Choose Your Numbers
May 8th, 2009
As expected, supporters of mayoral control of schools see the test results announced yesterday as an argument to leave the mayor in charge. This even though many experts — including the new head of the state Board of Regents — see no clear connection. (See yesterday’s post.) As WNYC’s Beth Fertig has written, all the advances made in the city “mirrored a similar pattern throughout the state.” (For a more detailed analysis of the numbers, see Aaron Pallas’s column in GothamSchools.)
That did not stop Mayor Michael Bloomberg from telling President Barack Obama yesterday, “If the rest of the country wants to actually improve performance” in education, the New York City schools are a blueprint for success. There is no mention of whether the mayor also cited the Buffalo schools.
The Daily News puts the mayor’s argument right on the front page giving, Tom McGeveran writes in the Observer, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein a platform “from which to characterize the results as a product of Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s assertion of mayoral control of the school system.” (The Post, by contrast, is oddly restrained.)
Inside the paper, the News headlined its editorial: “Keep mayoral control: Great new reading test scores make the case.” Citing a narrowing of the racial “achievement gap” and rising scores among middle school students, the paper said, “To mess with success like this would be criminal. Which is why Gov. Paterson and the legislature must maintain undiluted mayoral control over the schools. Which is why an orchestrated drive to wrest authority from City Hall is so misguided and destructive.”
The paper does feature a column by Juan Gonzalez who spoke with educators who questioned the jump. “All across the state, scores rose by an average of 9 percent, and even beleaguered Buffalo’s schools matched the jump our city students registered,” Gonzalez wrote. He quoted one secondary school principal saying, “After seven years of these improved test scores, how come the children we’re getting in high school aren’t reading any better and don’t show any greater love of literature?” (Maybe because tests have nothing to do with loving literature?)
The data wars promise to continue. Gonzalez notes the city today will release scores showing even greater gains at charter schools, a key part of the mayor’s education program. Already critics are disputing the relevance of those numbers. “What the Bloomberg administration doesn’t like to admit is how the approximately 100 charter schools created in recent years have steadily evolved into institutions that do not serve the poorest and most vulnerable students,” Gonzalez wrote.
And then there was the dispute last week over whether the city was boosting its high school graduation rate by “discharging” students who had little chance of getting their diplomas on time.
The legislature has until the end of June to decide whether to continue, end or change the current school governance system. And, Fertig wrote, “As Bloomberg lobbies Albany now to keep control of the schools, people on all sides of the argument have plenty of data to make their case.”
By Gail Robinson on May 8, 2009, 11:08 amIn category: Albany, Education, Eye on Albany, Gotham City, Measuring UP | 1 Comment »


May 13th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
I suggest you interview Basir Mchawi of “Education at the Crossroads” (WBAI 99.5FM http://www.wbai.org) for several good reasons why Mayoral control has not been good. And a list of education experts who also think Mayoral control has not worked and should be abolished.
Neither the Mayor, nor his Chancellor know anything about education. All the debate that went on before the appointment of Arne Duncan by Pres. Obama, such as in Greg Palast writing, would be helpful for people to know.