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Judge Defines Bullying in Case Involving City Schools


Bullying once meant dipping a schoolgirl's braids in the desk inkwell or throwing snowballs at the new kids. But 21st century bullying can involve schoolhouse shootings, tormenting gay classmates, ruinous sex videos, devastating Internet abuse and suicides. The new extremes may be due to increasing violence among children, and, ironically, may also flow from diversity, which provides bullies with targets who look or sound different or may be gay, or have disabilities.

In a federal lawsuit brought against New York City's Department of Education by the parents of LK, then a 12-year-old pupil at P.S. 6 on Manhattan’s upper east side, Judge Jack Weinstein of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York has framed a test for defining schoolhouse bullying. Although the child in this case has disabilities, Weinstein's approach appears to be generally applicable.

Defining Bullying

The test, the judge wrote is, whether the conduct is "sufficiently severe, persistent or pervasive that it creates a hostile environment," which the school does not correct and so "deprives a student of substantial educational opportunities." The victim need only show that the bullying is likely to affect the student's opportunity for an appropriate education.

The primary characteristic of bullying, as contrasted with rough play or teasing, involves power struggles based on a perception of strength (the bully) and weakness (the victim). According to a report of a recent White House Conference on Bullying Prevention, the critical element of bullying is "unequal and coercive power" or "at least a perceived advantage for the bully either physical or psychological."

LK, originally diagnosed as autistic and later as learning disabled, was enrolled in a class of children of varying abilities. The allegations, officially undocumented but confirmed by special aides assigned to her while in school, included that other children laughed at her when she tried to speak in class, tripped her in the hallways and generally shunned her to the point of refusing to touch any object she had touched. In this case, the only report the school provided described LK as the aggressor.

Testifying at an administrative hearing, the school's principal could not recall what, if any, investigation she had done into complaints made by LK's parents. According to the plaintiffs -- the parents -- heir child was not protected at schools and became fearful and discouraged about school. As a result, the family transferred the girl to a private school at their own expense.

Alleging a failure by the city to provide LK with a suitable learning environment and education, the lawsuit sought recovery of the costs incurred for private school. The defendants, however, counter that the transfer was not necessary and so the public should not have to pay for the private school. Where the public school system is unable to or fails to provide an appropriate education for a child with disabilities and her needs can instead be met in a private school, the family need not pay the costs.

The parent also asserted that LK had progressed in school, an issue the judge said did not nullify the hostile environment or bullying.

Weinstein wrote, "This case presents the largely unresolved issue of the extent to which bullying by other students inhibits a disabled child from being educated appropriately, and what her school must do about it."

Outlawing Bullying

Under federal law, all public schools receiving federal funds must provide an education appropriate to each child’s abilities and disabilities. Federal law further requires that harassment of someone because of a disability must be investigated and responded to promptly and appropriately. The question to be asked and answered in this case and all cases, Weinstein said, is "Whether school personnel [were] deliberately indifferent to, or failed to take reasonable steps to prevent bullying that substantially restricted a child with learning disabilities in her educational opportunities."

In a long opinion replete with citations to academic articles on education, psychology, sociology, and law, Weinstein referred to New York State's recently enacted Dignity for All Students Act, which is to become effective in 2012. That law is meant to assure "all students in public schools an environment free of discrimination and harassment." (For more, see Governor Signs Bill to Combat Bullying.) But the city has not implemented its own version of an anti-bullying law, although a regulation has been adopted. State law, when it goes into effect, would be available to victims in city public schools.

LK's parents had also claimed that they were not included in the child's Individualized Learning Plan, a program required for all students with disabilities, but the court dismissed this claim.

Based on Weinstein's preliminary findings and operative definition of bullying, the case can now proceed to trial to determine whether LK's treatment and neglect falls within the judge's parameters of what constitutes bullying. Trial evidence must establish whether she was the victim of bullying, and whether the unchallenged harassment in school had the effect of denying her a full, appropriate public education.

Emily Jane Goodman is a New York State Supreme Court Justice

Plans to Boost Two-Year Colleges Fall Victim to Budget Cuts


community college
Borough of Manhattan Community College
Despite being touted by Mayor Michael Bloomberg and President Barack Obama, two-year schools, such as Borough of Manhattan Community College, must grapple with rising enrollments and falling resources

During his bid for a third term, Mayor Michael Bloomberg promised to make community colleges a top priority if he were re-elected. That campaign promise to help the City University of New York, which runs the two-year public schools, has now been abandoned in the face of proposed cuts of over $50 million in city funding for the next fiscal year.

This change has sparked criticism from many advocates who have protested Bloomberg's cuts in funding to CUNY during a time of high enrollment and tough economic times -- especially after the state already cut $95 million, according to CUNY officials.

"With the increasing need of services for students at both community colleges and senior colleges in the CUNY system it is unacceptable to continue to cut CUNY's budget the way the administration has done the past few years," said Councilmember Ydanis Rodriguez, who chairs the higher education committee. "These drastic cuts come on top of a quarter of a billion dollars worth of cuts that have been handed down to CUNY over the past three years."

The administration defends its decision and blames its own fiscal problems.

"The city has had to make some hard budget decisions for the coming fiscal year, and we're asking everyone to do more with less," said Jessica Scaperotti, a spokesperson for the mayor.

CUNY officials say that while they understand the city and state's economic situation, the budget cuts and the economic downturn are taking a toll on CUNY resources.

"The university recognizes that state officials are diligently endeavoring to meet the fiscal challenges associated with the current budget deficit," CUNY Chancellor Matthew Goldstein said in a statement. "At the same time, record-breaking numbers of students are seeking higher education opportunity at CUNY so that they may compete effectively for careers in an unforgiving economy and increasingly international marketplace."

While the cuts will affect the entire CUNY system, they come as a particular blow to the two-year community colleges. During his 2009 campaign, Bloomberg proposed a "Gateway to the Middle Class" to help increase community college graduation rates by 20 percent by 2020. The plan was a response to President Barack Obama's plan to graduate 5 million more people from community colleges in 10 years. Bloomberg vowed to expand access and "help those who are enrolled stay enrolled." The mayor also called for an investment of $50 million in hopes of graduating 120,000 students from college.

"Community colleges really do have the power to help more Americans get through this recession and come out with better skills ready to build new careers in good paying jobs," said Bloomberg at his presentation. "Investing in those who wants to invest in their own education and careers is one of the single best ways to promote economic growth and help most New Yorkers earn good paying jobs and improve their financial security."

Bloomberg’s office declined to comment about the promise to invest $50 million in CUNY, and CUNY representatives have refused to disclose if the system even received the money. According to Kate Pfordresher, director of research and public policy for the Professional Staff Congress, the union representing CUNY faculty, the $50 million pledge amounted to nothing more than a campaign promise.

The Two-Year Solution

When the nation was hit with the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, many public officials turned to community colleges. Bloomberg focused on the increased role of community colleges and vowed to make the modernization of community colleges a top priority.

"Education is the future of our country, it is the future of our state and city, it is the future of our world," said the mayor announcing his Gateway to the Middle Class initiative. "If there's one thing that we should do to help everybody … it is making sure that everybody gets the kind of quality education they need to participate in the world and particularly here in the great American dream."

Many other public officials also called for increase enrollment in community colleges. Obama even referred to community colleges as "the unsung heroes" of education.

"They may not get the credit they deserve, they may not get the same resources as other schools, but they provide a gateway to millions of Americans to good jobs and a better life," the president said last year when presenting his Skills for America's Future partnership.

Now, though, community colleges around the city find themselves in a precarious position, with record admissions and decreasing funds. Many blame CUNY's financial woes on the lack of commitment from the state. According to State Sen. Toby Stavisky of Queens, the state's share of CUNY funding fell sharply in the past 20 years from 65 percent in 1991 to 40 percent this year.

"That's not the fault of CUNY; it's the fault of the state -- because we had budget crises and higher education has not been a priority," she said.

Increase tuition has made up some of the shortfall. The CUNY board of trustees already authorized a tuition increase of $75, bringing tuition for a year to $3,300. Fall 2012 will see an additional $30, bringing the yearly total to $3,360. When Bloomberg announced his initiative in 2009, tuition for CUNY community colleges was $2,800 a year, Pfordresher said.

According to the City Council Committee on Higher education, in 2009, tuition made up $840 million of CUNY’s budget. For the projected 2012 year, that number is expected to jump to $1.1 billion. Barbara Bowen, president of Professional Staff Congress describes students as being mobilized and determined to block further hikes., "Our students can’t afford to pay more. They don't have the resources to support that," she said.

