February 13, 2012 · www.gothamgazette.com

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Cuomo: Carrots and Sticks for Schools
January 17th, 2012

Two weeks after he signaled his intention to focus on education, Gov. Andrew Cuomo today filled in some of the details and inserted himself squarely in the dispute over teacher evaluation.

In his budget address Cuomo confirmed that, as announced previously, the state would up its aid to districts by 4.1 percent or $805 million next year for a total of about $20 billion.

Unlike last budget year — when the governor cut spending across the board regardless of a district’s needs — the increase would be weighted toward higher needs areas. These parts of the state will receive 76 percent of the hike and 69 percent of all school aid, according to Cuomo’s Budget Briefing Book.This means New York City stands to gets almost $6.4 billion next year, an increase of 2.6 percent over the approximately $6.2 billion it is getting this year.

Districts also would be able to compete for some $200 million in special state grants, under a New York version of the federal Race to the Top program.

The Road to the Money

But Cuomo put a big condition on all the additional money. To get it, districts will have to come up with a new evaluation system for teachers.

Details after the jump.
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By Gail Robinson on January 17, 2012, 5:23 pm
In category: Albany, City Hall, Education, Eye on Albany, Public Finance, Work and Labor | No Comments »

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Bloomberg and Quinn on Cuomo's Budget
January 17th, 2012

Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Council Speaker Christine Quinn have major praise for Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s 2012-2013 fiscal year budget. “This is the strongest state budget that New York City has seen in a long time. With this new budget, Governor Cuomo is establishing a stronger financial basis for a more vibrant and healthy New York,” Quinn said in a statement.

“Governor Cuomo put forward a budget that demonstrates a bold commitment to tackle some of the toughest challenges facing our great state. He has my strong support,” said Bloomberg in a statement.

Bloomberg hasn’t had the smoothest relationship with Cuomo so far but the Mayor is especially pleased with Cuomo’s plans for mandate relief and pension reform.

“The Governor’s push for mandate relief and pension reform could save the City billions in the long term,” Bloomberg’s statement continues. “New York City spends more than $8 billion annually – more than 12 percent of our budget – on pension costs, more than we spend on the operating budgets for the Police, Fire and Sanitation Departments combined. Without a new pension tier, which will not diminish the retirement benefits of a single current employee, taxpayers will continue to spend more and more on pension costs, leaving less and less for public education, public safety, job creation, affordable housing and other critical services.

Here are Quinn’s and Bloomberg’s full statements: Read the rest of this entry »

By David King on January 17, 2012, 3:40 pm
In category: Albany, City Hall, Economy, Education, Eye on Albany, Work and Labor | 1 Comment »

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Alliance For Quality Education Commends Cuomo
January 17th, 2012

The Alliance for Quality Education issued this statement on Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s proposed budget:

School Aid and Competitive Grants
“We commend Governor Cuomo for restoring $805 million in school aid; these funds will help students throughout the state.  The exact distribution of these funds and how much is prioritized to high need and average need school districts will take a few days to evaluate. We are greatly concerned that almost one-third of these funds could be distributed based on competition between school districts which has the potential to create a system of educational winners and losers among our students.  It is important to note that last year the state moved backwards on its commitment to quality education by enacting huge classroom cuts that resulted in larger class sizes and narrowing of the curriculum.  Students need the budget to focus on restoring these classroom cuts for all, not only for those whose schools win at a competition.”

Cost Savings through Centralizing School Bus Purchasing
“Governor Cuomo has proposed a new cost savings initiative that would centralize the purchasing of school buses through a single statewide contract. This is the type of cost saving initiative from the state we need to see more of and we commend Governor Cuomo for providing the leadership to advance this type of common sense cost savings solution.”

