelphia.
He has two children. “Everything that I do I look through the eyes of my children, and if it's not good enough for my children, then it's not good enough for someone else's children,” he said.
Becoats said his biggest challenges have been operating a school district during a global pandemic when there are insufficient resources. It wasn’t until emergency federal aid arrived that the district was able to provide a Chromebook for each student in the district to learn remotely, and enough protective equipment and other infrastructure for in-person learning.
The one-time funds from the federal COVID relief program known as ESSER are designated for specific purposes to help districts recover from COVID-19, and they will expire in 2024. The district used most of the first round of funding to update its curriculum, and most of the second round to establish a summer enrichment academy to address learning loss, Becoats said.
The district used additional ESSER funds to hire temporary mental health counselors and to upgrade district technology, Becoats said. But William Penn could not use the one-time ESSER funding to hire any permanent staff. Nor does the district have a source of funding to maintain this new technology once ESSER funds expire.
When ESSER funding expires in 2024, he said, “we will revert back to where we were. And, in my opinion, that's unacceptable.” He is unsure how the district will continue to operate without those funds, he said.
The remaining ESSER funds, which the district has yet to receive, are set to be used for repairs to district buildings, Becoats said. Becoats’ predecessor, Jane Harbert, discussed the effect of subpar facilities on learning in the district at length in her testimony last week.
The district hired an architecture firm to conduct a study of district facilities, which found major HVAC deficiencies, as well as masonry problems, water damage, malfunctioning lighting, and other issues across the district’s 11 buildings. Becoats described the conditions of school buildings, the youngest of which is 50 years old, as “deplorable.” The study concluded that the district needs $149 million in facilities improvements. The district anticipates receiving only about $16 million in additional ESSER aid.
A broken thermostat in William Penn School District’s Cypress Avenue high school campus auditorium. The heat in the auditorium does not work. These photos were taken in November 2019, and former superintendent Jane Harbert testified that the conditions depicted remained the same in December 2021.
William Penn has seven principals for eight elementary schools. “I've never worked in a district in my 28 years” where there were schools without a principal in the building, Becoats said.
The district has no math and reading interventionists or specialists to help students make up learning gaps. Two social workers work in the district, which has more than 4,800 students across 11 buildings.
Learning gaps in the district that are present in standardized test results start early, Becoats said. In math, Becoats said William Penn students fall further behind grade level as they move from 3rd grade to 6th grade, according to district assessments, culminating in a 2.8 grade level gap in 6th grade.
"We don't have the resources in the early grades to really begin to address the deficits that we are seeing when students enter our district,” Becoats said.
Math builds on itself, Becoats said, making it essential to catch students up quickly. If William Penn had sufficient funds to do so, Becoats would hire more teachers to ensure that elementary school classes are smaller, and would hire “at minimum” a math interventionist in each school to work with small groups of students on remedial math, so that classroom teachers could continue to focus on grade-level content.
Becoats testified that he has not considered asking the school board to raise taxes in the district. Residents of the district already pay the second highest tax rates in the state.
Becoats testified that students ask him why they can go up the street eight blocks to a neighboring district and see a school that looks “totally different,” with enough resources to meet students’ needs.
With sufficient funding, “we would be able to show students that we've been able to address the issue that's at hand,” he said.
Becoats will be followed on the stand tomorrow by Dr. William Hite, the superintendent of the School District of Philadelphia. Hite is the first witness from the state’s largest district to testify. Learn more about Philadelphia in our district profile.