Calling on The Pennsylvania Legislature to use Federal COVID-19 Relief Money to fund Freedom Schools across the state, and in Philadelphia.

WHEREAS; The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania will receive approximately $4 billion in federal Covid-19 Relief funds and has the capacity to match Illinois' recent $17 million funding initiative for Freedom Schools, and

WHEREAS; Funding Freedom Schools with Covid-19 Funds can address the education gaps widened by the pandemic and improve the lives of disadvantaged families, and

WHEREAS; Freedom Schools are a part of literacy and cultural enrichment programs, with a heavy emphasis on servant leadership, rooted in the civil rights movement of the 1960s; and

WHEREAS; The First Formal Freedom Schools began in the summer of 1964, when US Civil rights workers taught students about their rights in order to counter the poor education Black people received; and

WHEREAS; Philadelphia has had Freedom Schools since the 1999 and in the summer of 2006, the Philadelphia Freedom Schools launched their very own curriculum model and became a network of independent freedom schools; and

WHEREAS, Freedom Schools, with summer programming, also engage young people during Out-Of-School Time (OST) with quality afterschool and summer programming; and

WHEREAS; Other states, such as Illinois, have taken the initiative to fund freedom schools with the Federal dollars; and

WHEREAS; Illinois State Board of Education says the initiative will supplement student learning taking place in the classroom with a research-based, multicultural curriculum offered during the summer or after-school; and

RESOLVED, BY THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA, That we hereby call on The Pennsylvania State House and Senate to use Federal COVID-19 Relief Money to fund Freedom Schools across the state, and in Philadelphia.

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