A New Initiative

Despite the cuts, CUNY officials have praised the mayor for leading other initiatives in community colleges, such as the Accelerated Study in Associate Program, or ASAP, which started in 2007 and aims to increase the graduation rate among community college students and to keep students in school. All ASAP students attend class full time, which makes them eligible for financial aid, and receive regular tutoring help. Students meet with academic advisors twice a week and also meet with job developers who help them find employment while they go to school. The program provides free Metro cards, textbooks and tuition assistance.

"ASAP would not exist without the steadfast support of the mayor and the city's Center for Economic Opportunity," said Goldstein. "It can be extremely challenging for community college students to balance a college schedule with the demands of work and family. ASAP helps eliminate these stresses by providing students with the academic, social and financial support they need to graduate."

While not disputing the value of the program, Pfordresher said it reaches only a small number of students, and low funding restricts the program from being expanded to accommodate more students.

he initiative, though, will be the basis for a new community college, called the Innovative Model Community College, slated to open in Midtown Manhattan in fall 2012. Students who attend the new college must enroll full time for the first year. As a way to help students graduate faster, the college will offer remedial classes, along with six majors related to industries with increasing demand: business administration, health information technology, human services, information technology, liberal arts and sciences, and urban studies.

Those students who don’t need remedial help will be automatically placed in the college's ASAP program. The college's president will be Scott Evenback, a psychology professor and founding dean of University College at Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis. According to CUNY, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation and the Carnegie Corp. will contribute funding.

"The new community college employs an innovative model for improving student performance and graduation rates," Goldstein said. "Over the next year, the new college's team will flesh out the concept developed during more than two years of intensive work by faculty and staff from 15 of CUNY's undergraduate and graduate institutions and the central administration."

The school will launch with 500 students and will grow to 5,000 students. It will be the first community college opened in the city in over 40 years, and will eventually move to the John Jay College campus on the West Side of Manhattan.

The Money Hunt

Meanwhile CUNY has looked to other funding sources. "Many public colleges were not really focused on how to sustain higher education in an era of reduced resources," said CUNY director of communication and marketing, Michael Arena.

One proposal in the Gateway to the Middle Class initiative that did not materialize included restrictions on out of State students getting Financial Aid.

Under the so-called CUNY Compact, the state pays all of CUNY's mandatory costs, such as labor, benefits and energy costs, along with 20 percent of the academic initiatives in the four-year master plan. The other funding is to come from donations and "internal restructuring." The funding formula also allows for incremental increases as opposed to large spikes in tuition.

Former Gov. David Paterson wanted to allow individual CUNY and SUNY schools to set their own tuition in accordance with a national higher education price index as opposed to having to the state legislature approve an across-the-board tuition increase. The state legislature rejected the idea. Recently, though, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has come out in support of a similar proposal for SUNY.

In the meantime, CUNY has no guarantee that the state or city will increase funding, leaving students to face tuition hikes.

There are many obstacles put in the path of students who are trying to get an education," said Bowen. "At a time when the economy needs to be revitalized it makes no sense to cut one of the chief engines in that revitalization.

Bowen criticized the city for cutting back during the recession instead of being as innovative as it once was.

"During the Great Depression, NYC built three new colleges for CUNY: Brooklyn College, Queens College and Lehman College," she said. "If during the greatest economic depression New York can have the response of adding colleges, why can't New York have that response now?"

Education Mayor Takes a Hit


Photo (cc)

In a stunning reversal and a glaring miscalculation in the Bloomberg administration's third term, Schools Chancellor Cathie Black stepped down Thursday just three months after she took the reins of the nation's largest public school system.

In a somber and humbling press conference at City Hall, Mayor Michael Bloomberg appointed Deputy Mayor Dennis Walcott, who has overseen educational policy for the mayor since 2002, as her replacement.

Bloomberg said he had met with Black early Thursday, and the two "mutually agreed" she should step down. The move came just one day after a deputy chancellor resigned -- the latest in a string of top educational officials to leave the department during Black's tenure. It also followed a Marist/NY1 poll this week that put the former chancellor's approval rating hovering at 17 percent.

Bloomberg took responsibility for Black's failure -- a rare moment of defeat for a mayor who typically balks at admitting errors in judgment. At the same time, Bloomberg thanked and praised Black, the former chairwoman of Hearst Magazines.

"I take full responsibility that this has not worked out," Bloomberg said. "I have nothing but respect and admiration for her," he said of Black.

Black's short tenure was mired by embarrassing gaffes and political unpopularity. Her replacement comes at a crucial time for the Department of Education.

The department faces losing more than 6,000 teachers thanks to budget cuts. Simultaneously, the Bloomberg administration is attempting to convince the State Legislature to repeal the city's last in, first out policy -- which requires layoffs based on seniority.

Given the upheaval, city and state officials question whether the administration will be able to get its policy priorities, like LIFO, accomplished even with Walcott's good reputation in and outside of the Tweed Courthouse.

A New Occupant

Walcott is no Black.

While Black was often criticized for her lack of teaching experience, Walcott's appointment has already received a warmer reception. The deputy mayor has taught kindergarten and served as an adjunct professor at York College. He also sat on the old Board of Education.

Before joining the administration in 2002, Walcott was the president and chief executive officer of the New York Urban League for more than a dozen years.

While Black sent her kids to boarding school in Connecticut, Walcott's four children were all educated in New York City public schools. He too is a product of the city's school system.

At City Hall on Thursday, both Bloomberg and Walcott were quick to list off the deputy mayor's resume. After bumping fists with the mayor, Walcott confidently took over the podium, describing himself as "just a guy from Queens."

"The great equalizer in society is assuring that every child receives a quality education, especially a quality public education," said Walcott. "I'm a believer in reform. I'm a believer in this mayor and more importantly, I'm a believer in our 1.1. million students as well."

Unlike Black, who was asked whether she had set foot in a public school before she became chancellor, Walcott said he has visited "hundreds" of classrooms across the city.

To add to the dramatics of the day, the administration's press conference was flooded by students from P.S. 10 in Brooklyn, who Walcott said he was committed to helping succeed. The deputy mayor promised to visit them and make them waffles next week.

Despite his experience, Walcott, like Black, will need a waiver from the state in order to serve as chancellor. State law requires the schools chancellor to have a master's degree, a certain amount of teacher experience and graduate courses.

Walcott has a master's degree in education and in social work. Bloomberg said Thursday he didn't anticipate the waiver proces would cause a problem.

Walcott's Agenda

When Bloomberg first arrived at City Hall, he laid his legacy down on the city's public schools. He quickly acquired the pseudonym: "The Education Mayor."

"Under mayoral control the mayor's in charge," said Councilmember Robert Jackson, who chairs the body's Education Committee and is supportive of Walcott's appointment. "Not the chancellor or anyone else."

For that reason, officials and advocates don't expect a dramatic shift in policy at Tweed.

Nonetheless, the Black debacle has tainted Bloomberg's educational legacy. Some experts question whether the last three months will curtail the mayor's ability to accomplish his policy agenda over the next two years.

"If anything, Bloomberg is weakened by this," said David Bloomfield, the chair of the education department at the College of Staten Island. "His judgment has been severely called into question."

Nowhere could that have more of an impact than on the mayor's pursuit of the repeal of LIFO . While the State Senate has approved legislation that would give the mayor the authority to layoff teachers based on merit, the State Assembly has balked at the proposal.

"I would be surprised if this indicated any change in the status of where things would go legislatively for the mayor," said Billy Easton of the Alliance for Quality Education.

On the other hand, because Black's appointment was so contentious, some state officials said Thursday Walcott would have an easier time getting Albany officials to sit down. But that doesn't mean they will listen.

"To some extent, his personality might be more suitable," said State Sen. Bill Perkins, who is a frequent critic of Bloomberg's educational policy, of Walcott. "He's been around. He knows a lot of individuals. Maybe our policy differences may not come with so much antagonism."

As School Suspensions Soar, Many Seek a Different Approach


Photo (cc) Max Klingensmith

Earlier this school year, a 9-year-old at a Manhattan school asked a girl during lunch if she would share her candy with him. Her friends reported him to a safety officer, complaining that he had approached their table aggressively.

The boy faced a 90-day suspension for assault and harassment. Although the suspension was ultimately dismissed, the experience may have a lasting emotional impact.

"He was terrified the whole time. He was ready to cry,” said Ana Estada, an advocate for Advocates for Children, who represented the child in his suspension hearing.

