Back-to-school season is underway, and school personnel have been busy cleaning, doing repairs and setting up classrooms for the 2026-27 academic year. This work includes making sure appropriate supplies and equipment are there for the students.

Oftentimes, they are not.

For the past two years, Philadelphia’s city controller’s office has cited the School District of Philadelphia for its poor accountability of capital assets. Capital assets are items with a useful life of over one year and that cost at least US$5,000. They include items such as pianos, laptops and smartboards, to name just a few.

Across its schools, the Philadelphia school district holds over $2.8 billion in capital assets, according to the most recent Annual Financial Comprehensive Report.

The controller’s office found that over 60% of the assets it tested in school locations had not been properly recorded in the official ledgers and were unable to be located. Its February 2026 report listed the numerous items by school building. These items included printers, computers and even a lunchroom table.

These findings don’t necessarily mean that a large percentage of assets were definitely lost or stolen; it is often the case that items are moved or disposed of and not properly recorded. But the findings indicate a systemic problem with recording, tracking and disposing of assets.

We are former school leaders in New York state public school districts. One of us was a superintendent of schools from 2008-2019 and the other was a regional school district controller from 2013-2024 in central New York. In these roles, we worked together, with the Board of Education and our administrative team, to build and test policies and procedures for the purchasing, inventorying and auditing of school equipment. We wanted to make sure that all school district assets were accounted for and available for student learning.

Today, we teach aspiring school leaders how to lead all aspects of education programs from pre-K through high school. This includes the business functions of running public schools, such as fulfilling legal, regulatory and policy........

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