You would think that freshmen at a top-ranked university could do basic math. You would be wrong. According to a recent analysis at the University of California, San Diego, one in eight cannot meet minimum high school standards. This story is repeating itself across America. As a proud product of Pennsylvania’s public schools, it pains me to say: Our nation’s public education system is failing miserably.
Fortunately, we have an opportunity to begin to fix it, thanks to the school choice tax credit passed into law in the Working Families Tax Cut Act in July.
The trick? Governors must opt in. So far, four governors — from North Carolina, Tennessee, South Dakota, and Nebraska — have signed up or signaled they will. Will Pennsylvania support giving free money to families? Or will it double down on a failing educational system that disproportionately hurts the poorest among us?
Access to a good education levels the playing field, giving students an equal opportunity to chase the American dream. It forms kids into citizens. And it not only gives students book smarts, but also the ability to wrestle with hard problems at a time when every American must be ready to adapt to a rapidly changing world.
The inverse is equally true. Trapping students in bad schools robs them of the opportunity promised to each generation and unduly harms people of color and students from lower-income families.
According to a 2024 national assessment, 45% of 12th graders could not complete even basic math. Roughly one-third of 12th graders could not read at a basic level. Pennsylvania students performed similarly: 37% of eighth graders did not have basic math skills, and 31% lacked basic reading ability. Students of color and those from low-income families struggled most.
The COVID-19 pandemic made this all so much worse and set back a generation of Pennsylvanians. The commonwealth’s children have still not recovered from the damage done by school closures foisted on them by the national teachers’ unions.
Our public school system too often puts the interests of the system over the interests of the students, Sen. David McCormick writes.
Not only are we falling behind as a nation, we’re also falling behind other states. Florida, Arkansas, and others have busted the education monopoly. By embracing this new federal tax credit, Pennsylvania’s leaders can follow suit.
One of my first acts in the U.S. Senate was to cosponsor the Educational Choice for Children Act. One of my proudest moments was voting to pass this school choice provision into law alongside childcare tax credits for working families.
The bill established a $1,700 tax credit for donations to organizations that give educational scholarships to families. The program offers families true opportunity, as these stipends can be used to pay tuition, hire tutors, buy school supplies, and otherwise expand educational opportunities for students. It could inject tens of billions of new funding for our schools.
Not everyone will agree with me. Some may say we shouldn’t take money away from public schools. Well, this tax credit doesn’t redirect any existing federal or state funds. It allows Americans to support other Americans’ right to a good education.
It also recognizes that a certain class of people already have the privilege of school choice: those who can afford it. If Pennsylvania opts into this tax credit, it will provide low- and middle-class families with the same opportunity.
Others might question the quality or accountability of private and charter schools. They have it wrong. The public education system has failed for decades without consequence. School choice introduces accountability through competition. It lets parents choose what’s best for their children instead of being forced into failing schools by fate of geography.
Finally, I understand the fears that promoting private and charter schools risks hurting teachers, but what I’m proposing is entirely pro-teacher. As the son of two Pennsylvania public school teachers and the product of the commonwealth’s public school system, I have immense respect and admiration for educators.
The problem is the system, not the teachers. Our public school system too often puts the interests of the system over the interests of the students — and educators. Teachers do the Lord’s work and deserve our thanks. They also deserve to work in schools that value their talent. This program would put more money into education and provide greater choice to teachers, too.
There are many details to iron out still, but this program has the potential to transform education in Pennsylvania at a moment of incredible change and consequence. It will both allow Pennsylvanians to support their neighbors and invite national investment in our commonwealth’s future.
The choice is clear. Pennsylvania families have been offered a door to a better education for their children. Will the governor and our leaders in Harrisburg open it?
David McCormick is a U.S. senator from Pennsylvania.
When Christina Vassallo was head of the Fabric Workshop and Museum, she landed several substantial grants from the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage.
Now she is moving to the other side of that donor-recipient relationship.
Vassallo is the newly named executive director of the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, starting Jan. 5, Pew announced Monday.
“The center embodies everything I value about arts leadership — intellectual curiosity, rigorous support for artists and arts organizations, and a true commitment to public life,” said Vassallo. “So for the center, I’m drawn to its dual identity as a grantmaker and as a hub for ideas, and for the opportunity to connect the arts with civic purpose.”
Leadership and operational changes at the Pew arts center are closely watched in Philadelphia’s arts and culture community since the center, along with the William Penn Foundation, accounts for some of the largest foundation giving in the area.
Pew’s center, for instance, also announced on Monday that it has awarded $8.6 million to 44 Philadelphia-area groups — nearly $180,000 to the Black Pearl Chamber Orchestra for a project on Black women composers, $360,000 to Monument Lab for the creation of environmental soundworks as a “living monument to Philadelphia’s birds,” and to projects by Mural Arts Philadelphia, Philadanco, Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens, theater companies, dance troupes, and museums.
After leaving the Fabric Workshop in 2023, Vassallo became director of the Contemporary Arts Center in Cincinnati. Before the Fabric Workshop, she was executive and artistic director of the alternative art gallery SPACES, in Cleveland. She was born in the Bronx and grew up in New York City and northern New Jersey, and holds two degrees from New York University — a bachelor’s in art history and a master’s in nonprofit visual arts management.
Vassallo arrives as Philadelphia’s arts scene grapples with a number of challenges. Many groups are facing the double whammy of attendance numbers that are still lower than pre-COVID levels, and cuts in federal funding under the Trump administration.
The Pew arts center specifically has undergone a significant change with the 2024 collapse of the University of the Arts, which had been its operational partner. In June, Pew announced that the Barnes Foundation would take UArts’ place, and Vassallo suggested that the Barnes — which also had a hand in her hiring — could take on a more significant role.
“I think there is tremendous potential there programmatically beyond their administrative role,” said Vassallo, who called the relationship between the Pew center and the Barnes an “evolving” one.
Dancers from Philadanco, which received a grant from the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage.
One significant change has already occurred. Vassallo will report to Barnes Foundation executive director and president Thomas Collins, whereas Marincola reported directly to Pew. The Barnes isn’t seen as getting involved with the Pew center’s grant-making process, but, rather, could work with the center on creating new programming.
