Come June, students won’t be the only ones receiving report cards from the Philadelphia School District.

Each of the district’s 289 schools soon will get marks for such things as school safety, student satisfaction and graduation rate. That’s beyond the academic standards set by the state.

“We want to give parents and the community a broader view of schools and their performance,” Superintendent Arlene Ackerman said yesterday, as the plan was laid out to the School Reform Commission and the public.

Some form of the system is used by districts in New York City, Chicago, Raleigh, N.C., and San Francisco, where Ackerman previously worked.

Ackerman, a former teacher and principal, has made focusing more on classrooms and “accountability for all adults” two key priorities since she took over the district in June.

Principals will receive the targets they must meet by the end of September. Their evaluations – and the evaluations of regional superintendents – will be tied to schools’ performance on the report cards.

Schools will be graded for each target: a green light for target hit, a yellow light for a target missed but with growth, or a red light for a target missed and no improvement. Those that do well will be designated “best practices” schools and models for the district; those that perform poorly will receive extra support.
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