The case, though, is hardly isolated. Suspensions of elementary school students, ages 4 to 10, are up by 76 percent in New York City over the past decade, with 6,119 suspensions during the 2008-2009 school year compared to 3,469 throughout the 2002-2003 academic year, the Daily News reported recently.

Overall, the Department of Education has increased student suspensions by 66 percent over the past 10 years, according to a recent New York Civil Liberties Union report. One in 14 current public school students have been suspended, compared to one in 25 students 10 years ago.

Black children, who account for one-third of city public school students, have served 53 percent of suspensions over the past decade.

Critics argue that students are being punished too harshly instead of receiving counseling and social services to address their problems. But the Department of Education believes suspending disruptive students is necessary to keep schools secure.

Marge Feinberg, a department spokeswoman, credits the increased suspension rate with a drop in violent crimes throughout city schools. "Preserving a safe and orderly environment in our schools is critical to our student's academic success," she wrote in an e-mail.

Though the department defends the policy, it has also started to look at alternatives.

Behind the Suspension Surge

Estada attributes the increase in suspensions over the past decade to the department's pressuring of teachers to file discipline reports to principals. The principal then decides whether to suspend the student.

When children tell parents about unresolved behavior problems "parents feel like their schools aren't safe," said Estada. "The principals say, 'I have to create a safe environment.' It's the only way to justify the suspension."

The majority of the suspensions are principal's suspensions, which last one to five days and target low-level offenses, such as insubordination and abusive language.

The superintendent's suspension, which can range from six to 90 days, applies to more serious offenses, such as drug and weapons possession. They last an average of 25 school days and require a hearing and the approval of the appropriate community or high school superintendent. Repeated instances of a relatively minor offense can snowball into a superintendent's suspension at the discretion of the principal.

Both types of suspensions have been on the rise since Bloomberg took control of the city's school system.

"They [the Department of Education] have to concede that kids are getting suspended and arrested for things that a generation ago would lead to a discussion with a parent," said Udi Ofer, co-author of the New York Civil Liberties Union report and advocacy director of the New York Civil Liberties Union.

Certain infractions, such as aggressive violence, gang-related activity and bringing a weapon to school, automatically lead to suspension. Last year the Department of Education reduced the number of so-called zero tolerance policy offenses to 21, down from 29 in 2007. Seven offenses met the criteria in 1998.

The Civil Liberties Union believes the Bloomberg administration's zero tolerance policy denies students their state constitutional right to a free public education.

"A suspension should never be the sole or only form of punishment," Ofer said. "Zero tolerance as a policy completes undermines the authority of teachers and principals."

Ofer criticizes suspension as a temporary solution that only succeeds in physically removing the child from the school and creating a tense environment between students and the administration. The Civil Liberties Union would like to see principals rely more on mediation and counseling when dealing with troublesome students.

"They need to create a positive school environment that fosters communication between students and pedagogical staff," he said.

While the Department of Education has not decided if it will further lower the number of zero tolerance infractions, it is exploring other approaches to discipline.

"This year, we expanded the disciplinary options principals have, including having a parent conference or in-school disciplinary action for certain infractions such as fighting," wrote Feinberg via e-mail. "The DOE is committed to providing a safe and nurturing school environment with a dedicated staff of employees.”

But some experts believe the department must do more to improve student behavior in the long-term.

"If you attend a school where you are treated poorly and even for a minor infraction you might be suspended, students feel disengaged," said Damon Hewitt, director of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Legal Defense and Education Fund's education practice.

He called the disproportionate number of black students being suspended "outrageous and highly disturbing."

The Department of Education, disputes his claim. "Race is not a factor in suspension decisions," Feinberg wrote via e-mail.

Nevertheless, Hewitt recommends that principals have less disciplinary authority. He also believes the vague nature of minor infractions, such as disrespect, gives Police Department safety officers who work in schools broad discretion to punish black students in a harsher manner. "It's in the eye of the beholder," he said.

Hewitt thinks the Department of Education must decrease its Police Department presence in schools in order to improve student relations, foster communication and promote trust.

"If you live in a community that is heavily policed and also attend a school that is heavily policed, you believe you are in a police state,” Hewitt said. "It undermines the effectiveness of law enforcement."

In December, the City Councilapproved legislation, now signed into law, that requires the Department of Education and Police Department to disclose school safety data, including figures on suspensions. The Legal Defense Fund plans on evaluating data, when it becomes available, that will track suspension trends in specific schools.

"The data will reveal differences amongst the schools," Hewitt said, commenting that he hoped "the data will spur improved practices."

Problems in the Process

Critics also find fault with the disciplinary process.

During suspension hearings, held only for superintendent's suspensions, a single official decides whether the student will be punished and, if so, for how long. The Department of Education and the defendant have the opportunity to present facts and call witnesses. Suspension hearings are held within five days of the school’s decision to impose the punishment. Decisions are usually made within three days of the hearing.

"It’s like a mini-criminal trial," said Nelson Mar, an educational law specialist and senior staff attorney for Bronx Legal Services. "Students don’t learn much about how not to get in trouble again."

Mar, who has 12 years of experience defending students facing suspension, criticizes the hearing process.

"A lot of times we don't see an investigation really happening. It's cursory," he said. Parents must make a formal request to the school if they want to view witness statements. But Mar claims the Department of Education does not provide his clients with that information, leaving him "with very limited knowledge of what happened."

According to Mar, most students enter the hearing without a lawyer, are represented by their parents or plead no contest to the charges. Parents often work full-time and plead no contest for their children because they are too busy to attend the hearing.

"Our goal is to protect a student from a long-term suspension, or avoid one altogether if we believe it's inappropriate or the facts don't necessitate such a response," he said. "Sometimes the charges are specific, sometimes they are vague."

One third of his clients avoid suspension entirely. "The greater good is that we wind up getting the suspension reduced," he said.

He described his typical client as an upset student who had an argument with a teacher and made physical contact with the instructor when attempting to leave the classroom. Sometimes teachers file reports to the principal, categorizing what may have been a light shove as an aggressive assault.

"The standard of proof is very, very minimal. You could bring two or three witnesses that say otherwise, but that one other [Department of Education] witness is enough to make the punishment," Mar said.

They Have a Budget Deal but Who Will Vote for It?


social service cuts

Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos may have been able to reach a budget deal late on Sunday evening, but the announcement left plenty of questions. The most pressing being, "Who is going to actually vote for this?"

"This budget makes tough choices, which is what you sent me to Albany to do," Cuomo said in a statement. "It closes a $10 billion dollar deficit with no new taxes or borrowing, redesigns government to force it to cut waste and inefficiency, and finally delivers real results for hard-working families across New York State."

Cuomo used tough talk, high poll numbers and the constant threat that he could make his budget a reality through extenders if legislators did not reach an agreement with him before April 1. The deal will force some rank and file legislators into a tough spot: vote for a budget that slashes spending and services and risk losing votes, or vote against a deal reached by the most powerful and popular man in New York State politics.

The $132.5 billion budget cuts spending by approximately 2 percent and makes major cuts to education and Medicaid spending. If passed before April 1, it will be the state's first on-time budget in five years. Not all the details of the budget are clear yet.

At least $250 million has been added to Cuomo's proposal, including funding for human services, state universities and education for the blind and deaf. In a victory for Assembly Democrats and advocacy groups, Cuomo eliminated a proposed cap on medical malpractice rewards. But in other areas, Democrats and advocates lost big: there is no millionaire’s tax extension despite a major last minute push by education, labor and advocacy groups. Also absent from the budget is the renewal of rent control laws that are set to expire in June. And it is unclear exactly how school aid will be distributed. Cuomo said that will be sorted out in the coming days. These issue could keep a variety of legislators from voting for the measure.

Reaction

Reactions from advocates were as expected. Conservative business groups praised the budget.

"This budget agreement marks a dramatic reversal in the tax and spend habits of Albany that drove this state to the brink of fiscal disaster. We congratulate Governor Cuomo, Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver for closing a $10 billion deficit without raising taxes. They have sent a clear message to employers that New York is open for business," said Kathryn Wylde of the Partnership for New York City in a statement.

The Alliance for Quality Education’s Billy Easton had the opposite reaction: "Governor Cuomo’s first budget makes heartlessly large cuts to our schools to finance tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires, and students in poor and middle class districts will lose the most educationally. Nobody who cares about students is celebrating this budget. Make no mistake about it: this budget will reduce the quality of education in New York."