“We could imagine partnerships between the [Pew Fellowships in the Arts] fellows … being able to engage in the collection at the Barnes, for example, we can imagine the center and the Barnes partnering on community conversations,” said Elinor Haider, senior director of Pew’s Philadelphia Program.
The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage will continue to be based in its offices on Walnut Street, Haider said.
Vassallo called Philadelphia’s arts scene “incredibly rich and vital.” About its challenges, she said — while noting that she needs to relearn Philadelphia’s arts and culture community — that “we are having to find new ways to fund our work. I have seen this in the form of creating new business models, coming up with innovative ways to increase ticket sales and engage current and new audiences to create new revenue streams.”
She said she has “always been a strong believer in nurturing the next generation of art enthusiasts, ensuring that kids have access to the arts across disciplines.”
As for future funding priorities, the center has not yet determined whether it will undertake a strategic planning process, she said.
“Not only are we assessing feedback from grantees and external parties, but we’re also understanding the state of the city, and then you have the various partners involved — you have Pew, you have the center staff, and now you have the Barnes. So I think within that there’s going to be a very special alchemy that starts to further determine the future of center funding decisions.”
When Villanova hosted the first women’s Big 5 Classic tripleheader last year, the Wildcats intended to cap it off by winning the title.
Instead, the Temple Owls spoiled the party plans and left the Main Line with the title in their hands.
This year, the Wildcats delivered. Led by Brynn McCurry’s 21 points, they topped St. Joseph’s, 76-70, Sunday in a title game that was close throughout. It marked ’Nova’s 22nd women’s Big 5 crown, the most of any City Series team.
For as much as rosters in college basketball change by season these days, coach Denise Dillon admitted she had kept last year’s loss in mind.
“That’s the responsibility of myself and our staff, to explain to our players, because of so many new players on the roster, and not recognizing what Philly basketball is,” she said. “Yeah, the taste stuck with me, and I think some of the others who were playing in that game. Denae Carter and Jasmine Bascoe last year, they knew they gave something up here on our home court, and wanted to make sure we took care of business here today against St. Joe’s.”
Villanova’s players celebrate with the Big 5 champions’ banner.
The Hawks were more than valiant. Rhian Stokes totaled 23 points and six assists, while Gabby Casey had 19 points and eight rebounds.
At the other end, St. Joe’s held Bascoe to 4-of-16 field-goal shooting, though she still had 13 points. McCurry, who missed all of last season with a knee injury, delivered her third straight 20-point outing.
“Kudos to [McCurry] and to her teammates for stepping up, because I thought we did a hell of a job on Bascoe,” Hawks coach Cindy Griffin said,
December obviously isn’t March, but Villanova is on some national bracketologists’ early NCAA Tournament bubbles. Though the Wildcats lost at Princeton last month, they made up for it with a win at then-No. 25 West Virginia last Monday, and followed it with a win at Georgetown on Thursday to open Big East play.
Villanova’s Jasmine Bascoe defending Rhian Stokes of St. Joe’s, who led all scorers with 23 points.
Their next game, following exams, should be another solid barometer: home vs. Seton Hall on Dec. 19. The Pirates were picked third in the preseason conference poll, with ’Nova fourth.
“We gave up a tough one to Seton Hall last year in this place,” Dillon said of a 56-55 defeat. “We’ll remind them [at practice] on Tuesday.”
The rest of the day
Drexel topped Temple in the third-place game, 59-52. With Dragons star guard Amaris Baker held to just seven points on 2-of-13 shooting, Deja Evans stepped up with 18 points on 8-of-14 shooting, plus seven rebounds and three assists.
“Things weren’t going our way, our scorers weren’t making shots, but they still found a way to lock in and stay focused on what we needed to do to win the game,” Drexel coach Amy Mallon said. “And to me, that’s what Drexel basketball is about, and how we find ways to win.”
New York Liberty star Jonquel Jones, the adopted daughter of Temple women’s coach Diane Richardson, sat courtside to watch the Owls. That was a reminder of how big women’s basketball is nationally these days, though the stardust hasn’t landed on the Big 5.
Jonquel Jones (second from left) sitting courtside during the Temple-Drexel game.
“Well, I’d love to have her on the court, but we have already exhausted that eligibility,” the always-charismatic Richardson said. “It’s great. She loves our kids and she’s got some time off because of her [ankle] injury, so she’s been spending a lot of time with me. We’re glad to have her here, and not only just for us, but for women’s basketball — and here at the Big 5, where we want to shine a light.”
Penn won the fifth-place game over La Salle, 65-52, led by Katie Collins’ 20 points and nine rebounds. The Quakers led by 21 points in the third quarter, but the Explorers rallied to within five at the end of the period before Penn pulled away in the fourth.
As The Inquirer confirmed a few days ago, the women’s tripleheader will change location next season. Sunday marked Villanova’s second straight year, and the second straight year of disappointingly small crowds on the Main Line: 1,242 fans over the three games.
Though it’s not official yet, the Palestra is the favorite right now to host as part of the arena’s 100th birthday celebration. Penn’s coach isn’t alone in hoping that moving the games to the city’s most famous college basketball venue will draw more fans to watch them.
“I know one thing: Penn would put on a first-class event, just like Villanova has done here,” said Mike McLaughlin, who has long championed having the women’s tripleheader at the city’s most famous venue. “This has been a great event for our athletes, and Penn will do the same if it’s at the Palestra.”
LOS ANGELES — The sky is falling in the city of Philadelphia, just not between Broad and 17th Streets, from Pattison Avenue to Hartranft Street. There, at the NovaCare Complex, the laws of gravitational pull and atmospheric pressure remain normal.
The 8-4 Eagles have lost two consecutive games, their second such losing streak of the season. Their offense, under first-year coordinator Kevin Patullo, can be generously described as inconsistent and harshly described at times as incompetent. The defense, normally a steady strength, got tossed around on Black Friday against the Chicago Bears.
“They sky’s falling outside the locker room,” Saquon Barkley said after that game.
Not inside.
The Eagles, Barkley included, say the energy at the practice facility reflects that. The Eagles have been attentive in the meeting room. They have had spirited practices. They feel like they have the right game plans.
“But [you’ve] got to go out there Monday and do it,” Barkley said Saturday after the Eagles finished their final practice before their Monday night matchup against the Los Angeles Chargers at SoFi Stadium. “That’s where we’re at.”
