This article was originally published in The Notebook. In August 2020, The Notebook became Chalkbeat Philadelphia.
For the second time in less than a year, the head of the Philadelphia School District’s Charter Schools Office is stepping down.
Doresah Ford-Bey, the District’s executive director of charter schools, will resign effective this Friday. In an email to colleagues, Ford-Bey wrote that she has taken a position with Chicago Public Schools.
"I was presented with an opportunity I could not turn down," she wrote.
The move leaves the District’s charter office with three vacancies among its seven full-time staff positions. The office is now overseeing the conversion of three District-managed schools to charters as part of the Renaissance schools initiative. The District is also in the midst of deciding whether to renew 16 city charter schools. Fourteen of those schools, as well as six other charters seeking modifications, are hoping to expand.
Thomas Darden, the previous head of the Charter Schools Office, resigned in July after a series of public missteps.
A spokesman said the District will begin recruiting a replacement for Ford-Bey this week.