A small private Quakertown school that closed with five days notice in July owes creditors more than two times what it has in two bank accounts, according to newly released financial filings.
In its Chapter 7bankruptcy petition, the former United Friends School listed its total liability at $224,155.85, with just $108,632 in available assets for distribution.
United Friends School filed for bankruptcy protection in the U.S. District Court of Eastern Pennsylvania on Aug. 14, one month after it abruptly closed its doors July 15 after 42 years. It cited lower than budgeted enrollment numbers. The K-8 school enrolled 70 students last year.
The school, which charged a $20,000 annual tuition, listed its gross revenues for the most recent fiscal year
as $1.54 million, slightly more than the previous year, according to the financial statement filing filed with the court. The gross revenues for July 1 through Aug. 14 was $85,509, according to the filing.
Parents who prepaid tuition for the upcoming school year and a summer camp, plus former employees, account for the majority of the people owed money. They are listed as priority claims, meaning they will be paid first, according to the filing.
A total of 47 parents are owed a total of $109,349, and 13 former employees are owed $64,375 in unpaid wages. The filing implies that refunds are expected, though the individual amount is unclear, and some parents may receive less than half of what they paid.
The list of nonpriority unsecured claims — which are paid last and only if money is remaining — are mostly suppliers and vendors, though two names that appear in the document have school connections.
Roger Sternfeld, the school's former business manager, is owed $30,000 for a loan he gave in May, and AA Property Holdings LLC of Sellersville is owed $4,240 in rent from April 2025.
AA Property Holdings is the holding company that purchased four United Friends School properties in March 2025 for $548,000, according to county records. It is connected to former school trustee Syed Mateen Afzal, who served on the board from January 2023 until October 2025.
AA Property Holdings appears two more times in the financial statement, once as receiving $9,000 for June and July rent before the school filed for bankruptcy and also for receiving $280,000 in April 2025 for the West Broad Street property.
The financial statement also shows that Daena Remondelli, the former head of schools, was paid $6,000 in July to handle school closure responsibilities and that attorney Alexander Moretsky was paid $10,000 for his services involving the closing and bankruptcy filing.
Since the closure announcement, parents and staff members have expressed frustration with school trustees over a perceived lack of transparency with its financial situation, the 2025 property sale and answers about refunds.
Perkasie residents Cailtin and Kevin Curtin said their child receive an excellent pre-K education at United Friends last year, and that they looked forward to continuing her education there.
But if they knew about the financial problems and the property sales, they may have reconsidered.
“Obviously we wouldn’t have paid half the tuition if we knew the school was going to close,” Kevin Curtin said. “It’s not like we’re out $100 — $10,000, you’re going to feel that, and we had to pay a second tuition on top of that.”
Caitlin Curtin also expressed disappointment and frustration with how trustees hid the school’s financial situation from parents and staff for as long as they did and continued to collect tuition payments up until the July 10 closure announcement.
“I find it to be just the opposite of what the Quaker values stand for,” Caitlin she added. “This type of situation gives a bad representation of what Quaker schools stand for.”
Crime and Courts reporter Jo Ciavaglia can be reached at jciavaglia@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Bucks County Courier Times: New details emerge in United Friends School bankruptcy | Exclusive