That’s where the translation hasn’t occurred. The Eagles are struggling, and the vibes on the sideline reflect a team that is trying hard to correct its issues without success.
“Honestly I think it’s been awful,” Barkley said when asked what the sideline energy has been like. “I think if you asked anybody, if they’re being honest, we’ll all agree on that.”
Eagles running back Saquon Barkley is stopped by the Bears on Nov. 28.
To be fair, who could blame them? The Eagles, with one of the highest-paid offenses in the NFL, haven’t scored more than 21 points in four consecutive games. Barkley ran for 2,000 yards last season but is finding it difficult at times to top 50 during a given game. The principals in the passing game haven’t been able to get on the same page, as evidenced by the sequence in which Jalen Hurts and DeVonta Smith didn’t have their signals down and missed a potential touchdown in the loss to the Bears.
“We haven’t been playing well,” Barkley said. “It’s easy to come on the sideline and have great energy when you rip off a 60-yard touchdown. That’s the truth. We know that.”
Barkley went back to a saying he picked up from offensive line coach and running game coordinator Jeff Stoutland. “Execution fuels emotion,” Barkley said. “When you make plays and score touchdowns it’s going to get the energy going on game days. Energy has been great throughout the week of practice.
“We got to carry that to game day.”
There’s an argument to be made that Barkley and the running game can lead the charge in changing those vibes. The Eagles have faced defenses that have keyed in on stopping the run. Only four teams are pitted against a stacked box more often than the Eagles, who see eight or more defenders in the box 32.7% of the time.
Patullo and Stoutland haven’t yet figured out a way to consistently break through against the opposition, and the passing game hasn’t been good enough for defenses to change their approach. Barkley’s blockers have been banged up, which has certainly affected the outcomes, but Barkley does not look like the same runner, either. He has had a nagging groin injury that hasn’t forced him to miss any time, and he has repeatedly said he is healthy.
New wrinkles are on the way, left tackle Jordan Mailata said earlier in the practice week leading into Monday’s game vs. the Los Angeles Chargers at SoFi Stadium. Barkley smiled Saturday when asked about the topic. “I don’t know what change they’re talking about,” he said.
“I really love the game plan.”
Barkley said he thinks positivity is important on the sideline.
“It’s kind of been a role I’ve tried to take on ever since I came into the league,” he said. “I feel like it’s big. Sometimes it’s just the sense of having confidence and having great energy is going to help us out on the football field. I’m a believer in that.”
A few feet away from Barkley’s locker stall as he spoke Saturday in the locker room at the NovaCare Complex was a large inflatable Easter bunny. Barkley said he didn’t know how it arrived there. Earlier in the day, though, AJ Dillon took the credit. The backup running back, who has been a healthy scratch, has anointed himself the “vibes guy.”
“I was told that it’s a vibes bunny,” Barkley said. “And the vibes are high.”
The Eagles have installed the “positivity rabbit” into the locker room
It showed up today and the offensive line stressed to me they are not sad they just wanted a good vibes bunny 👍 pic.twitter.com/zJi0M93SEr
The Eagles on Sunday waived wide receiver and returner Xavier Gipson. They now have an open spot on the 53-man roster, which will likely go to safety Marcus Epps, who is expected to be activated from injured reserve and could start next to Reed Blankenship on Monday night.
Gipson missed the Eagles’ Week 13 game with a shoulder injury, one he suffered during a mistake on a punt return that helped flip the result of the team’s Week 12 loss to Dallas. The team will continue to use Britain Covey as a returner.
The Eagles also downgraded Myles Hinton (back) to out for Monday’s game. Hinton’s 21-day practice window is nearing its end. The Eagles have until Wednesday to activate their rookie offensive tackle or he will be sidelined for the rest of the season — like fellow rookie lineman Willie Lampkin, whose window expired on Nov. 27.
All will have plenty to prove against the Chargers. But none will have more than the guys whose primary responsibility is putting the quarterback on his back. The most important players on the field Monday night will be the Eagles edge rushers.
The pressure is on the pressure.
Or, rather, the pressure-ers.
Jaelan Phillips, Nolan Smith, Jalyx Hunt. These are the names you will need to hear with regularity against the Chargers. We haven’t heard them nearly enough this season.
Eagles defensive tackle Jalen Carter (right) and edge rusher Jaelan Phillips stop Lions quarterback Jared Goff on Nov. 16.
Through 12 games, the Eagles have gotten just eight sacks combined out of their edge rushers.
True, five of them have come in the last five games, a stretch that has seen Smith return from injured reserve and Phillips arrive via trade from the Dolphins. But it still isn’t enough. Three years ago, Haason Reddick, Josh Sweat, and Brandon Graham combined for 38 sacks, an average of more than two per game. That’s the kind of output the Eagles should be expecting on Monday night.
Rarely have the Eagles faced an opponent so ripe for the picking. The Chargers have been a mess up front all season. In late August, they lost starting left tackle Rashawn Slater to a season-ending knee injury. A month ago, they lost All-Pro right tackle Joe Alt to a season-ending ankle injury. In the four games since Alt went down, the Chargers have allowed a remarkable 17 sacks. That included three last week against the Raiders, a game that ended with Justin Herbert nursing a broken non-throwing hand.
Chargers quarterback Justin Herbert is expected to play against the Eagles.
This should be a get-right game for the Eagles’ most underperforming unit. That’s true regardless of who is under center — or in shotgun, or in the pistol — on the other side of the line of scrimmage. It will be especially true if that player is Herbert, who is reportedly preparing to play despite undergoing surgery to repair a broken bone in his left hand early last week.
The Eagles have already seen firsthand what Herbert can do when given an ample amount of time to throw. The Chargers veteran shredded them during Sirianni’s first season as coach, completing 32 of 38 passes for 356 yards and two touchdowns in a 27-24 win in Week 9. That afternoon was one of the 11 times in Herbert’s career that he was not sacked. The Chargers are 9-2 with a plus-110 point differential in those 11 games.
It goes without saying that none of those games has occurred this season. Herbert has been sacked multiple times in 11 of 12 of his starts in 2025, with three-plus sacks in eight. Heading into Sunday, the Chargers were one of five teams in the NFL to allow five-plus sacks in at least four games. At 8-4, they are the only one of those teams with a winning record. The other four have combined to go 10-38.
