Circus School Closing, Negro League Mural & Cruise Ships in Philly

Philadelphia is losing the only accredited circus school in the country. The Circadium School of Contemporary Circus, based in Mt. Airy, will shut down on June 1 after federal funding cuts made continued operation impossible for the school, which opened in 2017.

Circadium founder Shana Kennedy said the board spent months looking for a way to keep the school alive. “We met over the course of the fall to try to figure out what our options were,” Kennedy told reporters. “It just reached a point where it just has become unsustainable.” The school had already absorbed multiple rounds of financial and administrative pressure since it opened, but the most recent federal cuts appear to have been the final blow. There is no accredited circus school anywhere else in the United States, which means this closure doesn’t just hurt Philly. It removes a one-of-a-kind training pipeline for performing artists across the entire country.

Also in the arts: Mural Arts Philadelphia unveiled expanded design plans for the Philadelphia Stars Negro League Baseball mural in West Philly. The announcement came on Jackie Robinson Day, with the new wall set to go up near the corner of Parkside and Belmont avenues, directly across the street from where the previous version stood from 2005 to 2026. The updated mural will be part of the Philadelphia Stars Negro Leagues Memorial Park in West Parkside.

Cruise ships are back. The Norwegian Jewel docked this morning at PhilaPort’s cruise terminal, the first cruise ship to dock in Philadelphia in 20 years. Mayor Parker joined city and port officials at PhilaPort this afternoon to mark the return of cruise service. Norwegian Cruise Line’s arrival is a real signal that PhilaPort is positioning itself for a new phase of passenger traffic, not just cargo.

At City Hall, officials are weighing two separate bills that would restrict ICE activity in the city, even as more Pennsylvania police agencies sign agreements to assist federal immigration enforcement. Parker has reacted with skepticism to those cooperation agreements, and the tension between state-level policing decisions and the city’s approach isn’t going away. Philadelphia’s sanctuary city policies remain in effect, but the political pressure around enforcement is building from multiple directions.

On the schools beat, Chalkbeat is out with a report on how dubious high school credentials, including things like ladder safety certifications, are inflating Pennsylvania’s graduation rate. That’s a story worth reading in full if you track what’s happening inside the School District of Philadelphia and the state’s accountability systems more broadly, because the pressure to hit graduation benchmarks doesn’t stop at district lines.

Mayor Parker had a full schedule today. She started the morning at Drexel University’s investiture ceremony for its 16th president, Antonio Merlo, then cut the ribbon at Harlan Sharswood Townhouses, then headed to PhilaPort for the Norwegian Jewel arrival, then appeared at the inaugural Point Breeze Market Festival. The May primary election is also coming up fast, and city officials are reminding residents they can still register to vote and apply for a mail ballot before the deadline.