A number of city Democrats were making a lot of noise this past week about their desire to see rent regulations renewed. "That may be one of the key issues for me as a legislator," Sen. Liz Krueger told Liz Benjamin. "If there is not rent regulation in the budget, or an ability to believe that we are ending up with much stronger laws long before June 15th, the deadline, that may be a basis for me and many of my Senate Democrat colleagues not to be able to vote for this budget."

Krueger even seemed to toy with the idea that the Senate would not have a quorum to bring the budget to a vote if Democrats did not show up to session.

Tentative deals have crumbled in previous years once legislators who were shut out of secretive negotiations were able to dig into the gritty details.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg slammed the deal as the "largest cut of state aid to New York City ever."

"At the outset of the budget process, we urged the governor and State Legislature to adopt a budget that treats New York City equitably and provides the mandate relief and reform that would allow us to absorb the State’s heavy cuts. This budget agreement appears to fail on both counts, and worse, it passes heavy new costs down to the city," the mayor said in a prepared statement. Bloomberg added that it was "encouraging" that a deal was reached on time. Bloomberg also said he hoped the state would move to abolish regulations that require the city to layoff teachers based on seniority.

Silver told reporters that he still plans to lobby the Senate to reauthorize both the millionaire’s tax and rent control laws. "Hopefully by doing this thing early, it will follow through on a lot of other issues," he said.

Meanwhile, as part of the budget, Cuomo will have the authority to close prisons. The deal calls for Cuomo to eliminate 3,700 prison beds --"in consultation" with the legislature. It isn't clear which prisons will be eliminated. It is likely that legislators whose districts face closures will put up a major stink.

"Government had to tighten its belt with the same sense of urgency that working families have been tightening their belts since the economy went into freefall in 2008," said Silver in a statement. "The sole consolation is that working with the Governor, we were able to achieve critical restorations which will soften the cuts affecting working families, our senior citizens, our most vulnerable populations and the children in our classrooms."

Education Department Slashes Plans for Building More Schools


p.s. 41
In recent years, some schools, such as P.S. 41 in Manhattan have become increasingly crowded.

This week parents and officials from lower Manhattan announced the area would soon get another elementary school, the third new school recently slated for the area.

But parents in other sections of the city have less reason to applaud. An amendment to the city's five year capital plan for the Department of Education, to be voted on by the Panel for Education Policy on Wednesday, calls for a major rollback in plans for new school design and construction between now and 2014, with some sections of the city set to get thousands fewer seats than they had anticipated.

Overall, the department anticipates building 19 fewer schools than it did just a year ago, a reduction of almost 10,000 seats. Just one community education district -- 30, which includes Jackson Heights, Long Island City and Sunnyside -- stands to lose three schools with 1,744 places.

Although these cuts have attracted far less attention than the city's intention to lay off more than 4,000 teachers, they have raised concern among advocates who see the reduced plan as a recipe for more school overcrowding and larger classes. City officials blame the scaling back on proposed changes in the way the state reimburses the city for school construction.

The Capital Plan

The administration proposes to reduce the $11.3 billion capital spending plan for 2010 to 2014, which was amended last February, to $9.3 billion. Only five months ago, in November, the city envisioned a much more ambitious program, never officially approved, totaling more than $16 billion.

The city attributes much of the cutback to an anticipated loss of state money. In 2010, the city expected the state to ante up $5.7 billion over five years. It now sees that dropping to $3.5 billion. The city has cut its anticipated spending by slightly over $100 million since the plan was approved last winter. To put it another way, the March plan saw the state putting up 49 percent of the money; the latest plan has the state contributing only 37 percent.

Much of the reduction will come in spending for new capacity, which was set at $4.0 billion in March 2010 and comes in at a bit under $1.8 billion now. The plan includes much smaller cuts in replacement capacity -- finding a new home for a school in a leased space -- and mandated expenses, such as improvements needed to comply with building codes.

Despite the anticipated cuts in state support, the city Department of Education still plans to provide $210 million to help charter schools build new facilities. In the budget plan, the department praises the partnership with charters and says it brings in "valuable private sector resources," with the education department having to pay only 73 percent of the cost of the new facilities for charters.

The latest plan also calls for an increase of $486 million to fund technology improvements, including those needed for new student assessments. Some of this money will go to accomodate the Innovation Zone program, an ambitious though still largely unrealized and untested plan to increase on-line learning and explore new approaches to the school day. This brings the amount slated for the iZone program next year alone to $542.25 million, according to Leonie Haimson of Class Size Matters.

Some believe said this money could be better spent elsewhere. Haimson said, "This an extraordinarily large amount to be spending in any one year, especially given the city's (and the DOE's) shaky record in investing in technology projects."

Contending there is no evidence that the iZone works, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer said in an emailed statement, "The DOE should either publicly release empirical data that justifies the large amount of funding it plans to dedicate to the iZone, or turn back to the basics and prioritize building school seats for our students who desperately need them now."

Finally, the plan calls for $141 million for efforts to increase energy efficiency "while simultaneously addressing the environmental issues associated with older lighting systems," as the education department put its -- in other words removing toxic PCBs from hundreds of school buildings across the city.

Jammed Up

The school crowding issue made headline earlier this year when School Chancellor Cathie Black famously quipped that birth control might be the best solution to the school system's capacity problems. But the shortage of space has been a persistent issue in many part of the city despite the addition -- completed or in progress -- of some 55,000 slots under the previous capital plan.

Although the system may not be above capacity overall, the department's figures show half of the city's children attend overcrowded schools, according to Helaine Doran of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity. That estimate, she said, is low because it does not include schools that uses trailers as classroom or students who have to be sent away from their neighborhood school.

One study found that more than half of all the city's high school students attend overcrowded schools. A report by the city comptroller's office in 2009 cited widespread overcrowding and stated, "The new capacity projected to be completed by 2012 will fall far short of the amount required to end overcrowding in primary and primary/intermediate schools in the following communities where enrollment exceeded capacity."

Map
The latest capital proposal from the Department of Education scales back the number of new seats to be added by 2014, essentially reversing a November 2010 proposal to substantially increase capacity and building fewer schools than the city proposed a year ago.

The crowding is not spread evenly throughout the city. While the Department of Education maintains that some schools have far fewer students than they can accommodate, others are packed. The Upper West Side has twice as many young children now than it did in 2000, creating a squeeze in schools there. According to the education department's own figures, P.S. 236 in the Morris Heights section of the Bronx had almost double the number of students it should have.

"In districts all over the city enrollment has been increasing, especially in the early grades," said Haimson.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg has widely touted the jammed classrooms as proof that his school policies work. Earlier this week, he cited the shortage of classrooms as one of the "problems of success" that "Buffalo would love to have." Schools have improved, his reasoning goes, enough so that parents who once might have fled to the suburbs now remain in the five borough and send their children to the public schools.

Others additional explanations, including the shutting of parochial schools. Haimson of Class Size Matters believes that some of the mayor's own policies -- notably the closing of big schools and replacing them with small ones and the placing of charter schools in some district school buildings -- have contributed to the space crunch.

Some observers point out that New York, unlike many other cities, does not require builders of major new residential projects to somehow provide for new schools in the area. Such new homes have certainly fueled the space problems in Tribeca and the Upper West Side, forcing the city to play catch up after the developer's work is done.

Funding the Space

Large class size and jam-packed classrooms plaguing city schools were key issues in the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit challenging school financing. As a result of the case -- though not as part of an actual legal settlement -- Gov. Eliot Spitzer agreed to fund about 50 percent of capital construction in the city.

The state no longer wants to adhere to that. For most years of the plan, the city will see between $500 million and $600 million in funds from the state -- down from the slightly more than $1 billion a year the city anticipated under the old plan.

Since the settlement of the suit, things have changed. "Both the state and the city have made major investment in education -- billions of dollars in increasing capacity. It's important to recognize that," said Morris Peters, a spokesman for the state Division of the Budget.

The state has aid the city can have up to $1 billion in what it consider allowable expenses annually, with the state reimbursing over 60 percent of that, for a maximum of around $600 million. In addition to a smaller pool, Gov. Andrew Cuomo has proposed changing the system for distributing money, Peters said. It would set priorities for which projects to fund, focusing first on those that address health and safety concerns, then ones that correct overcrowding and so on down a list.

The reimbursement formula also considers the fiscal status of the district. Until now, Peters said, districts could choose a year, going back to the 1980s, that would put them at the best advantage. Under Cuomo's changes, they could no longer do this.

However the state determine's the city's allotment, the Bloomberg "administration understands that our school system needs more investment than that, which is why the city's relative share of this capital plan would actually skyrocket should Albany cap building aid," Department of Education Jack Zarin-Rosenfeld said in an email.