The Eagles need to take advantage. Whatever the overall numbers say, they have more than enough talent on the edge to be a deciding factor Monday night. We’ve seen flashes of dominance from the group. Apart from maybe the cornerbacks, the Eagles’ edge rushers were the best unit on the field in back-to-back victories over the Packers and Lions. In a 10-7 win over Green Bay in Week 10, the group combined for two sacks, three tackles for losses, and five quarterback hits against Jordan Love. The following week, Phillips and Hunt combined for five hits on Lions quarterback Jared Goff, including Phillips’ first sack in an Eagles uniform. The pressure on Goff was one of the biggest reasons the veteran completed just 14 of 37 passes with an interception.
But those two wins feel like a distant memory, don’t they? For the first time in the Vic Fangio era, the Eagles are coming off back-to-back games of 400-plus yards of total offense allowed. Two weeks ago, Dak Prescott was way too comfortable while completing 23 of 36 passes for 354 yards. Last week, the Bears gashed them for a ridiculous 281 rushing yards, with running backs D’Andre Swift and Kyle Monangai combining for 255 yards on 40 carries.
The Bears gained 281 yards on the ground against the Eagles.
The four truest words in the NFL came out of Jordan Davis’ mouth earlier this week.
“It’s a copycat league,” the Eagles defensive tackle said.
With Herbert ailing and the Chargers pass protection in shambles and the Eagles taking the field without All-World defensive tackle Jalen Carter, we should expect to see Greg Roman do as Sean McVay and Ben Johnson did before him.
“We’ve got to play the run well enough to where they just don’t run it a bunch,” Fangio said. “They run it, and like most teams that run it well, they have a good play-action game, and not give up the shots in the play-action passing game, which they do a good job of.”
But stopping the run can only carry you so far against a quarterback like Herbert. The Eagles need to put themselves in a position to pummel him as thoroughly as the rules allow. They need Smith to be the guy he was down the stretch last season, when he recorded 10½ sacks in his last 16 games, including four in the playoffs. They need Phillips to be the guy he was against the Packers.
The best offense is a good defense. And the best defense is a great pass rush.
For anyone trying to follow OpenAI’s latest corporate restructuring, here’s the breakdown from a professor of entrepreneurship who studies social enterprises.
The nonprofit OpenAI Foundation controls a for-profit company that just restructured into a public benefit corporation (OpenAI Group PBC). The company says this new form will “benefit everyone” by allowing OpenAI to cure diseases and build “resilient AI.”
Sounds noble, right? Stick with me, and I’ll explain what is really happening.
Let’s use the analogy of KPop Demon Hunters, a recent megahit movie by Netflix. It’s an age-old story in which it’s up to the brave to fight evil for the good of humanity, but this time told using catchy K-pop songs and pastel animations.
In the movie, the demons disguise themselves as a boy K-pop group, the Saja Boys. The girl K-pop group, HUNTR/X, are the saviors who need to slay the demons — but instead are dazzled by the Saja Boys’ talent and smooth dance moves. The Saja Boys end up sucking the souls of all humans and lead the population into misery as the girl group remains helpless to the boy group’s whims.
So in our analogy, OpenAI sees itself as HUNTR/X, and it is here to save the world from the demon, which in this scenario is artificial general intelligence (AGI).
Unlike today’s generative artificial intelligence (e.g., ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini), artificial general intelligence would actually think and reason like a human. Some data scientists see it as having the ability to become superior to human intelligence. (Think of Terminator’s Skynet, an AI that becomes self-aware and launches nuclear war against humans. Some call that science fiction fantasy, whereas others say it is a possibility.)
AGIs are not yet possible, but OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, wants to be the first to introduce them to the general market. So, like the girl group HUNTR/X, OpenAI sees itself as the savior by building “resilient” AI to harness the evil AGI.
To have the power to fight evil, HUNTR/X needed K-pop songs, whereas OpenAI just needs capital, and lots of it. For example, it just signed a $38 billion deal with Amazon. However, OpenAI is more like the Saja Boys than HUNTR/X, by disguising itself as a public benefit corporation that allows it to make profits while saying it is focusing on the public good.
It’s important to our story to know that a PBC is a for-profit corporate entity that legally commits to pursuing one or more declared public benefits in addition to generating profit for shareholders. Being a public company, it can raise funds through selling shares. By investing in a PBC, shareholders understand profits will be diverted to a public good.
OpenAI promises profits will flow back to its nonprofit, funding “AI resilience.”
It sounds altruistic until you realize: If it’s all for the public good, why does a nonprofit need to own the for-profit version of itself — and what is AI resilience anyway?
Back to our analogy: OpenAI wants to be the market leader in building out AGI (fight evil demons). It can’t do it without capital (catchy songs). Representing itself as a public benefit corporation (Saja Boys), it can collect the cash (human souls) that is then diverted to the nonprofit (demon king), which will control how AGI is used and marketed (rule the world).
“AI resilience” is OpenAI’s way of controlling the market. This is a form of “Big Tech extraction.“ Another benefit of this shell is that it pays less taxes as a nonprofit.
Some may say my analogy is too simplistic. I’ll counter that every “save the world” story needs a hero and a villain. The twist? The villain always insists they’re the hero. When a $500 billion company says it’s saving humanity, it’s worth asking why it needs a legal shell game to do so.
A lawsuit against OpenAI claims that Joshua Enneking, 26, was coached into suicide by ChatGPT after confiding in the chatbot for months.
These are hardly the marks of altruism.
OpenAI isn’t HUNTR/X or even the Saja Boys. It’s the soul-stealing Gwi-Ma, the demon king who wins by pretending to deliver good.
Investors, beware: You’re being Gwi-Ma’d. Many will be OK with that. The rest should question the deception of Big Tech.
Rosanna Garcia is the endowed chair of innovation and entrepreneurship at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts and a public voices fellow on technology in the Public Interest with the OpEd Project.
The massive construction project rose outside Room 221, where 22 curious second graders peered outside their classroom daily, noting daily progress with great interest.
