I have mixed feelings about this. Since it's near my neighborhood, in some ways I kind of like the site. But I hate the idea of the city building on park land. What about NTI? What about all those vacant parcels? They have to build in Fairmount Park?

On the plus side, I'm very happy to see that this school will be a magnet. When it was first announced it was pitched as a neighborhood school. This seemed grossly unfair to me - that one neighborhood would luck out and have this brand spanking new school with 21st-century technology and most other parts of town would have to make due with the same old crumbling infrastructure. Now at least kids from all over the city will have a shot at it (so to speak).

i think it makes sense for the school in that it's near please touch and the zoo. could take the trolley to school. interesting. what grades will this be? am I th eonly one that didn;t have environmental "science" until college? hogwash.

Microsoft sucks. They pump thier crappy, buggy software into a charter school and what happens when the subject of Apple Computers or Unix or Linux comes up in classrooms? Does Big Brother close out all interest in any other platform but Windows? In wake of the impending AntiTrust judgements, I find this school to be a disgusting piece of asskissing on Microsoft's part.

Before all of you go "oooooo, but it's helping kids", that's all fine and good, but what about licensing fees they charge all schools, wether rich or poor? Schools that can't afford computers or have ancient ones would benefit more from donations and free software then from one magnet school.

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John Street Sucks. Duh.
STARSKREAM

I would hope Paul Vallas would keep an eye on things and make sure that, whatever Microsoft's contribution, it doesn't compromise the integrity of the school's mission. On the other hand, if they want to contribute money and personnel to get the thing running, why not? I agree Microsoft is a dubious corporate partner (and a producer of lousy software), but corporate support of Philly schools is one way to get new money into the system. Not without oversight, though...Vallas doesn't strike me as a shrinking violet.

I don't know about that "close to Please Touch Museum" argument. I mean, this is a high school! Please Touch targets kids 0-7; where exactly is the synergy?

i think MS beat most of the software companies to the punch and offered products for less than the competiytion in order to gain their market share. apple had it's head up its arse and ended up with a better OS but inferior products. prior to MS office, co's spent several times the amount of various office products than the office sweet. while Ms has made some questionable decisions, you should not ignore the facts and make such claims on emotion. their siftware is not perfect but they have given people more or less what they want. 98, ME were crap but XP has beenpretty good. they dont have to create the best software now, just good enough to keep customers from switching. do a littel research before you throw such accustions out and you will find that MS made good decisions and had good timing. with that said, their future is anything but clear. if schools can make do with other software that is cheaper, great. but stop blaming MS...the schools made the decision to use the software. you can use linux and many do. but claiming MS has some moral onbligation to give away software is bunk. you are trying to steal something from someone, plain and simple. i htink it's a gret experiment and even if they get a MS bias out of it, big deal. it's not like the skills of learning math and prog. are nontransferrable esp on an 18 year old. gripe, gripe, gripe.

Ok, I am not throwing out statements before I do research ok? I am an IT professional, I have been so for almost 10 years now. I have worked with all sorts of Operating Systems (Mac OS, All flavors of Windows, Linux, Unix, Vax/VMS, FreeBSD) and let me tell you, Microsoft makes the worst of it. Every week and a half another Internet Explorer or Windows exploit is discovered and Microsoft doesn't really care. They have openly admitted that they knew about big exploits in the OS's and browser *before* anyone noticed and they did nothing about it, but yet have done nothing to prevent it. With them it is more about selling copies of stuff then it is about quality of software.

This would be all fine and good if we lived in a world where spftware wasn'ta big deal. But imagine if you bought a car that had serious flaws in it, the manufacturer knew it before hand and people had serious problems and accidents with it. You might think I am being a little drsamatic with my choice of examples, but there are thousands of companies who have lost a lot of money because of these exploits. On Slashdot they just had an article about an FBI AGent's visit to a college, and how he told them that major banks are being blackmailed with lists of customers. It is ridiculous.

The next few years will be interesting in software development.

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John Street Sucks. Duh.
STARSKREAM

that's all fine and good but it doesn't dispute the fact that MS made its money giving people what they wanted. apple had to stick with their expensive, proprietary approach and it ulimately cost them the market. I never said MS made perfect software, but for the corp. market they can do their HW and choose a different package. Ms will go down like all other co's when someone figures out a better package that fits peoples needs.

I vehemently disagree! This school like all others in Philadelphia should be a neighborhood school. The neighborhood where this school will be built is in Parkside which is adjacent to Strawberry Mansion and of all neighborhoods in the city, those two deserves a structure like this to provide the residents and their children with hope and opportunity. Strawberry Mansion has pretty much the lowest home values in the entire city and a High School with average SATs at 650 (total!!!)

This will only serve as another mechanism to academically segregate Philadelphia's public school students and reinforce the two public school systems in America (one for the rich and acdemically gifted and one for the poor and politcally unconnected). The proposal that only 30-40% of the slots will be open to neighborhood students is one to be wary of. The district never releases this type of data and in a few years after opening those numbers could easily shrink to 10-15%, especially if the demand for this school is high.

and some of the nicest homes. I agree, it should be a neighborhood school. However, Parkside ahs sen some interest lately and don't be surprised if 15 years down the road it gets completely made over. location is good. close to transit (10 trolley and girard trolley). zoo, park, etc. decent housing stock and roads are better than average for philly.