By David King on January 17, 2012, 2:19 pm
In category: Albany, Education, Eye on Albany | 1 Comment »

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UFT Wants Mediation With City
January 13th, 2012

The United Federation of Teachers is holding a press conference at 3:15 p.m today to announce that it asking the state labor board to mediate talks with the city because of the breakdown over teacher evaluation talks and the Mayor’s insistence in his State of the State speech that he will unilaterally move forward with a teacher evaluation system in low performing schools. Here is the full press release:

Teachers Union Asks State to

Order Mediation in Evaluation Talks

UFT seeks order from state labor board that would

force city to take part in mandatory mediation

on new teacher evaluation system

UFT President Michael Mulgrew holds news conference to announce that in the wake of the city’s walking out of negotiations on a new teacher evaluation system, the union has filed an impasse petition with the state’s Public Employment Relations Board (PERB).  If PERB finds that an impasse exists, it will appoint a mediator and force the city to participate in attempts to resolve the issue.

WHEN:           Friday, January 13, 2012      3:  15 p.m.

WHERE:         52 Broadway, 2nd floor

By David King on January 13, 2012, 2:51 pm
In category: Albany, Education, Eye on Albany, Gotham City | No Comments »

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Cuomo Weighs in on Race to the Top
January 10th, 2012

“Secretary Duncan’s report saying New York is on the watch-list for failure is yet another warning that the inability of school districts across the state and their unions to come together has jeopardized the quality of our kids’ education. New York State’s students are now in danger of losing hundreds of millions of dollars because of the failure to devise a teacher evaluation system that works,” Gov. Andrew Cuomo just said in a statement released in response to a warning from the federal Education Department that the state has failed to meet certain obligations in the Race to the Top program that doles out millions of dollars in federal grants. Here is the full statement from his office: Read the rest of this entry »

By David King on January 10, 2012, 2:49 pm
In category: Albany, Education, Eye on Albany | No Comments »

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Alliance for Quality Education Reacts
December 6th, 2011

Billy Easton of the Alliance for Quality Education said that the deal reached by Gov. Andrew Cuomo and legislative leaders today is a step in the right direction. He does not blast the deal but seems to reserve judgement.

“ AQE applauds the Assembly Majority and Senate Minority for consistently advocating tax fairness and adequate revenues. We appreciate the fact that the Governor and the Senate Majority are responding to the demands of the 99% of New Yorkers for tax fairness. However, we are concerned that $2 billion in revenues does not fully address the $5 billion hole created by the elimination of the existing millionaire’s tax,” said Easton in a statement.

Easton goes on to say that the plan will be judged on whether it allows the state to restore cuts made to schools.

By David King on December 6, 2011, 3:59 pm
In category: Albany, Economy, Education, Eye on Albany | 1 Comment »

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The Union on School Cuts
November 1st, 2011

With the city facing a multibillion dollar shortfall – and the Bloomberg administration demanding further cuts, the United Federation of Teachers went on the offense today, with a study it says shows that fiscal constraints already have taken a toll on the city’s more than 1.1 million students.

A survey of union chapter leaders (perhaps not the most objective of sources) found, the UFT reports, that 74 percent of elementary schools have seen class size increase this year. The number of students in a class rose at 61 percent of the middle schools reporting and 59 percent of the high schools.

More than half of elementary schools responding have scaled back services to help academically struggling students, and almost two thirds cited reductions in supplies. In general, the chapter leaders at high schools cited fewer effects from cuts than those in elementary schools. And despite Chancellor Dennis Walcott’s pledge to focus on improving middle schools, 63 percent saw their afterschool programs curtailed and 59 percent lost extracurricular activities.

While the administration enthusiastically supports charters schools, which often offer after school and or weekend programs, it has ramped back efforts to expand instructional time for students in its conventional public schools, according to the report. About 60 percent of schools at all levels reported cuts in afterschool programs, and about 40 said weekend programs had been reduced.

In a statement on his union’s report UFT president Michael Mulgrew said, “Based on our survey, an estimated 91 percent of our school population — nearly 1 million children — are in schools where budget cuts are having a direct and immediate effect on their education.”

By Gail Robinson on November 1, 2011, 2:09 pm
In category: City Hall, Education, Gotham City, Public Finance | No Comments »

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Sleep Over on Wall Street
October 20th, 2011

Thought Occupy Wall Street had jumped the shark when MTV started trying to cast protesters for the Real World? Well think again, because OWS just got even more main stream in a way that will almost certainly send Fox News anchors into stuttering tirades.

Break out your sleeping bags kids! Parents for Occupy Wall Street is holding a “Family Sleep Over” on Friday at 4 p.m. until 11 a.m. on Saturday morning. A similar event was planned last week but canceled do to the (cancelled) eviction and clean up.