Sometimes, the kids at Fanny Jackson Coppin School, on South 12th Street in South Philadelphia, cheered for the workers, spurring them on as the summer heat gave way to chillier temperatures.
But they had so many questions: “What colors are for the building, and how many colors are you going to use? Red or pink?” and “How does the building not fall down?” and “When will you stop making it taller and taller?”
Teacher Kate Atkins collected the 7- and 8-year-olds’ queries, compiling them in a letter she left at the job site with her phone number. “We think you should come and tell us about construction because it is getting better and better,” the kids wrote.
Jack Delaney, the project manager on the job site, found the letter. He was charmed; he reached out to Atkins.
Zach Winters, cofounder and partner at 3rd Story Philly, second grade teacher Kate Atkins, center, and Jack Delaney, right, Project Manager at 3rd Story Philly, talk with students at Fanny Jackson Coppin School, in Philadelphia, December 05, 2025.
And on a frigid Friday, Delaney and Zach Winters, construction manager and a cofounder of 3rd Story Philly, the development and construction company working on the house project, walked into Room 221 with tools to show and energy appropriate for a roomful of enthusiastic second graders.
For 50 minutes — a long time for second-grade attention spans — the students talked about tools and examined pictures of the project in progress. They donned their own hard hats. But mostly, they gleaned information.
Zach Winters, cofounder and partner at 3rd Story Philly, left, and Jack Delaney, Project Manager at 3rd Story Philly, right, talk with students at Fanny Jackson Coppin School, in Philadelphia, December 05, 2025.
Here are some of Room 221’s greatest hits:
Question: Why did you decide to make the house bigger by making it taller instead of making it wider?
Answer: “We build additions on top of existing homes or sometimes behind existing homes, because there’s not a lot of space in the city,” Winters said. “We make the house bigger by going up.”
Q: Do you ever worry that you’re going to fall off the building?
A: “Yes, I do,” Winters said. “You should always be worried that you’re going to fall off something high. We try to be very careful. We try to stay away from the edge of the building. If we’re close to the edge of the building, we put on safety harnesses, so if we were to fall, that could catch us. But, yes, I’m worried, and my wife worries, and my mother worries.”
Students Landon Watkins, center, and Leo Horn, right, try on hard hats at Fanny Jackson Coppin School, in Philadelphia, December 05, 2025.
Q: How much will the house cost to build?
A: The project is a full remodel, with third- and fourth-story additions, basement excavation, and two roof decks.
“Often today, we are building a new construction at around $200 to $250 a square foot,” Winters said. “And it depends on how fancy the building is. A project like this is close to a half-million dollars. That’s a lot of money — but it’s a lot of house.”
Q: How long will it take to finish the house?
A: “Eight months to a year,” Delaney said.
“That depends on how many problems we have. Sometimes, it rains for a week, and we have to get the roof done,” Winters said. “Sometimes, it gets really cold, and the masons can’t work.”
The Coppin kids did not let Delaney and Winters off easy.
“Will it be done by Christmas?” one student said. No, Delaney and Winters said. The job started in March. It won’t finish until next year.
“Maybe you should try to finish it by Hanukkah,” another student said.
Q: (To Delaney) Do you do any drywall?
A: “I don’t, but the drywallers do,” Delaney said. “They are very strong. They hold up giant sheets of drywall.”
Winters interjected: Delaney knows how to drywall, but that’s not his job right now.
Delaney smiled.
“I get to say, ‘Hey, you go do the drywall,’ and then I run away,” he said.
The kids loved the level Delaney showed them. They had excellent guesses about how many bricks were used on the project.
“Four thousand million,” one girl shouted.
(Close — it’s 17,500.)
At the end of the visit, Atkins had a question for the kids.
“Who might want to work in construction someday?” she asked.
Nearly every hand shot up.
Delaney and Winters looked triumphant.
“We’ve got a labor shortage now,” Winters said. “Let’s go!”
Zach Winters, cofounder and partner at 3rd Story Philly, talks with students at Fanny Jackson Coppin School, in Philadelphia, December 05, 2025.
Emily Phillips and her family never slam doors or walk too heavily inside their North Philadelphia rowhouse. They’re afraid of what too much movement could do to the vacant house next door.
In early August, a back window and part of a wall came crashing down during harsh winds and rain. An inspector for the city’s Department of Licenses and Inspections declared the vacant rowhouse “imminently dangerous,” which means it is at risk of collapsing.
“I never know when something’s going to actually happen,” Phillips said in late October. “We know it’s just a matter of time. … I’m so scared right now.”
Across Philadelphia, families are living in a limbo of anxiety next to buildings that the city has determined are unsafe or imminently dangerous. The buildings at greatest risk of collapse are usually vacant.
Renters Emily Phillips (left) and Dayani Lemmon examine the basement wall that their home shares with the abandoned and dangerous rowhouse next door.
Philadelphians rely on the city to keep an eye on vacant properties that are or could become dangerous. And in 2016, the city rolled out a method for determining which properties were likely to be vacant. L&I’s commissioner at the time said the inventory tool was making the department more proactive in protecting the public from deteriorating vacant buildings.
But L&I officials now say the department no longer uses the tool. They said the department mainly relies on residents’ complaints and its list of vacant property licenses — which L&I admits is a massive undercount — to monitor empty buildings.
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L&I points out that property owners are responsible for securing vacant properties and repairing dangerous buildings, and the department steps in as resources and laws allow.
Around the time Inquirer reporters spoke with Phillips, the city’s spreadsheet of likely vacant properties listed about 8,000 vacant buildings — a potentially serious threat to their neighbors. An Inquirer analysis of the city’s list of imminently dangerous buildings showed that 79% of those also appeared on the list of likely vacant buildings.
Just under half of those vacant and imminently dangerous buildings were rowhouses, which are especially risky to neighbors because of shared walls. This risk is not borne equally by all of Philadelphia’s residents.
Emily Phillips and her landlord, Samantha Wismann, stand next to a neighboring abandoned rowhouse, where part of a wall collapsed and a tree grows inside.
Nearly eight in 10 of all such rowhouses are in the poorest 25% of the city’s zip codes. The zip code with the most such rowhouses — 19132, where Phillips lives — has a median income of $31,000, according to the latest Census Bureau data. Philadelphia’s median household income is $61,000.
