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To most students at SLA, the soul of their school exists with the people in the community–teacher, students, and the larger community.

However, none of this would exist if the school did not have an actual building. Most students don’t know about the history of how SLA was built–and how the current home of the school, at 55 N. 22nd street, could be a temporary one.

Although SLA opened its doors to students in the fall of 2006, School District of Philadelphia and the Philadelphia Management negotiated the lease for the school in 2005. This lease was set for ten years and is not paid for by the capital of the state. The lease, like a rent, is paid by the operational funds of the school. This means that the funds used to make sure students have supplies, tools, and programs to better education are also being used to pay the lease, unlike most other schools, where the building is owned by the School District.

Chris Lehmann, the founder and principal of SLA, acknowledges that this is a difficult situation. “A perfect world is a school paid with capital funds so all operating funds go to the kids and education.”

The lease was enacted before Lehmann was hired, so he has no power over the matter, the only thing he can do is make sure his needs are met that may appear in the building.

Currently SLA is in its seventh year in the current building. With the lease expiring in three short years, the questions is rapidly approaching: What is the future home of SLA?

Lehmann described three possibilities.

The first would be that the school would have to vacate the building — but only to move to a new school built specifically for Science Leadership Academy. The disadvantage to this plan is that it would cost the School District approximately $40 million dollars, which is cheap in the long run but very expensive at the moment, due to budget cuts and the financial problems the School District and Philadelphia is facing.

The second possibility is that SLA renews the lease or negotiate an entirely new lease, but again. The drawback here would be the school using its operational funds to maintain the lease.

The third possibility that could happen is that SLA moves to a building that once housed a high school. The only disadvantages would be that SLA has very specific needs for its building — such as a high number outlets for laptop chargers, and full science lab facilities — that help it run effectively. Even an old school building could require major renovations.

How do the students feel about this? Sophomore DeShawn McLeod, whose brother Jerome graduated two years ago with the first class of SLA, feels deeply connected to the current school space. “It’s a home, there’s so many places that we’ve found to make a home in this building. I feel like we’ve settled down into a second home.”

McLeod also responded about the possibility of the school being relocated and how it will affected the community. “It will affect the people who have been here and the history we have created, especially the freshmen.”

Although the SLA community would love to have a new facility to call their own, this is an unlikely hope in the current School District climate. Currently SDP is seeking to close several schools in the city, not open new ones. Lehmann acknowledges this challenge. “Figuring out how to fill all the needs of the schools in the district, and how to balance that, it is a challenging thing.”

No matter what happens, there is only one outcome that the populace of the school looks forward to: the future in which the SLA community has a place to learn, create, and lead.

Mainly known for being a 1:1 laptop school, SLA also has a wonderful, and more traditional, source of education and relaxation for students: a library. The library is nothing on the scale of a Free Library, but through donations it has become a adequate source for information for the school. With all that, who is the one that keeps the information in check? The Librarian.

Since it opened its doors to students six years ago, SLA has had four different librarians. The most recent full-time librarian, Joshua Newman, started at SLA as the librarian and then music teacher in the 2010-2011 school year. However, due to budget cuts imposed by the School District of Philadelphia, he along with other a number of other SLA teachers, faculty and programs were elminiated.

When asked recently how he felt about being let go, Mr. Newman replied that, “employment is never a guarantee and things happen that are beyond anyone’s control. It cemented an idea in my head that was larger than my own situation, and that feeling was, ‘this educational system is broken.’”

In the wake of Mr. Newman leaving, students and even teachers were overcome with confusion and sadness. “I felt like we lost something really valuable. He played a huge part in revitalizing SLA’s music scene. now that’s he’s gone, I don’t see anyone playing instruments the way they used to.” says Abe Musselman, a junior at SLA.

At the same time he lost his job, Mr.  Newman was expecting a child on top of having to find new employment. “Its not just about me and what makes me happy, but a new responsibility in my life taking hold,” he said.

His son William was born at the end of last school year, and Mr. Newman is now the librarian of Olney Charter High School. “The school is not much like SLA,” he said of his new placement. ‘It’s a neighborhood school, so most everyone comes from this area. There were big problems with truancy, fights, and gang activity.”

As for his experiences at SLA, Newman says that his year at the school “was amazing for me, because I have these dual passions of pursuing library science and music, and I got to engage in both and call it a job.”

He also complimented the students at SLA. “Not every High School student is as gregarious as your average SLA student, and I really value the model that is established there. It is a tremendous place. And getting to play music with students and faculty was very rewarding.”