While some advocates say the city wants to lobby Albany for more funds, the Bloomberg administration so far has been relatively quiet on this issue, preferring to press its campaign to end the last in, first out system for laying off teachers.

The mayor did, however, discuss the proposed cuts in testimony before the legislature this year.

"The courts have ruled that class size is too great as it is. Just imagine what would happen if the state does cut its support for school construction by 67 percent. It would be a huge setback -- and make it much harder for us to relieve the pockets of overcrowding that exist," Bloomberg said.

He also criticized prosed changes in the state system for evaluating capital projects, calling it "a recipe, if I’ve ever heard of one, for bureaucratic inaction and delay [that] would also make it harder for local elected officials, and community leaders, to make their voices heard on projects in their districts."

In a joint statement issued yesterday City Council speaker Christine Quinn and Robert Jackson criticized the state for proposing a plan that they said "would force the DOE to scuttle its plans to add 36,000 new school seats." The two council members said they are "pushing hard to reverse this plan."

At least up until now, advocates have not focused on the capital spending either. "The cut is so big on operations," said Doran. "How many pieces can you go for?"

Haimson, though, believes the administration could find money to build schools. "The city has never put any effort into increasing capacity," she said. "There are plenty of capital funds available. They don’t want to spend it on schools."

"Kindergarten waiting lists, which we've never had in this city, and overcrowded schools are going to be this mayor's legacy," she said.

Winner and Losers

A few districts do fare better in this year's plan than last year's. The Upper West Side, for example, which had no new space under the February 2010 amendment now is set for 480 new seats.

The Corona section of Queens, widely seen as among the city's most overcrowded, will add room for 3,123 more students -- a slight increase over the amount in last year's plan.

On the other side of the ledger, Chelsea/Midtown West drops 800 seats. A new, unnamed school slated for District 8 in the Bronx is gone. In another part of the Bronx, District 10, which was supposed to get there new schools, will now only have one. The Van Nest/Pelham Bay section will lose almost half of its anticipated seats.

In Brooklyn, all 612 planned new slots in Williamsburg/Greenpoint have been deleted. A new school for Carroll Gardens and Red Hook is also off the table. Last year, District 20 in Bay Ridge could look forward to six schools with 3,046 seats; that's been cut to two schools with room for 1,075 students.

Bayside, Howard Beach and Hollis are no longer slated for new schools. Staten Island lost one school, in the New Dorp section.

In deciding which projects to drop, the education department said it considered a few factors.

"We study data by neighborhood so we can ensure our investments are going directly to the areas of the city that need the most new school seats. That means, by definition, our new construction investments are going into the neighborhoods with the most need," said Zarin-Rosenfeld. "In putting together this latest amendment, any project that is already in construction or has a site identified remained in the plan. Other projects were shifted to 'design only' for this five-year plan, while the remaining projects were deferred until the next plan."

Many of the projects being abandoned were in early stages of development without locations or advanced design plans. Department of Education documents identified most of them only by borough and number.

(Correction: This article originally attributed all $86 million for technology programs to spending on the Innovation Zone. Instead, according to the education department, that money will go for a number of programs, including the iZone and redesigned student assessments. The story has been corrected.)

With IBM's Help, New School Hopes to Groom Students for Tech Jobs


p-tech
As the Department of Education "phases out" Paul Robeson High School, a new technology school, created in collaboration with IBM and CUNY, will open in the building next fall.

(This is the second of two articles on science teaching in New York City public schools. To read the previous article on city students falling short in science, go here.)

This September, if all goes according to plan, the New York City Department of Education, the City University of New York and IBM will unveil an entirely new kind of high school in Brooklyn.

Eventually the school will have about 600 students in grades 9 through 14. Those who successfully complete the six-year program will receive an associate degree in a computer science-related field – and, in theory, first dibs on a job at IBM.




In some ways, the plan fits into the prevailing narrative of the Bloomberg administration's approach to education: trying to fix what ails public education by looking for expertise in the private sector.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, announcing the project last fall, trumpeted the school as a way of "taking an education system that has fallen far behind the times, and moving it into the 21st century." He presented it as part of a broad initiative to modernize the city's schools, which includes increased funding for innovative new school models and linking teacher tenure and pay to merit.

While there is little if any opposition to the concept of the school, some question whether it will be able to deliver on its ambitious goals.

Breaking the Mold

The IBM school, called Pathways and Technology Early College High School, or P-Tech, will not be a charter school but a regular public school working in partnership with IBM. The school is also the first grade 9 through 14 school in the country (someone dubbed it a hollege) where students can leave with an associate's degree in information technology -- though students may end up leaving after grade 12 and attending a CUNY school for grades 13 and 14, according to IBM. In either case, CUNY staff would be involved in teaching the technical side of the school's curriculum.

The school's staff will be drawn from a pool of New York teachers and administrators experienced in math and science education. Rashid Davis, currently principal of Bronx Engineering and Technology Academy, has been chosen as its principal. IBM's role will be primarily to provide financial support and administer mentor and internship programs.




IBM, for its part, conceives of the new school partly as a way to test a new model of education. The company has said that it sees public education partly as a kind of long-term investment -- a way of ensuring that the pool of trained technology workers stays strong.




"It's looking at having a more vocational focus on a specific topic area where there's a need and a desire for those skills in the future," said IBM spokesperson Lisa Lanspery. Starting vocational training in grade nine, instead of waiting until a student community college, could be a "huge advantage," she said. She said students also would benefit from the mentor, internship, training and career placement programs IBM planned to offer at the school.




"You think of a current high school today, they're not going to get access to mentors," Lanspery said.




Ultimately, Lanspery said, the company might try to replicate the model elsewhere in New York and other cities – though for now, she said, the company is taking it "step by step."

Initial Support





In December 2010, IBM hosted a reception for New York public school and CUNY administrators to share their thoughts on the project and on challenges it might face. That reception was attended by principals of various New York public schools, especially those focused on science and technology, including Aviation High School, George Westinghouse High School and Midwood High School. Stanley Litow, IBM's vice president of corporate affairs and chairman of its foundation, represented the company. 
Chiara Coletti, a spokesperson for the administrators' union, the Council of School Supervisors and Administrators, said she has received "100 percent positive feedback" from members of her union and praised IBM's involvement. "They're really taking the initiative," Coletti said. "This is like a little laboratory of learning for doing this kind of thing."

While enthusiastic about the idea, the administrators cautioned IBM that the school would face unique challenges. Foremost among them is that, unlike existing technology-focused schools like Brooklyn Tech, the planned IBM school will not choose its students through a competitive application process. September's incoming class -- about 100 ninth graders -- will be selected by lottery, with some preference given to students who attend an information session. As a result, those attending the school will likely have a wide range of abilities and aptitudes.

On its web site, the school says it expects students to be wiling to put in extra hours, to be interested in computers, math and science and to be "curious, dedicated learners."

The school already has encountered opposition, largely because the city plans to put it in the Crown Heights building that now houses Paul Robeson High School, which it is starting to close. Robeson, which itself was created as a technical high school in 1985, has had a particularly challenging student body. About one eighth of the students, according to a report by the Center for New York City Affairs at the New School, is homeless or living in temporary housing, its graduation rate had dipped to 40 percent, and many of the students are overage, often indicating they had fallen behind in high school or been forced to repeat a grade earlier in their school careers. The school had launched efforts designed specifically to help struggling students, such as a program for students who had children of their own.

To critics of the IBM school, P-Tech looks like another flashy "innovation school" pushing out a struggling, but viable, traditional school. City Councilmember Al Vann, who represents Paul Robeson High School's district, told New York 1 that, while he supported the idea of the IBM school, closing Robeson is not fair to its students.

In addition, having a corporate sponsor does not guarantee success. While some of the Department of Education's public-private partnerships -- used most notably in publicly funded, privately run charter schools -- have done well, other have faltered. The city founded Metropolitan Corporate Academy in downtown Brooklyn with the help of Goldman Sachs, which provided mentors and internships. But this year, the city decided to shut the school, which had a crumbling facility in downtown Brooklyn and suffered from poor attendance.

IBM's Pledge

For all its commitment to the school, IBM's long-term role remains unclear. An important unanswered question is how strongly IBM has committed to hiring graduates of the school. When Bloomberg announced the school, he said in a televised address on NBC that that its graduates would be "guaranteed" jobs at IBM.