Seven in 10 vacant rowhouses that the city identified as imminently dangerous are in the 34% of the city’s zip codes that are predominantly Black. Roughly nine in 10 residents in 19132 are Black.
Dianna Coleman, a community activist who lives in Southwest Philadelphia, called vacant properties “one of Philadelphia’s most pressing and overlooked crises.”
This summer, a hole opened in the back of an abandoned rowhouse that is connected to a North Philadelphia house owned by Samantha Wismann.
When Coleman and a group of residents in Southwest and West Philadelphia came together last summer to organize around quality of life issues, residents’ top concern was fixing vacant properties. They partnered with the grassroots social justice nonprofit OnePA and launched their first campaign — asking the city to deal with abandoned buildings and vacant lots.
“While we recognize that the city has taken steps — demolishing some buildings, addressing some lots — the pace is way too slow, the resources too scarce, and the strategy too weak,” Coleman, cochair of OnePA West/Southwest Rising, said at a news conference this summer. “Unsafe buildings are left standing for years, growing more hazardous, pulling down property values, and pushing people out of their homes.”
The vacant rowhouse next to Emily Phillips’ North Philadelphia home had its collapsing porch roof removed, but the rest of the home remains in disrepair.
The city’s questionable vacancy data
About a decade ago, the city started using an algorithm that takes feeds from a variety of datasets (such as whether a property has had its water cut off) to determine whether a property is likely to be vacant.
City officials celebrated the tool when it launched.
“Protecting the public from deteriorating vacant, abandoned properties as they grow more and more likely to collapse is critical to L&I’s mission,” former L&I Commissioner David Perri said in a 2016 news release announcing the index. “The Vacant Property Model and dataset are making us more proactive and strategic in carrying out that mission.”
But the reliability of the city’s list of likely vacant buildings and lots was recently called into question by individuals who have worked closely with the tool and collaborated with city officials in the past.
For more than three years, Clean & Green Philly, a nonprofit that — until its closure earlier this year — used data to help Philadelphians deal with vacant properties in their neighborhoods, relied on the city’s tool in combination with other data to identify vacant properties in greatest need of addressing.
But last year, founder Nissim Lebovits and the organization’s former executive director, Amanda Soskin, noticed something was wrong.
For years, the city’s list of suspected vacant properties had hovered somewhere around 40,000 records — buildings and land combined. But then, according to Lebovits and Soskin, that number plunged to around 24,000 in June 2024.
“And at first I was like, ‘OK. Something’s probably broken,’ and we looked into it,” Lebovits said. “And we realized that the city’s actual underlying datasets were no longer reporting the same number of vacant properties.”
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The spreadsheet was showing only about 14,000 records as of this June, according to Lebovits and Soskin.
Then at some point between June and early November, the index grew to about 37,000 total properties.
Inquirer reporters began investigating the connection between vacancy and structural deficiencies in buildings after the April collapse of an abandoned rowhouse in Sharswood. At that time, L&I offered the vacancy index while asserting it could not provide detailed information about the data and referring reporters to CityGeo, the department that developed and maintains the index.
At no point during an hour-long interview with the department’s chief data officer in early June did city officials mention any concerns about the reliability of the data.
Reporters learned about issues with the data when Lebovits and Soskin wrote an article for The Inquirer’s opinion section later that month detailing their concerns. They wrote that city sources told them the process of collecting and publishing vacancy estimates “was quietly discontinued after [Mayor Cherelle L.] Parker took office.”
In an email, a CityGeo spokesperson said the city has not stopped updating the index, asserted that its accuracy depends on continued updates from various departments, and noted that CityGeo pauses updates “every few years” for “a month or so” to ensure the tool continues to work, most recently this past summer.
The spokesperson did not respond to questions about why the index’s size had varied so greatly recently. Lebovits and Soskin told The Inquirer that nobody from the city reached out to them after their article was published.
“My big takeaway here is that the lack of transparency around this dataset is a major liability,” Lebovits wrote in an email. “Having so little accountability regarding data production and quality seriously hampers any community groups trying to use these data and undermines the credibility of the City’s vacancy work.”
The tree inside an abandoned North Philadelphia rowhouse towers above the roofs of the house and its neighbor, owned by Samantha Wismann.
‘Very, very scary’
When Phillips’ landlord, Samantha Wismann, bought the house on North Woodstock Street in 2020, she didn’t know that its neighbor was vacant.
Wismann noticed the house looked a little shabby, but it wasn’t until Phillips moved in the following year that the women saw no one lived there. They didn’t know how long it had been vacant, but they watched it quickly deteriorate.
Most pressing back then was the collapsing porch roof, which was dragging down the roofs of the porches on either side of it.
Someone eventually tore it down. But the rest of the home remains in disrepair.
“It’s very, very scary,” Wismann said in October, “because eventually, if it’s not handled, it’s gonna come down.”
Cracks snake between the homes.
From the women’s backyard, through the door-sized hole in the back of the neighboring house, they can see past splintered beams and an abandoned refrigerator, beyond the staircase that leads to the second floor, and straight through to the front door.
Then there’s the tree that’s growing inside the vacant house. It has pushed outward through bricks and plaster and busted a second-story window. The tree’s branches tower over the homes, and some have reached the window of the bedroom where Phillips’ grandchildren stay.
L&I’s Contractual Services Unit is responsible for inspecting unsafe and imminently dangerous properties and administers the city’s demolition program. The unit has 10 members and openings for two more inspectors, said Basil Merenda, commissioner for L&I’s Inspections, Safety & Compliance division.
“We’re out there doing our job,” he said. “We’re out there making sure that these unsafe and [imminently dangerous] properties are properly addressed through procedures and that public safety is always being maintained.”
Renter Dayani Lemmon looks at the abandoned property located next door to his home in North Philadelphia.
But a 2024 report by the City Controller’s Office said the unit used to have 15 inspectors, which the office said was not enough to keep up with inspections of unsafe and imminently dangerous properties.
Merenda said L&I is “making do with what we have” and mobilizes inspectors in other units when needed.
After L&I declares a property to be unsafe or imminently dangerous, it must issue notices to the property owner, who is responsible for repairs. The department can take unresponsive owners to court and pursue demolition in emergency situations, such as when a property is likely to collapse, is next to an occupied building, and has recent structural failures, Merenda said. The city demolishes imminently dangerous buildings in order of the risk officials determine they pose.
