{"id":124649,"date":"2026-02-27T00:53:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T00:53:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/124649\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T00:53:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T00:53:07","slug":"philadelphia-schools-revise-facilities-plan-to-close-18-schools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/124649\/","title":{"rendered":"Philadelphia schools revise facilities plan to close 18 schools"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>From Philly and the Pa. suburbs to South Jersey and Delaware, what would you like WHYY News to cover? <a href=\"#Section1\">Let us know!<\/a>\n<\/p>\n<p>The Philadelphia School District unveiled changes to the final version of its <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/search?client=safari&amp;rls=en&amp;q=whyy+philly+school+closures&amp;ie=UTF-8&amp;oe=UTF-8\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">facilities master plan recommendations<\/a> at Thursday\u2019s school board meeting, now proposing to close 18 schools across the city instead of 20.\n<\/p>\n<p>Changes to the proposal<\/p>\n<p>Most notably, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.chalkbeat.org\/philadelphia\/2026\/02\/09\/schools-like-conwell-and-lankenau-mount-fierce-pushback-against-school-closure-plan\/#:~:text=Students%20at%20the%20meetings%20made,ultimately%20decide%20which%20schools%20close.\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Russell Conwell Middle School<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.inquirer.com\/education\/motivation-high-school-philadelphia-closures-student-walkout-20260213.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Motivation High School <\/a>were removed from the closure recommendations after receiving outspoken support from families to stay open.\n<\/p>\n<p>Under <a href=\"https:\/\/whyy.org\/episodes\/philly-superintendent-ludlow-overbrook-education\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Superintendent Tony B. Watlington\u2019s<\/a> original plan, Conwell would have merged with Alternative Middle Years, or AMY, at James Martin. The two schools are about a mile and a half apart \u2014 nearly a 40-minute walk \u2014 a commute families raised concerns about.\n  <\/p>\n<p>By instead using Elkin Elementary School as a feeder for Conwell, the district can boost enrollment while keeping students within walking distance of school, Watlington said.\n<\/p>\n<p>Motivation will merge with Paul Robeson High School, becoming \u201cMotivation-Robeson,\u201d and will continue to operate at the Motivation site.\n<\/p>\n<p>The building infrastructure at Motivation is \u201csignificantly better\u201d than Robeson\u2019s, according to Watlington. He said community feedback found that families were open to closing Robeson if a better option was presented.\n<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith Motivation High School, there\u2019s adequate space \u2026 and the building infrastructure is appropriate for us to do that,\u201d Watlington said.\n<\/p>\n<p>While Lankenau Environmental Science Magnet High School is still recommended to close, students will merge with W. B. Saul High School of Agricultural Sciences. The new choice aligns better with the offerings Lankenau could provide, according to the district.\n<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe environmental theme at Lankenau can fit nicely with the W.B. Saul agricultural campus,\u201d Watlington said. \u201cThere are some connections with regard to the curriculum.\u201d\n<\/p>\n<p>One of Lankenau\u2019s most distinctive features is its location on 400 wooded acres next to the Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education.\n<\/p>\n<p>Unlike the more urban Roxborough High School \u2014 where Lankenau was originally slated to merge \u2014 W.B. Saul offers <a href=\"https:\/\/www.usda.gov\/about-usda\/news\/blog\/sowing-future-agriculture-philadelphia\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the largest agricultural program in the country<\/a> on a 150-acre working farm that sits directly beside Fairmount Park.\n        <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From Philly and the Pa. suburbs to South Jersey and Delaware, what would you like WHYY News to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":32855,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[223,69,25116,71,70,8973],"class_list":["post-124649","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-pennsylvania-education","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-board-of-education","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news","tag-philadelphia-school-district"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124649","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=124649"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124649\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=124649"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=124649"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=124649"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}