In fact, IBM has said no such thing. What it is promising, according to Lanspery, is that graduates of the school will be "first in line" for any jobs at IBM for which they are qualified -- that is, that they will be considered for these jobs before other applicants.




"It has to be an appropriate job with the appropriate credentials," Lanspery said -- and many jobs at IBM aren't appropriate for someone with only an associate degree in computer science.




"If we're looking for someone with a business or graduate degree, probably someone graduating from a 9-14 school would not be the most qualified applicant," Lanspery said. More appropriate jobs, she said, might include "lower-level" programming and software development.




Moreover, Lanspery said, given the rapid evolution of the technology sector, IBM's job openings might look very different by the time the school's first class graduates.


 “It's tough for us to say what those jobs are going to look like six years from now," she said. "Six years from now, the tech world is going to look totally different." 


Nonetheless, Lanspery stressed that graduates who don't get hired at IBM will hardly be adrift. Nearly every sector is creating more and more tech jobs, from telecommunications to energy, and graduates of the IBM school will have an excellent shot at those jobs, she said.




To help make that happen, IBM plans to appoint a committee to develop a "core set of minimum requirements for entry-level IT jobs that will serve as benchmarks and targets" for the school. At this point, it is too early to say what those benchmarks might look like, or how they will be met.




Department of Education spokesperson Jack Zarin-Rosenfeld said that the actual curriculum for the school, which will include both traditional instruction and vocational training during all six years, is still in the early planning stages. He said the department should be able to announce more details this spring.

City Students Fall Short in Science


science education
Photo by Art Jessen
As the city attempts to lure high-tech jobs, city students, by several measures, seem to lack basic science skills.

With Google having purchased property in Chelsea for almost $2 billion and Internet Week New York looking to its fourth year, city officials hope the technology and bioscience industries will continue to expand here, bringing new job opportunities with them. But will graduates of the city’s public schools have the skills to get those jobs?

Results of a new national science test released late last month, along with a steep decline in the number of students qualifying for a prestigious science award and testimony from teachers indicates that even if new, high-tech jobs come to New York City, the positions may not go to people who attended the city's schools.

Earlier this month Patrick Sullivan, the Manhattan borough president's appointee to the Panel for Educational Policy, asked schools Chancellor Cathie Black about what Sullivan described as " the continued decline in science education under the mayor's watch." According to Sullivan, Black said she would look into the issue.

The Test Scores

The National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NAEP, recently released results for the fourth and eighth grade students from 17 urban districts, including New York City who took a national science test in 2009. Also referred to as the Nation’s Report Card, NAEP, a product of the National Center for Education Statistics, serves as a barometer for national student performance. Fourth graders in 14 of the 17 city districts and eighth graders in all but one of the districts scored lower than the national average of 149 on a scale of 0 to 300. New York City's fourth and eighth grade students scored below the national average, at 135 and 129, respectively. That puts the city's fourth graders in the middle of the urban districts; the eight graders lagged behind those in many other city schools systems.

In all types of districts across the country, a large percentage of the nation’s fourth, eighth and twelfth graders did not reach the level of proficient on the NAEP tests. The 2009 results for the 17 urban districts "are worse, not better," said Alan Friedman, former director of the New York Hall of Science who explained the results in a National Center for Education Statistics webcast.

"Urban districts in general performed less well in math and reading compared to the nation as a whole, while performing even further below in science," Friedman said.

New York's Department of Education has said not all cities considered "urban districts" face the same challenges that New York does. "While our kids have a long way to go, right now we're outperforming districts with much lower levels of poverty," said the department's chief academic officer, Shael Polokow-Suransky, in a statement.

And the department has noted that New York fourth graders eligible for free or reduced-price lunch -- a poverty indicator --outperformed similar students in other large cities, and that New York fared better than other cities with similar poverty rates, such as Chicago and Los Angeles.

The department, though, also has expressed some dismay about the scores. "The gap between how our students perform in elementary and middle school is a real concern," Polokow-Suransky said.

A Lack of Talent?

While the students taking the NAEP represent a sample of city students, some observers also see a falloff in achievement among the city's best science students. This year, for the first time in recent memory, no city school student, public or private, reached the final round of the prestigious national Intel Science Talent Search. Only 14 students were among the 200 semifinalists, according to Steve Koss, who has written extensively on the issue.

For decades, city school students dominated the competition, but Koss writes, "Since 2002-2003 ... NYC schools' participation in STS has dropped by nearly half, and the level of semifinalist winners by nearly three fourths."

In his post on NYC Public School Parents, Koss links the decline to the advent of mayoral control of schools. He offers a number of possible explanations, including that the emphasis on math and reading tests have minimized or "dumbed down" science instruction.

Science Requirements

The city science curriculum, according to the Department of Education website begins with a hands-on approach for elementary school students. At the high school level, students are required to complete three years of life or physical science, as well as 1,200 minutes of lab time to qualify for a Regents diploma.

Overall, the department says, "The city's approach allows students to practice problem-solving skills, develop positive science attitudes, learn new science content, and increase their scientific literacy."

Based on discussions with several New York City teachers that may not be working. (The teachers asked to remain anonymous.)

One teacher in a public high school with a business focus who has taught biology for 10 years said that the majority of students entering her classroom have not been "well prepped" for high school science. More importantly, the students lack basic skills, she said. For example, students had difficulty answering review questions because they didn’t understand words such as "predict" or "sequence." To address this, the teacher has enrolled in a class to help her teach reading to her students.

Another teacher said her students have difficulty using a ruler because they’re not familiar with the measurements.

Other educators echo such concerns. A professor at LaGuardia Community College recently told the New York Times that his students -- people who have graduated from high school -- "have serious challenges remembering the basic rules of arithmetic.”

To try to bolster science education, the city has begun introducing state standards, called Common Core. Among other things, these would have students analyze academic, non-fiction texts, including science texts, similar to those they might encounter in college.

The NAEP scores, Polokow-Suransky said in his statement, point up the importance of "working toward the tougher Common Core Standards as quickly as possible." The standards, he continued, will "build literacy skills in science ... and prepare our kids for the critical thinking and problem solving they begin to face in middle school."

In the Lab

The high school teachers also expressed frustration over the lack of lab time. Student are supposed to have 44 minutes of lab a week "but they aren't experimenting the whole time because time has to be allotted for setup, explaining the lab instructions because students have difficulty comprehending them, and then clean-up,” said one of the teachers.

She thinks students would need a minimum of 90 minutes per week to see the results of and have the opportunity to change their experiments.

The education department says it is in the midst of what it describes as "a multi-million dollar effort ... to improve the quality and quantity of science laboratory facilities." But while many schools have added new science labs, a recent report on NY1 found that they don’t have teachers for them, making it hard to boost time spent on hands-on experiments.

The department admits that it has had shortages of science teachers but says it has tried to fill science-teaching positions and, in the last three years, hired more than 500 new middle school science teachers. Impending teacher layoffs, though, could bring a halt to those gains and even erase some of them.

Extra Help

Whatever the school day may lack in science education, some city students try to make up for it after hours. The Department of Youth and Community Development's Beacon Program offers an opportunity for several hundred students to build and program robots. Enthusiastic science graduate and post-doctoral students teach the elementary and high school students, according to Darryl Rattray, the Beacon Program’s assistant commissioner.

This program, though, could also be vulnerable to budget cuts. In testimony before the state legislature, city youth commissioner Jeanne Mullgrav said that Gov. Andrew Cuomo's 2011-2012 budget proposal could result "in the loss of 4,800 afterschool slots" out of an afterschool population of approximately 80,000 students.

As exciting as building a robot is, the afterschool program does not guarantee that students will learn the essential concepts required to excel in physical, life and earth and space sciences or boost their test scores. Meghan Groome, the director of K-12 science education for the New York Academy of Sciences who is responsible for recruiting graduate students to teach in afterschool programs, said the "program's mission is to engage and interest students in the sciences, not to ready them for test taking."

Ms. Black Goes to Albany


Cathie Black
Photo by Edward Reed
Schools Chancellor Cathie Black on a recent visit to P.S. 262

"Is Cathleen Black here?" The pointed, almost scolding voice of Sen. John DeFrancisco rang out across the hearing room in the legislative office building in Albany on Tuesday. DeFrancisco, who was overseeing the joint budget hearing on education for the senate majority, was looking for a copy of the schools chancellor's testimony.

Black made her presence known. "You weren't going to keep it for yourself were you?" DeFrancisco chuckled as she handed in her testimony.