“Occupy Wall Street is a place for everyone, including families. At the Family Sleepover, families and children will find arts and crafts, a children’s music sing along, a pizza party, and a bed time story,” reads a statement released by organizers.

The group has already made the New York Police Department aware of the event and parents will wear shirts to identify themselves as being affiliated with the sleep over.

By David King on October 20, 2011, 3:13 pm
In category: Economy, Education, Parks | 1 Comment »

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Education Councils: Weak by Design
October 3rd, 2011

Whatever else it has and has not done, the system of mayoral control of schools as practiced in New York City must have set some kind of record for the creation of toothless bodies.

The chief one of course is the Panel for Educational Policy, which as Patrick Sullivan, a member, wrote on New York Public School Parents, routinely rubber stamps Department of Education contracts – even ones dripping with corruption such as the agreement with Future Technology Associates.

The impotence of the PEP is hardly surprising – Bloomberg always vowed the body would not do anything. But committed parents across the five borough hoped the Community Education Councils, heirs to the former Community School Board – might function a bit better. They were, alas, wrong.

A report released by four of the five borough presidents (all but Staten Island James Molinaro), Pubic Advocate Bill de Blasio and parent leaders, tells some of the sad history of the councils under this administration, focusing to a large extent on the repeatedly botched election for members in 2011.

To remedy this and other ills, the report calls for major changes in the current two-tier voting system, where parents first cast an advisory vote and then leaders of parent organizations in the respective area make the final choice. The borough presidents et al would replace that with an actual election among parents. They would also improve training for council members, call for the councils to do more outreach and revise the council’s responsibilities. (Now the most meaningful thing they do is approve school zones within the district, influencing which neighborhood sends its children to what school.)

Perhaps most notably, the report’s writers would take the responsibility for the councils away from the Department of Education and give it to an independent nonprofit or government body.
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By Gail Robinson on October 3, 2011, 3:20 pm
In category: City Hall, Education, Electoral Politics | 1 Comment »

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Bloomberg's Technology Pit
September 29th, 2011

Another day, another disturbing revelation about the city’s handling of its technology contracts.

This time it’s the latest chapter in the scandal involving computers at the Department of Education. The company the department paid $75 million to do technical work on its purchasing, payroll and finance systems – Future Technology Associatesbilked the city out of at least $6.5 million, according to a report by Richard Condon, the city’s special commissioner of investigation.

Among other things, Future Tech set up shell companies and then vastly inflated its claims of how much those companies charged. So the Department of Education was being charged between $55 and $110 an hour for work that actually cost Future Tec $10 to $14 an hour.

Concerns about Future Technology have been circulating for some time.

According to a letter-report from the city comptroller’s Bureau of Audit, given to Gotham Gazette today (posted here), in 2005 the department submitted a request that Future Tech get a no-bid contract. (No-bid contracts at the Department of Education have raised concerns in the past.) “This request appears to have contained inaccurate and misleading statements from FTA, which, if DOE had known, should have precluded FTA from being awarded this contract,” says the report from the comptroller’s office, which went to Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott and Condon’s office.
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By Gail Robinson on September 29, 2011, 4:24 pm
In category: City Hall, Crime & Safety, Education, Gotham City, Governing, Tech | 2 Comments »

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The Year's School Report Cards
September 23rd, 2011

In what has become an annual ritual, the Department of Education has today released its latest school progress reports, often called school report cards, today. (For links to summaries and individual school reports, go here.)

Today’s release covers only elementary and middle schools. The department will issue high school reports next month.

Once again the department has tweaked the oft-criticized annual reports. For one the grades seem to have stabilized somewhat from the time when the results would gyrate wildly from year to year, completely baffling parents. This year, according to the Times, 79 of the 1,219 schools dropped by two or more letter grades and 55 rose by two or more.

As part of Mayor Michael Bloomberg’ s initiative on black and Latino males, a school now gets extra points for making significant progress with students in that group whose prior performance has put them in the lowest third academically. (A school, though, does not lose points if it fails miserably with black and Latino boys.)

