Discovery Charter School v. School District of Philadelphia

135 A.3d 581, 635 Pa. 268, 2016 WL 1644673, 2016 Pa. LEXIS 880

• Court: Supreme Court of Pennsylvania
• Decided: April 26, 2016
• Docket: 193 EAL 2015 (Granted)
• Status: Published

Opinion

ORDER

PER CURIAM.

AND NOW, this 26th day of April, 2016, the Petition for Allowance of Appeal is GRANTED. The issues, as stated by Petitioners, are:

(1) Did the Commonwealth Court err when it created an extra-legislative scheme for amending charters that is not contained in the Charter School Law?

(2) Did the Commonwealth Court err when it held that, although the Charter School Law does not authorize amendments to charters, a charter school has a right to amend its charter at any time to change its charter’s terms without evaluation of the proposed amended terms by a school district under the [Charter School Law’s] provisions governing charter applications?

(3) If charter amendments are permissible, did the Commonwealth Court err when it held that, although the Charter School Law does not authorize displacement of a school district governing body’s authority with respect to amendment applications, that governing body should be deemed to deny an application if that body fails to act on it within an unspecified time and to thereby forfeit that authority to the State Charter School Appeal Board?