With only two months on the job, Black has weathered a storm of controversy after being appointed by Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Formerly a publishing executive, Black had no experience in education and has made only limited and carefully controlled appearances since taking office at the beginning of January.

Black, who also has little to no experience dealing with organized labor, took her new job as the city's dealings with the teacher's union turned notably contentious. In his State of the City address, Bloomberg pushed for new control over pension negotiations and the elimination of state mandates such as the first-in, last-out rule that means newer teachers must be laid off before teachers with seniority. United Federation of Teachers’ head Michael Mulgrew has taken the mayor's push as an attack on seniority and a move designed to cut costs by getting rid of more highly paid teachers.

The Exmining Board

Black's testimony on Tuesday before a joint hearing of the notoriously cantankerous legislature was supposed to be her biggest test to date. Instead Black delivered her written testimony and had a basically cordial question and answer session with legislators. But it wasn't all smooth sailing.

As Black took her seat in front of a microphone and a large panel of legislators, the chanting began. At first it was muffled, but the noise of human voices protesting in unison was unmistakable. Most of the audience looked at one another nervously, assuming the protest was directed at Black.

"Wanna take a break?" one legislator asked. "Can we have some order please!" shouted DeFrancisco. The protesters got louder, closer to the floor and to Black. "Gov. Cuomo, don't kill the CFE!" they chanted, demanding the state honor a settlement in the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit that requires it to provide more aid to under-funded school districts. "You have the wrong room. Gov. Cuomo is on the second floor of the capitol," DeFrancisco said. When the protesters exited the room, Assemblymember Herman "Denny" Farrell told a staffer, "Lock the doors when they leave." But the protest brought a round of applause from legislators and audience members alike.

With that, Black began her testimony. "Thank you for that warm welcome," she said, smiling. Legislators laughed. Black was accompanied by Deputy Mayor Dennis Walcott and the Department of Education's chief financial officer, Veronica Conforme.

Black read from her testimony, thanking the legislators, especially the "New York City delegation."

Pleading the City Case

"Let me say from the outset that we recognize the state's precarious financial condition. As Mayor Bloomberg said, ‘What we are urging you to do is provide our students with their fair share of state aid and our city with the tools and reform needed to end unnecessary mandates and crippling policy that otherwise will accelerate an already daunting situation,'" she said.

Sen. Martin Golden agreed with Black that Cuomo's budget calls for New York City to bear an unfair share of the cuts in state education aid. He asked Black what legislation City Hall plans to put forward to deal with the state mandates the Bloomberg administration says are so burdensome. Black replied that a bill dealing with last in, first out was forthcoming.

She was asked what criteria, other than seniority, could be used for evaluating teachers. "We have a number of plans to have a more formulaic evaluation of teachers," she said. "The current system is only two letters: satisfactory or unsatisfactory. Ninety percent get satisfactory. That number by any stretch of the imagination doesn't fly. At the moment we can't move forward on teacher evaluations in any significant way because that is a contract we have to work out with the union."

Dodging Controversy

Assemblymember Nick Perry had sharper questions.

"What is your own vision?" he asked Black. "The reason I'm asking the question is, it seems to me you got on the train and just took the driver's seat, and my observation is the train has been going down the wrong track for long time, and my perception is that you have been driving the train in the same direction as your predecessor."

Black's response did not include any criticism of her predecessor and avoided any hot topics.

"I have a very clear vision that our children deserve the best schools that they possibly can have for all of the years they are in school -- to prepare them for a world they are going into, which is more complex than it has been in the past," she added, "I want to do much better job of reaching out to the community in tandem to work together to assure our children a better future."

Perry pressed on. "Do you believe that the policy of routinely closing schools after what seems in a lot of cases deliberate policy by the department to let these schools deteriorate until they are not worth keeping open, do you think that is policy that should be part of your vision?" Perry asked.

"We do not have policy for closing schools," Black promptly responded.

"Excuse me! Did you just say you don't have a policy for closing schools?" Perry asked in disbelief.

"We have a very strong belief we should phase out failing schools," Black continued. Perry tried to interject but Black continued. "We visit schools not once, but multiple times," she said, explaining how students, principals and teachers were evaluated in failing schools." Walcott then added to what Black said, insisting that the city works in tandem with the state to identify poorly performing schools.

Cutting Costs or Keeping Teachers

Perhaps the most pointed questions came from Sen. Andrew Lanza on the topic of last in, first out.

"What is the anticipated cost savings if we were to move away from the LIFO system or process?" asked Lanza.

"I don’t have an exact number on that but with this kind of budget shortfall it’s going to be a significant number," said Black.

Walcott quickly interjected, "We don’t view this as a cost saving measure. We view this as an issue of how to provide the best teachers for schools during a very difficult time around layoffs."

"Well, this is a budget hearing," said Lanza, "and the issue of changing LIFO has been advanced in the context of saving the city a lot of money. So I am trying to get an accurate picture as to what the expectation is. Why is it the city's expectation that so many experienced teachers would be let go?"

Black seemingly missed the point of the question -- whether intentionally or not . Black said that she expected teacher layoffs in general would be necessary because of Cuomo's proposed budget cuts.

Visibly frustrated, Lanza responded: "I’ll tell you my concern is that this is being driven by cost savings, because this is being advanced as a cost savings measure for the city. Would you agree all else being equal experience matters?"

Black told the story of meeting a "fantastic teacher" and finding out that she only had a year of experience.

Lanza still didn't have the answer he was looking for. "We can agree to disagree," he said.

But he had one more question -- this time about pensions. Lanza noted the teacher had agreed to a new -- and lower -- tier for new teachers in 2009. "Are we saying that we need to move beyond that? That that's not going to work?" he asked the chancellor.

"The deputy mayor may want to add to that," Black responded, quickly handing the question off to Walcott.

More questions came and went, about building funds, closing the achievement gap, class size, using e-readers in the classroom. Some legislators were anxious to talk about their experiences as a teachers. Others seemed pleasantly surprised that Black was talking about the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit and reducing state cuts to city education aid.

Assemblymember Daniel O'Donnell seemed almost incensed when he asked Black if she agreed with a recent "tabloid editorial" that said this was the wrong time to make good on the CFE lawsuit. He appeared relieved when Black said she did not agree with the editorial and thought an injustice was being done by not funding it.

Report Card

So what did legislators think of Black's performance?

"She's only been in for less than a month. I think she did a good job. I would give her a B pus," said Sen. Ruben Diaz. But Diaz added he wasn't particularly concerned with who serves as chancellor. "It is the mayor's way. It is his agenda. No one else matters. This is the same administration-- it has nothing to do with the chancellor.

Sen. Liz Krueger said she thinks that the teachers union, Black and Bloomberg all agree that the city is bearing an unfair share of education cuts -- whether the union and the administraiton are getting along or not. She said she has disagreed with past legislation that would do away with protections for senior teachers, but thinks there may be some sort of formula that takes more than just seniority into account. That said, she added, "I don't think it is an appropriate budget discussion," because it should not be about cost savings

As for Black's performance, Krueger thought she did well but that she wasn't facing much of a firing squad this time. "She gave her answers, and sometimes referred to the deputy mayor. When she didn't have the answer she was reasonable and said she would get back to us on that. It was a civil Q and A. I don't think it could have been harder than having 3,000 angry people screaming at you," Krueger said.

Later Black told the press she prepared for weeks for the testimony.

Seniority Fight Highlights Rift Between City, Teachers


bloomberg
Office of the Mayor
Last month teachers union president Michael Mulgrew stood with Mayor Michael Bloomberg and schools Chancellor Cathleen Black to announce a program to help struggling students. But Mulgrew and the administration have agreed on little else in the past several weeks.

The content of Mayor Michael Bloomberg's State of the City address last month wasn't exactly a surprise. He had made many of the points before. Nevertheless, his pointed call for sweeping labor concessions left many union leaders with jaws agape.

According to some reports, no one was more surprised than United Federation of Teachers" president Michael Mulgrew, who learned of Bloomberg's demands only moments before the speech. Mulgrew and Bloomberg were previously on good terms, but after the address Mulgrew acted like a man betrayed. Bloomberg not only wants the state to give the city the right to negotiate pensions, but he has made doing away with the first-in, last-out law on laying off teachers a centerpiece of his agenda. Looming over this is the question of teacher layoffs. Gov. Andrew Cuomo's budget will cut $518 million in school aid to the city and $1.5 billion statewide.

Bloomberg projected that with the current funding cuts and with the last-hired, first-fired provision still in place he will have to lay off nearly 8,000 teachers – all of whom will be recent hires.