A tree can be seen growing inside the vacant North Philadelphia rowhouse through a hole in the back wall, which partially collapsed this summer.
The city charges owners for tear-down costs and places liens on properties if they do not pay.
L&I was unable to say how many such tear-downs the department has conducted this year and referred questions about the cost of demolitions — and the proportion of those costs recouped from owners — to the city’s Department of Revenue. The revenue department did not provide any figures to The Inquirer.
“In many, many cases, property owners surface at the last minute and request a continuance, request a temporary restraining order from us going in and demolishing the property,” Merenda said. “And you know, that’s the purview of the courts. It’s beyond us.”
In the meantime, people living next to dangerous properties are left in the dark.
Kate and Dan Thien and their daughter stand in the backyard of their Port Richmond home, the foundation of which is cracking because of weed trees next door.
Frustrated with L&I
After the back of the abandoned rowhouse on North Woodstock Street opened up this summer, Phillips led an L&I inspector through her home so he could see.
“He went in the backyard, he looked over and was like, ‘My god!’” Phillips said. “I said, ‘Yeah, I can see right through their house.’ And he looked up and was like, ‘It’s a tree!’ I said, ‘Yeah, the tree is pushing the house out.’”
The inspector put an orange “imminently dangerous” notice on a front window, and Phillips and her landlord thought they wouldn’t have to worry much longer. But days after the notice went up, it was ripped down.
Weeds from the neighboring vacant property surround Kate and Dan Thien’s home in Port Richmond.
The property has attracted rats and mice. Water leaked into Phillips’ basement until her landlord reinforced the shared wall with concrete.
For months, her landlord got no response from the city to her calls and emails asking for help.
On Nov. 20 — 3 ½ months after the partial collapse — an L&I inspector visited the vacant rowhouse to post a “final notice” that the owner must repair or demolish the home or else the city will have it demolished.
Kate and Dan Thien are trying to live with the vacant property next to their rowhouse in Port Richmond as they wait for the city to respond to their 311 complaints.
When they bought their house in February 2024, they saw that the neighboring backyard was a mess, but they didn’t know the house was vacant.
Renters who had lived in what is now the Thiens’ home had used and maintained the neighboring backyard. But it quickly became overgrown. Neighbors later told the Thiens that the home had been vacant for more than a decade.
The backyard of the abandoned North Philadelphia rowhouse is full of debris.
“Pretty much the entire neighborhood knows about this house,” Kate Thien said.
She and neighbors on the other side have filed complaints with the city. The property has racked up 19 violations since 2012. Public records show that the city cited the property for “high weeds” last fall and most recently inspected it last December. The property passed inspection.
A year later, a weed tree’s branches stretch above and behind the Thiens’ two-story home. Tree roots are growing into their home’s foundation and cracking the concrete. Trees are “very rapidly growing” as Thien waits for the city to do something, she said. She worries about her home’s property value as the situation worsens.
This abandoned property on Spruce Street in West Philadelphia, pictured on July 30, was one of the houses on a list of problem vacant properties compiled by OnePA West/Southwest Rising.
“It’s not going away,” she said.
Annette Randolph and her husband, Dennis, live in a Point Breeze rowhouse next to a home that’s been vacant for more than a decade and that the city classifies as unsafe, a step below imminently dangerous. Four generations of her family have lived in her home. She hopes she’s not the last.
A tree growing inside the vacant house burst through its back roof, next to a tarp-covered hole. Randolph has had to repair her own roof because of damage from next door. Water gets into her basement.
The home’s legal owners are dead. A scheduled sheriff’s sale in 2011 for overdue property taxes gave Randolph hope for a resolution. But right before the sale, someone paid part of the tax bill to stop it.
On Nov. 20, an inspector with Philadelphia’s Department of Licenses and Inspections posted a final notice on the vacant North Philadelphia rowhouse that says owners must repair or demolish the home.
Now, “for sale” signs hang in the front windows, and a contractor showed up last week. Randolph hopes any work on the house won’t damage the one she’s called home for 66 years.
She has lost track of the number of times she’s called 311 about the situation. She’s felt helpless. When she needed new homeowner’s insurance, companies told her they wouldn’t insure her or would charge more because of the attached vacant and unsafe house.
“L&I and the city I blame for allowing this type of stuff to happen,” Randolph said.
Merenda said L&I hears neighbors’ complaints, “and we’re going to try to take action as efficiently and properly as possible.”
“I want to make, during my watch, L&I more accessible, responsive, and accountable to the neighbors, stakeholders, contractors, developers, average citizens, the City Council,” he said.
A collapsing roof was removed but the rest of the vacant rowhouse was left to deteriorate.
Neighbors band together
In September 2024, OnePA West/Southwest Rising launched its campaign to get the city to deal with abandoned properties.
The group created a list of 20 of the worst ones as submitted by neighbors. Among the vacant buildings, some had collapsing porches, one’s basement had flooded and damaged a neighbor’s house, and one’s walls were crumbling. Some had squatters, including a property where human waste was dumped in the backyard.
City Councilmember Jamie Gauthier’s office got the group a meeting with staff at L&I this January.
As a result, this summer, the group celebrated successes: five lots cleaned by the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, three properties cleaned and sealed by the city, five properties whose owners the city took to court, and three properties that were repaired and returned to use.
The group believes it was able to get L&I to act because it had the weight of a Council member behind it.
“I do think L&I is overwhelmed. I don’t think they have enough staff to really stay on top of this,” said Eric Braxton, project director for OnePA West/Southwest Rising. “But clearly there are people in leadership that care about our communities and are trying to do the right thing.”
Now the group plans to push for systemic change. It wants the city to make small repairs to stabilize vacant buildings and charge the owners.
“There’s a gap in the system when it comes to dealing with unsafe abandoned buildings,” Braxton said. “The result of that is that those buildings just get worse and worse until they are imminently dangerous and have to be demolished.”
Wistar Institute scientist Maureen Murphy wants to solve a decades-long mystery: Why is ovarian cancer often resistant to hormone therapy?
