Upper Darby officials schedule Jan. 28 hearing as district outlines options for Charles Kelley and pool upgrades

At the Jan. 14 meeting of the Upper Darby School District Board of School Directors, Superintendent Daniel McGarry said the district will hold a public hearing on Jan. 28 to review options for Charles Kelley Elementary School and that an open comment period will run through April 29.

Why it matters: Charles Kelley is housed in a leased, nondistrict building, and the district is weighing whether to continue leasing, build a new school, or redistrict students back to neighborhood schools. The decision affects class sizes, staffing and transportation across multiple elementary schools and raises community concerns about extracurricular facilities, most prominently the Upper Darby pool used by the Marlins swim program.

Student representatives Tasneem Yasmin and Timothy Bijou told the board, “There will be a hearing soon on January 28 about the options the district has moving forward,” and said the district will accept public email comments through April 29. Several residents who submitted comments in advance urged the district to preserve pool access and oppose closing Charles Kelley.

Resident Maria Harkness asked the district to publish cost and timeline estimates and to explain who would staff a proposed mental‑health center and how services would be billed. Parent Dr. Shanterra Smith wrote that “The Upper Darby Pool has been a sanctuary for my 3 sons,” saying the pool provided accessible, diverse swim programming that helped her children reach college‑level competition and that closing the pool would make swimming less accessible to working‑class and minority families.

McGarry said the board had directed administration to produce short‑ and long‑term plans for pool repairs and for improved mental‑health services, and to return with specific cost options. He reiterated a long‑standing district objective to reduce leased space and place students in district‑owned buildings when feasible. McGarry said Charles Kelley currently has a budgeted staff of 32 teachers; he estimated that roughly eight of those positions would follow direct student shifts during redistricting while the remaining 24 FTEs would be redeployed to fill other elementary vacancies as part of routine staffing and attrition. He described an enrollment analysis showing average elementary class sizes of about 22.7 students after the proposed redistricting, and projected that Highland Park would lose about 60 students while Stonehurst would increase by about 100 and Aronimic and Hillcrest would see more modest changes.

McGarry also noted the district’s constraint that it does not own the Charles Kelley facility, and said that because the district does own the pool facility it is feasible to plan phased repairs there. He said the board had directed the administration to return with options and cost estimates before the board takes any formal resolution.

Next steps: the Jan. 28 hearing will present options; the board will hold a follow‑up hearing and may consider a formal resolution if it chooses a course of action. Public comments submitted in committee on Dec. 17 were read at the Jan. 14 meeting and will remain part of the record.

Notes: The transcript shows repeated community concern about transportation, class sizes, and access to the pool and swim programming; the superintendent tied the district’s preferred objective to regain district‑owned capacity and to limit reliance on leased property.