Cuomo and his budget director Robert Megna have said that the cuts are not as bad as Bloomberg claims and that the city could use its rainy day fund to patch the budget.

Teachers say they feel as though they are under siege. Last year the union accepted a new pension tier that would give new teachers lower benefits than their predecessors and found themselves with wage freeze that prevented lay offs. They see little end to what Bloomberg and Cuomo say is "shared sacrifice."

Many teachers see the effort to weaken seniority as still another indication that the mayor and his administration have little respect for career educators. A large number of parents and teachers saw the appointment of Cathleen Black, a publishing executive with no education experience, as a slap in the face, saying she lacked the credentials to teach in the system, let alone run it.

Some complain about the paucity of long-time educators in the education department bureaucracy and about the city's hiring people with scant classroom experience -- but a stint at management training course -- as school principals. They have noted the education department no longer even has an office devoted to "Teaching and Learning."

"I just came from a meeting of thousands of teachers and they have lost all respect for the mayor," said Mulgrew, "This is what they are telling me: ‘He is fighting for how to do layoffs instead of fighting against them.’"

Much Ado About LIFO

For now, seniority rules are the main point of contention between the administration and the union.

Bloomberg and his Albany office worked feverishly to persuade Cuomo to add language to his budget bills that would allow the Department of Education more flexibility when it comes to layoffs, so that not only new teachers lose their positions. Cuomo didn't do that, but said he would consider legislation altering the agreement, along with other changes to pension mandates, after the budget is passed.

Cuomo told reportersrecently that negotiations are ongoing.

Bloomberg started pushing for changes to last in-first out last year, but dropped the issue after the salary freeze averted teacher layoffs. Before Cuomo released his budget, though, Bloomberg returned to the idea -- more forcefully than ever before -- threatening as many as 21,000 teacher layoffs. Under existing rules, he said, every teacher hired since 2006 could lose his or her job. He soon retreated from that but has held fast to his position that last in, first out must change.

"State law includes a 'last in, first out' provision, which would force us to lay off some of our very best teachers, while keeping some of our worst. Those layoffs would be felt heavily in the city's poorest neighborhoods, where schools tend to have the newest teachers," Bloomberg testified at a state budget hearing this week.

Mulgrew said he believes that Bloomberg is "playing chicken little" -- exaggerating the severity of the financial situation to get changes to pension law and alter seniority rules. "Just like everything else he [Bloomberg] has done, he says the sky is falling," Mulgrew said. "In his speech he said he wants principals to decide who is laid off, and he said how much money they make should be a factor, so those with seniority will be at greater risk. We have a 50 percent attrition rate in our profession, and it is as if the mayor is saying, ‘We don't want you.’ More people are going to be scared away from this profession."

A number of education advocates see Bloomberg's State of the City speech and his position on this issue as his way of turning a bad situation to his favor. Bloomberg knew full well Cuomo would make cuts this year, they say. By making teacher seniority an issue the mayor would be able to control which teachers get to teach and rid himself of senior teachers who are due raltively high salaries and expensive benefits.

By repeatedly saying the seniority rules would force the Department of Education to fire many outstanding teachers, some teachers and education advocates think the mayor is implying that senior teachers are inferior to newcomers.

"Look at it this way," said Carl Korn of New York State United Teachers. "If you brought your car to a mechanic, would you want someone straight out of vocational school or someone with 20 years of experience working on cars? We are lucky enough in this state to have some great first- and second-year teachers, but we are also lucky to have some very experienced teachers with 15 or 20 years behind them."

"The mayor is saying that only the new teachers are making a difference in these poor neighborhoods, and I think that isn't right," said Sen. Bill Perkins, who was elected with strong support from the UFT. " It is bad for public education to even make that characterization. There are rotten apples and they should be gotten rid of, but is he saying that all teachers with seniority are bad? That is a very deep prejudice."

Perkins said he thinks Bloomberg's position could be related to his support for charter schools, few of which are unionized. "It may have to do with all these young teachers working for charter schools. He is saying, ‘Come in and work for less.’

The split between the Bloomberg administration and the union has grown increasingly rancorous and public. According to the Wall Street Journal, Mulgrew has become so irate about Bloomberg and Black's statements about eliminating seniority privileges that he withdrew his name from an agreement he and Black signed saying they would work collaboratively on hiring, evaluation and retention issues. Mulgrew's action meant he won’t be able to attend an upcoming national conference in Denver -- and that Black won't be able to go either.

"If we sign a pledge and before we even get to Denver they've broken their pledge, why am I going? Makes no sense," Mulgrew told the Journal.

Who Goes, Who Stays?

Assemblyman Jonathan Bing, who last year proposed a bill to do away with last in, first out, says he has no exact details on the new criteria that could be used to decide which educators are laid off -- only that Bloomberg and Cuomo are negotiating some sort of legislation. He says he expects it would not undermine seniority.

Corn says he is concerned the real reason for laying off more senior teachers may be to decrease costs. Last in, first out "was put in place to stop patronage and nepotism," he said. "If we do away with it, management could basically decide who gets to teach, and there will be questions about why those decisions were made."

But opponents of the practice say there must be a better way than years served to determine who gets to keep their jobs."As it is now we can't get rid of teachers who perform unsatisfactorily after giving them due process," said Bing. "I think there is a better system out there than the one we have now. I am not trying to bust any union."

Getting Control

Bloomberg also wants Albany to allow him to negotiate pension deals in the city. Pension costs have grown in the last few years as the economy has faltered. As a result, Cuomo, Bloomberg and business groups say, that pension costs are killing the state and local governments.

In his State of the City speech Bloomberg said pension costs for all city employees -- not just teachers -- have increased 360 percent since he became mayor in 2002 and calculated that if the subway fare had increased a similar amount, it would now cost straphangers $7.05 -- each way -- to go to work.

"New Yorkers can't afford those subway fares, and we certainly can't afford pension costs on that level either,' Bloomberg said

Corn points out that school districts did not always have to pay so much to cover pension costs. From the late 1990s to the early aughts school districts were putting in less than one percent of teachers’ salaries, while teachers contributed around 3 percent because the economy was doing well. When the economy went bad, governments had to make up some of the difference. Mulgrew said he thinks the economy is rebounding and pension costs will soon decrease.

What's at Stake?

Most unionized public employees have protections similar to the teachers' last in first out. Mulgrew said that “first in last out” is a general principle of civic code.”

Perkins fears the effort to do away with it for teachers -- and the fiscal crisis -- could lead to a general undermining of labor law "It would be a sea change for labor if they totally repealed LIFO [last in, first out]," he said.

Bing said he has no interest in undermining labor, but believes the law as it applies to teachers is unique. "I don't think any other profession is affected geographically the way education is. I don't think any other profession is affected geographically the way education is," her said.

Bing said he got involved in the issue during last year's budget process when his community school district seemed about to lose 19 percent of its teachers because of layoffs. "Under the proposed cuts we would have lost four times the number of teachers as any other part of the city," said Bing.

Billy Easton of Alliance for Quality Education said he thinks teachers are being used as scapegoats. "Anytime politicians want to make unpopular cuts they need a straw man to knock down, and teachers are that straw man," said Easton.

Fighting the Change

As the Times reported on Wednesday, teachers unions along with other labor groups are not, as they did in previous years, launching major attack campaigns on the governor for his proposed cuts to education and other programs. Instead, they are trying to take advantage of what they perceive to be good will toward them to create grassroots campaigns to lobby the legislature to stop education cuts and keep the so-called millionaires tax. Korn points to a December Siena University poll that shows that 74 percent surveyed opposed Cuomo's proposed cuts to education, while 73 percent supported continuing the millionaires tax. Cuomo has vowed not to increase taxes and to roll back the current tax on the wealthiest New Yorkers.

"We can't just cut our way out of this budget crisis," said Easton of Advocates for Quality Education. "Seventy to eighty percent of New Yorkers oppose ending the tax on the wealthiest New Yorkers, but so far Albany isn’t listening."

As for city teachers, what are the chances that Bloomberg gets what he wants with respect to both the last in, first out rule and control over pension negotiations?

Most legislators have expressed little interest in getting involved in the debate, and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a longtime ally of the union, has remains publicly noncommittal.

Meanwhile, Mulgrew hopes time is on his side.

"The important thing for us is to get through the next 18 months," he said. "We should look at it fairly--not as the mayor does like Chicken Little trying to cause panic to push his agenda through. It looks like we have an upturn in the economy. It looks like we are getting out of this so we need to talk about not just shared sacrifice but shared prosperity."



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