Now in the new school year, the new “librarian” is Brenda Chhin, a senior. Although she isn’t being paid for her job, she and other parent volunteers fill the spot of Newman. As the librarian she’s faced with the burden of handling books, dealing with students, among other things.

When asked about the current state of the library she responded with: “At times, I get frustrated due to students not following simple rules such as no eating, pick up your trash. It’s pretty frustrating.”

While it’s her Capstone, she doesn’t feel that it is something she’d like to pursue as a final senior project. “I wanted to help out in the school just to be more involved and Lehmann was wondering if it could have been a capstone.”

Chhin has tried to keep the traditions that Newman created, such as First Friday, no food in the library, and respecting the music room and its contents. However, she admits that “without a real librarian, it is kind of tough. No student will listen to a student.”

One can see where she’s coming from. Most high students will only listen to people they identify as teachers or a high authority figure. As of now our library is the good hands with Chhin, but it’s not something that she will be able to continue with once she graduates. Students and staff are both hoping that a full-time librarian can be restored to SLA in the coming years.

By Isabela Supovitz-Aznar

Loud drilling. Occasional hammering. Construction workers in the stairwells. All of these things have made students wonder: what’s going on in the building at SLA?Unfortunately, this construction work will not be benefiting the school, but is a project to turn part of the building into apartments.The division of ownership of 55 N. 22nd street is an unusual one. The School District of Philadelphia owns all but the fourth floor of the building that SLA is located in, and Philadelphia Management owns the fourth floor. Since the School District doesn’t own the whole building, it is not their decision what happens to the other floor.

In the spring of 2011, Philadelphia Management decided to build apartments in it so that they can make a better profit off of the building. But how will this development affect the school?

Officially, the whole plan of renting out the fourth floor is still under negotiation. If it does end up happening, Mr. Lehmann assures the school that he will try to keep SLA life as completely separate from the apartments as possible.

If the apartments are completed and rented, the school’s environment won’t be changed drastically. The only major concerns about the apartments being in the middle of SLA are the conjoined stairwells, since they would be open for people who lived in the building and students, which Lehmann said is “not appropriate”.

The construction itself has been a disruption at times. English and History teacher Joshua Block said that, “it’s a little unrealistic to have classes going on with all that noise.” English teacher Matt Kay also confirmed that he finds the noise distracts some of his students, and is annoying to deal with in general.

Senior Sam Sirochman agreed. “The noise from the construction workers makes it hard to concentrate sometimes, but it’s been getting a little better lately.” Teachers have been asked to keep track of when and how often the noise is causing a problem, in case a formal complaint needs to be issued.

Even if the apartments are rented, another factor is that SLA’s lease on the building is only for another three years, so the issue of sharing space could be very temporary, if the school seeks to move locations.

SLA is no stranger to visitors. With so many shadows in school each day, a few more students in class usually don’t get noticed–unless they have a British accent.

For one week in October, SLA played host fiftenn young women from the United Kingdom as a part of an exchange program with the school, sometimes referred as “Liverdelphia.”

The students are from Broughton Hall High School in Liverpool, England. For the program, one student from each schooll are paired together. In the fall, the Liverpudlians come to enjoy the pleasures of  SLA and a general American life. This includes spending time sightseeing in New York and Washington DC. It also includes visiting historical sites and other famous places This year, Reading Terminal Market and the Philadelphia Art Museum were part of the experience.

The program capitalized on the mixture of two cultures. Each Liverpudlian students lives, eats, and sleeps with their housing partner. “Basically they are doing a home stay like having dinner and family time so they can get an understanding of student life,” described Ms. Echols, one of three SLA teachers assisting in the exchange. “They also talk to each other over the range of the different families.”

Although the visitors didn’t arrive until the 18th of October, they have been in contact with their American partners for some time. Shamus Kirby, an SLA sophomore involved in the program first had contact as early as July. “Over the summer on Facebook we went back and forth about things like what we like to do.”

When they were here, students both enjoyed and learned from each other’s cultural differences. For SLA Junior Jenn Wright, this included some jokes about different vocabulary. “I was attempting to fit in with them by using terminology that they taught me, but they didn’t indicate how offensive a particular word was, until I said it in front of their teacher. She laughed, but it was still really embarrassing.”

This process happens in reverse when students from SLA house with their partners from the UK and spend about a week living a British Life. The trip to the UK will happen at the end of March, during spring break. Wright is looking forward to new cultural experiences in England.

“Trying new foods and being totally immersed in a new culture. Because for her [Terr Duffy, her Liverpool partner] everyday life is different even though there are some similarities.”

This event has become a yearly tradition between the two schools, and will hopefully continued for years to come. Those interested should keep an eye out for applications this spring.