The number of schools with low grades has increased again. Based on their 2010-11 performance, the department says, 25 percent of the schools received an A, 35 percent B, 30 percent C, 7 percent D and 3 percent flunked. This still might seem generous, but it certainly represents a change from 2009 when, in the midst of the mayor’s re-election campaign, his Department of Education decided 84 percent of elementary and middle schools deserved As and only two – that’s two school, not 2 percent – flunked.

This time around, according to Gotham Schools, the city decided in advance how many schools would get each grade.

The increase in schools getting D’s and F’s means more schools could be considering for closing, thought the departments says that that will not necessarily translate to more schools being shut down. Earlier this week, School Chancellor Dennis Walcott said he would look to close persistently failing middle schools as part of his efforts to bolster education in grades 6 through 8.

By Gail Robinson on September 23, 2011, 3:02 pm
In category: Education, Gotham City | 1 Comment »

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Walcott Takes on Middle Schools
September 20th, 2011

It’s no secret to anyone who has spent time in city schools, had an adolescent or been one that middle school is where things begin to go awry for many students. Test scores fall, behavior problems develop and many students begin to fall so far behind that they never catch up – and simply leave schools a few years later.

The city has mounted various, often half-hearted efforts to combat this – and none have accomplished much.

In his first major policy speech as chancellor, given this morning at NYU, Dennis Walcott focused on the issues of middle schools, ticking off a panoply of problems in grade six through eight and acknowledging his department must do more to address them. (This post is based on the prepared text of Walcott’s speech, available here.) To do that, Walcott plans borrow a page from the Bloomberg administration approach to high schools by closing failing schools and opening new ones. The administration claims success with this, but the policy has been controversial and has many critics.

In his speech, Walcott vowed to open at least 50 new middle schools in the next two years. Some will be charter schools, Walcott said.

On the flip side – closing schools – Walcott said, “We will hold our middle schools to the same tough standards we hold our high schools. If a school is failing, we will phase it out.”

More on the plan after the jump.
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By Gail Robinson on September 20, 2011, 12:15 pm
In category: Education, Gotham City | 1 Comment »

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Levy's Legacy at Bronx Science
September 16th, 2011

The Times yesterday had an interesting story on the exodus of teachers from the prestigious Bronx High School of Science. According to Anna Phillips, eight of the school’s 20 social studies teachers decided not to return this year, sending the turnover rate at what one would think would be a desirable to teach to 19 percent, five percentage points higher than for the city as a whole. Phillips traces the discontent back at least as far as 2005 – but actually it dates before that to the pre-mayoral control days and the region of now largely forgotten Chancellor Harold Levy.

Back in the Giuliani administration in 1999, Stanley Blumenstein announced his retirement as principal of the selective public school. A search committee unanimously recommended William Stark, an administrator and social studies teacher serving as interim president, to fill the post.

Levy, a graduate of Bronx Science, balked, reportedly wanting a scientist to fill the post, not an educator — although there was never an indication that any top scientist even wanted the job. Levy asked the committee to find someone else.

Levy was a corporate lawyer when he was named chancellor and, like Cathie Black a decade later, needed a waiver to become chancellor. (He now works in finance and raised eyebrows in 2009 for a $500,000 contribution to Al Sharpton.)

To many observers his handling of the situation at Bronx Science was a classic indication of what can happen when people with little experience running schools control them. Faculty and parents disputed Levy’s notion that a scientist would be the best pick for the job. “Running a public high school, they say, is more like running a fine restaurant than a political campaign, a foundation or a college. At Bronx Science, they say, the importance of spin and public relations pales compared with the mundane ability to deal with cantankerous union officials, powerful custodians and 2,700 needy, if talented, adolescents,” the Times wrote.
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By Gail Robinson on September 16, 2011, 3:19 pm
In category: Education, Gotham City | 3 Comments »

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More Testing for Schools
August 31st, 2011

In the wake of the closing of a Bronx schools contaminated with a toxic chemical, two advocacy groups and eight members of the City Council have written to Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott demanding immediate testing of city school on leased property and a public disclosure of he results.