In a recently published study, she shared a new theory as to why treatments designed to block or remove hormones, known as hormone therapy, often fail in ovarian cancer — and a potential approach to make them more effective. Such therapies have cut the risk of death from certain breast cancers by a third and reduced the odds of a recurrence by half.
She pinpointed a problem facing hormone therapy — the vast majority of ovarian cancer cases have mutations in a key protein called p53.
Her study, published last month in the medical journalGenes and Development, suggests that mutations in p53, a protein that normally works to stop tumors from growing, drive resistance to hormone therapy and that their effects could be reversed.
“There are very few drugs that treat it,” Murphy said.
Her p53 mutation discovery led to her identifying a drug currently in clinical trials that’s promisingin a small number of cases. Murphy wants doctors to start testing the combination of the drug and hormone therapy in ovarian cancer.
If the approach makes it into a clinical trial, it would still take years to evaluate the safety and efficacy of the combination. Most treatments tested in clinical trials do not become standard practice.
“For ovarian cancer, the treatment hasn’t changed much in the last 20 years, and so we really do need new treatments,” Murphy said.
How does hormone therapy work?
Hormones are like the body’s mail service.
These chemicals carry messages to cells throughout the body, controlling mood, growth, reproduction, and development.
Tumors can co-opt hormones for their own purposes using proteins called receptors, which act like mailboxes to receive the messages.
Breast cancers, for example, often have estrogen receptors so that they can receive more of a hormone called estrogen. Similar to how bodybuilders use steroids to build muscle, tumors use estrogen to grow and divide.
“Breast and ovarian tumors love estrogen. They grow on it,” Murphy said.
Hormone therapy works by either blocking the receptors from receiving the hormones, or reducing the amount of hormones in the body altogether.
One of the first hormone therapy drugs for cancer, tamoxifen, was approved in the U.S. in 1977 to target the estrogen receptor in metastatic breast cancer.
In this study, Murphy looked at fulvestrant and elacestrant, two anti-estrogen drugs approved for breast cancer.
More than 70% of cases of the most common type of ovarian cancer express estrogen receptors, making them theoretically a good target for hormone therapy, if the p53 problem can be fixed.
Solving the mystery
In her first professor job at Temple’s Fox Chase Cancer Center in 1998, Murphy chose to study the tumor suppressor protein p53, with a focus on genetic variants in women of African and Ashkenazi Jewish descent that put them at risk of cancer.
Decades later, Murphy expanded her focus at Wistar to look at hundreds of genetic variants of the protein found in the general population, in an effort to predict people’s risk of cancer.
Murphy started to wonder whether mutant p53 controlled the function of the estrogen receptor, and how it might affect the response of tumor cells to hormone therapy.
That led her team to look atovarian cancer because of its high prevalence of p53 mutations. They used cell lines and a lab model to mimic stage 3 and 4 tumors.
The researchers found that when mutant p53 was bound to the estrogen receptor in these models, it inhibited part of the estrogen receptor’s activity, driving resistance to hormone therapy.
By simply removing the mutant protein, tumors “responded great” to the hormone therapy, Murphy said.
A lab at the Wistar Institute in Philadelphia.
Hope for hormone therapy?
While it’s easy to take away p53 in the lab, it’s not as easy in a patient.
There is, however, a promising drug currently being tested in clinical trials. Called rezatapopt, it can convert mutant p53 into a normal-functioning version of the protein.
It works for one particular mutation, Y220C, found in roughly 4% of ovarian cancers.
Murphy’s team foundadministering rezatapopt alongside hormone therapy led to 75% shrinkage of ovarian tumor models, versus 50% shrinkage when the hormone therapy was given alone.
This finding lined up with rezatapopt’s early data from clinical trials.
“For reasons we didn’t understand, women with ovarian cancer were responding best to this drug,” Murphy said.
Nineteen out of 44 women treated with rezatapopt alone saw their tumors shrink, with one even having a complete response, according to recent interim results from a phase 2 trial.
Murphy hopes this paper will prompt clinical trials to test rezatapopt in combination with anti-estrogen therapy.
However, since rezatapopt only targets one p53 mutation, this approach is limited to a small subset of patients. Murphy hopes that more drugs can be developed thatfix other mutant forms of p53 seen in ovarian cancer.
Murphy’s findings make sense conceptually and present a “promising avenue for future clinical trials,”said Tian-Li Wang, the head of the Molecular Genetics Laboratory of Female Reproductive Cancer at Johns Hopkins University, who was not involved in the Wistar study.
A caveat is that the study looked at a limited number of cell lines, she said.
She thinks the results should be confirmed in cases of ovarian cancer that have other types of p53 mutations to see if it could be applied more broadly.
“[I’m] really interested to see if the approach can benefit patients,” Wang said.
Across Philadelphia, people live next to vacant properties that are or could become dangerous.
Drew Miller, a paralegal at the legal aid nonprofit Community Legal Services of Philadelphia, said residents living next to risky vacant buildings can take certain steps right away to protect themselves and their properties.
Take pictures. When they start having concerns, they should immediately take pictures of the inside and outside of their home, especially basements and shared walls, Miller said.
“Having those initial photos is crucial for them to very clearly show that damage happened over this period of time,” he said.
Submit a 311 request. They should submit a 311 service request to the city’s Department of Licenses and Inspections by calling or using the online portal or app. Miller recommends submitting virtual complaints to easily track updates and to upload photos to give inspectors a head start before they arrive at a site.
“They can often see in the photo whether or not the issue is urgent,” he said. “That can be a helpful tool if the resident’s concern is that this is prioritized.”
Make a specific complaint. And if residents are concerned that a building is dangerous, they should make sure they select the right category for their complaint.
Complaints about vacant properties can range from trash or high grass to structural issues that need urgent attention. So “a vacant property complaint might not immediately be taken as seriously,” Miller said.
“In the most extreme circumstances,” if residents are worried that a building may collapse, they should consider filing a “construction complaint,” which clues L&I in that there may be a structural issue, he said.
But if part of a property collapses, a building facade is crumbling, or the situation otherwise seems like an emergency, call 911, said Basil Merenda, commissioner for L&I’s Inspections, Safety & Compliance division.
Contact your Council member. Merenda also encouraged residents to contact their City Council representative if they are concerned about a vacant property that doesn’t constitute an emergency.