Earlier this summer, the Department of Education shut Bronx New School, which had operated in a leased former industrial site in Bedford Park. Walcott has admitted the department knew of the contamination since January but did not tell parents until eight months later. The school had apparently never been tested before – although students attended classes there for two decades.

While other cases may not be quite that egregious, as Melissa Checker reported in Gotham Gazette last month, Bronx New School, also known as PS51X, is hardly an isolated case. The city now leases more than 90 properties ––many of them former industrial sites — for schools, and the regulations regarding leased properties, as opposed to those for sites the city owns, are lax, to say the last. Schools on leased sites, Checker wrote, do not have to undergo environmental review under the State Environmental Quality Review Act, and the city does not have to keep the public – including parents, staff and students –- informed about its plans for building or monitoring those schools or remediating any hazards at the site.

In the letter, New York Lawyers for the Public Interest, New York Communities for Change and the council members seek to address some of these issues, focusing on 31 schools whose leases are up for renewal. The city does inspect school when their leases come up for renewal, although a schools spokesperson told Checker only that the inspections would take plan within eight weeks – not necessarily before the school year begins.

More and the letter after the jump.
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By Gail Robinson on August 31, 2011, 12:44 pm
In category: Education, Environment, Gotham City | 8 Comments »

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DiNapoli vs. Murdoch
August 28th, 2011

You might have missed this as you were taping your windows yesterday: The Daily News reports that State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli has rejected the state Department of Education contracts with Wireless Generation. The educational tech company is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. — and as a result under the purview of former Schools Chancellor, now Murdoch consigliare Joel Klein.

In rejecting the $27 million deal, DiNapoli cited the phone hacking scandal that has shaken Murdoch’s British newspaper empire — and Britain’s government as well. “In light of the significant ongoing investigations and continuing revelations with respect to News Corp., we are returning the contract with Wireless Generation unapproved,” DiNapoli’s office wrote to the Education Department.

The education department blasted DiNapoli’s move, with a spokesperson accusing the comptroller of having “allowed political pressure to get in the way of vital technology that would help our students/”

The state was prepared to use part of its federal Race to the Top money to pay Wireless Generation to develop software to track student test scores, achievement and so on, creating a system similar to the Achievement Reporting and Innovation System, or ARIS, that it developed for the city schools.

Even before the phone hacking scandal, the deal did not meet the smell test for many. The contract was a no-bid deal, even though many other companies reportedly expressed interest in it.
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By Gail Robinson on August 28, 2011, 12:53 pm
In category: Albany, Education, Eye on Albany, Public Finance, Tech | 1 Comment »

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Walcott Promises More Testing for Toxins
August 19th, 2011

By all accounts last night’s meeting in the Bronx between schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott and parents is unlikely to settle the rising concern about the contaminated site of the Bronx New School –- and the problem of polluted schools overall.

Three weeks ago, the Department of Education announced it would shut the Bedford Park building because high levels of trichloroethylene, or TCE, had been found on the site.

The department learned of the unsafe levels in January; it did not tell parents, the principal or the staff until this summer. And although the school has been on the former industrial site for about 20 years, no record exists of it ever having been tested before. And there may be other untested schools as well.

Walcott has said the city is checking another 31 schools whose leases are now up for renewal and plans to complete the tests by early next month. It has not released the names of those schools.

Melissa Checker wrote in Gotham Gazette this week that, while the city must conduct environmental reviews of any property it purchases for a school, it does not have to check out land or buildings it leases. As a result, Dawn Philip an attorney with New York Lawyers for the Public Interest told Checker, “Parents, school staff and community members often have no idea that a leased school site sits on top of contaminated property and, more importantly, what the [Department of Education] has done to eliminate any health risks.”
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By Gail Robinson on August 19, 2011, 1:42 pm
In category: Education, Environment, Gotham City | 1 Comment »

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Slight Rise in Test Scores
August 8th, 2011

In 2011, the second year of more rigorous scoring of state standardized tests, achievement dipped slightly across the state, according to figures just released by the state education department.

After taking a battering last year, when the state recalibrated the scoring, the city saw a slight increase this year. Some 43.9 percent of students in grades three through eight met or exceeded the state standards in English — up from 42.4 percent last year. In math, 57.3 percent met or exceeded the math standard, an increase from 54 percent in 2010. This is still far less than the number meeting standards under the old – allegedly dumbed down – system.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg is set to provide more details – and undoubtedly some healthy spin – later today. We’ll bring you ore then.

By Gail Robinson on August 8, 2011, 12:01 pm
In category: Education | No Comments »

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Murdoch in the Schools
August 5th, 2011

The city and state teachers union are stepping up their opposition to the awarding of a state education contract to a company owned by Rupert Murdoch.

The unions have not been big fans of the beleaguered press mogul – or of former Chancellor Joel Klein, who now heads education technology (and damaged control?) for him. And the deal has been raising eyebrows since June when the Daily News’ Rachael Monahan reported that the state Department of Education was about to award a $27 million no-bid contract to Wireless Generation to develop a system for the state similar to the city’s Achievement Reporting and Innovation System or ARIS.

Klein had been a big promoter of Wireless Generation during his days as chancellor. Two weeks after he left the city to take a mega-lucrative deal with News Corp., the Murdoch company bought Wireless Generation. Admittedly Klein himself worked for the city, not the state. But the ties are there –- and the former chancellor certainly stands to benefit from a deal that, in the view of a Forbes blogger, “smack of cronyism.”

The phone hacking scandal has raised further doubts. In their letter to Merryl Tisch, chancellor of the state Board of Regents, and state Education Commissioner John King Jr., state United Teachers president Richard Ianuzzi and Michael Mulgrew, head of the city teachers union, stressed those concerns. Parents and educators, they wrote, question “the wisdom of allowing a News Corp.-owned company to have access the the personal data of students from all across New York.”
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By Gail Robinson on August 5, 2011, 1:08 pm
In category: Albany, Education, Gotham City, Governing, Public Finance, Tech | No Comments »

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Bloomberg and the Achievement Gap
August 4th, 2011

Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s announcement earlier today of a major initiative to help young black and Latino men today, includes a big focus on education. Few would debate the wisdom of that.

Bloomberg has long patted himself on the back for narrowing the gap in academic achievement between the city’s white and Asian students on one hand and blacks and Latinos on the other. Today Chancellor Dennis Walcott sounded the theme. “We’ve come a long way in improving achievement for black and Latino young men, helping to narrow the racial gaps in state exams and graduation rates,” he said.

But as Bloomberg basks in praise (and some almost fawning press coverage) for tackling a truly tough issue, his record on ending education disparities is — to put it charitably – mixed.

The mayor noted the city had narrowed the gap in high school graduation rates between the races. And the evidence backs that up. But in myriad other areas — test scores, admission to elite high schools, admission to gifted and talented elementary programs, suspensions — the gap has remained essentially the same or widened under the Bloomberg regime.

Let’s looks at the numbers – after the jump.
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By Gail Robinson on August 4, 2011, 3:34 pm
In category: City Hall, Civil Rights, Demographics, Education | 3 Comments »

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Regents Relief
August 3rd, 2011

High school students disappointed they could no longer take Regents exams in January will get a reprieve this year. Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced this morning that Bloomberg Philanthropies and five anonymous donors have each agreed to pony up $250,000 to privately fund the creation and giving of the subject tests in January 2012.

The state announced last spring it would eliminate the January test date to save money. High school students need to pass five of the exams to get a Regents diploma. Some 150,000 Regents exams were give last January in the city.

Not having the opportunity to take the exam midyear, Bloomberg said, “put thousands of prospective graduates in a bad spot and even puts their graduation in jeopardy.”

The donations, though, will only pay for one year; after that, Bloomberg said, the state will have to figure out how to pay for this service.

What was a good news announcement, though, turned prickly as reporters pressed Bloomberg to disclose the names of the donors. He refused, though did own up their being individuals who he had approached, not in government and without young children.

As to their names, “I don’t think it’s anyone’s business,” Bloomberg said. “They don’t want to be dragged through the press.”

He continued, “They don’t want their name out there. … They just want to help, not give you a story.”

Bloomberg said he had revealed his own name only because he’s a public official. Once he no longer is, he said his largesse will remain anonymous as well.

By Gail Robinson on August 3, 2011, 11:18 am
In category: Education, Gotham City | 1 Comment »

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