A forum open to all people who want to be heard in exercise of their First Amendment rights, and who have something to say about issues which affect NYC
I represented children who were given Superintendent's Suspensions for 9 years. What a despicable process I saw at the West 125th Street NYC DOE Suspension Office!!! Once a child is suspended, the parents can declare no contest and the child goes right back to his/her school, scarred for life, or the parent can say they want to go forward to a hearing, and, in most cases, the child is found guilty and sent to a remote location where no meaningful learning takes place, and no services are provided, if the child has an Individualized Education Plan (IEP).
In the 9 years I assisted parents whenever requested, I never saw a child with a white face. Yep, that is right. Twice I saw a white face belonging to a lawyer who was at the hearing office to defend a child. 99% of the students were African-American or Hispanic. They were not informed of their rights, and the parents were clueless as well. All charges were never investigated, only substantiated.
The NYC Department of Education never appropriately addressed or investigated any of the charges in a case I was asked to work on. There is an institutionalized failure in the NYC DOE to look fairly into charges against a child. No rules or Regulations are followed, and if you bring the rules and regs not followed, you are attacked and vilified. This must change.
Jonathan Lopez with dad Mahoma, was disciplined for "sexual" conduct at MS 88
Jonathan Lopez, a Brooklyn sixth-grader in a schoolyard tussle with two girls, got caught up in the sex-harassment tornado.
Jonathan insists he only tried to grab the water bottle and backpack of classmates who had tossed his stuff during lunchtime horseplay.
But the school charged him with “conduct of a sexual nature.” He was accused of trying to touch one girl’s breast and kiss her and of “humping” another girl from behind.
“Like, I’m not sexual,” the baby-faced 11-year-old wrote in a city Department of Education statement. “I do dumb thing [sic] but I’m not sexual to girls.”
The dean at MS 88 in Park Slope pressured him to admit lewd behavior or plead “no contest” and waive his right to a hearing, Jonathan told The Post.
“After what you did, I don’t want to see you in my school,” he said the dean, John Roumbeas, told him.
Jonathan refused. “I told him ‘I’m not going to admit to it because I didn’t do it.’ ”
MS 88 Principal Ailene Altman Mitchell (left) with NYC Chancellor Carmen Farina
That day, the school banished Jonathan to a distant suspension center, populated by tough older kids who “bring knives,” he said. “They roamed around the halls and didn’t listen to the teacher.”
In the end, a suspension judge found no evidence of breast-touching, kissing or humping and ordered Jonathan’s “immediate reinstatement.”
But he missed 16 days of classes.
“They treated him like a criminal,” fumed his dad, Mahoma Lopez.
The tsunami of sex-harassment allegations in the news “escalated things” against his prepubescent son, Lopez suspects.
“They’re real predators,” he said of Harvey Weinstein and other offenders. “The school is making an example of my son. He’s an innocent kid who just wants to play.”
Maria Chickedantz, a feminist lawyer who has known Jonathan since he was 6 and took up his case, described him as sweet and friendly. “The kid hasn’t even hit puberty yet. He’s little and immature,” Chickedantz said.
Jonathan’s troubles started on Nov. 22, when a girl classmate complained that Jonathan had harassed her.
“He comes up to me (2 inches away) and pretends to sqush [sic] my chest. Then he runs away. I chase him to tell him to stop,” her written statement says. “After he takes my water bottle and I have to chase him up and down and I chased him for 10 minutes. And he said, ‘You should be my girlfriend. We can forget about what happened’ ” and he leaned in and tryed [sic] to kiss me. And he was about 1 foot away.”
She said Jonathan had harassed her friend days earlier. That girl gave a statement: “I was walking with my friends when Jonathan comes out of no were [sic] and he lifts up my bag and he is touching my back and he starts humping me. I tell him to stop but he keeps doing it four more times. He humped me one last time and I almost fall down the stairs.”
The Dec. 13 hearing was a bust. Roumbeas, the dean, did not show up, so the statements he took were not admitted as evidence.
The first girl who accused Jonathan also did not show. The second girl testified that Jonathan grabbed her waist but she never mentioned “humping.”
Hearing officer Anthony Jordan sustained a sole charge that Jonathan “placed his hands” on the girl’s waist. He ordered that records of the matter be expunged at the school year’s end.
But Jonathan was still treated like a sex offender. On his first day back, the dean warned he was “in more trouble” for not confessing, Chickedantz wrote in an e-mail to Principal Ailene Altman Mitchell.
“Faculty, staff and students now see him as some sort of sexual predator, which is so unfair,” Chickedantz wrote. “Even if the accusations were true, the manner in which the school . . . treated an 11-year old like a dangerous criminal was absolutely unacceptable.”
Mitchell and Roumbeas did not return messages. DOE spokeswoman Miranda Barbot said, “The school followed protocol in reporting, investigating and addressing these incidents.”
Federal investigators have interviewed several people who work in Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s office, but are
paid by other state agencies.CreditBryan Bedder/Getty Images for Unicef
but he won't be held accountable for anything. The Cuomo political bus is stronger and bigger than anyone else's, reaching into all areas of New York State media and business.
Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s hiring practices are under investigation, as F.B.I. agents and federal prosecutors have begun examining how staff members working in the governor’s office are being paid by other New York State authorities and agencies.
The governor’s office received a “document subpoena” months ago, according to Richard Azzopardi, a Cuomo spokesman. “We have cooperated, providing necessary documents,” he said.
Mr. Azzopardi called the line of inquiry “absurd.”
“The agencies are all part of the same executive branch, and this administration follows the exact same lawful hiring process we inherited from previous administrations stretching back decades,” he said. “If there are questions about it, call George Pataki,” referring to the three-term former Republican governor.
The F.B.I. inquiry was first reported by The Times-Union in Albany, which said that agents had interviewed “a number of people” who work in the governor’s office, even though their salaries are carried on the budgets of other state agencies and authorities.
The investigation is being conducted by an F.B.I. agent in upstate New York, in conjunction with prosecutors in the United States attorney’s office for the Eastern District of New York in Brooklyn, according to a person with knowledge of the matter, who could not explain the unusual arrangement.
John Marzulli, a spokesman for the United States attorney’s office, would neither confirm nor deny the investigation. It was also unclear what law, if any, may have been broken.
F.B.I. investigations are nothing new in Albany, where the previous four leaders of the State Senate, two Democrats and two Republicans, have been indicted. The former United States attorney in Manhattan, Preet Bharara, had previously investigated the Cuomo administration in a different matter, but never brought charges. And in January, one of Mr. Cuomo’s closest former advisers, Joe Percoco, is scheduled to go on federal trial for corruption.
Although the timing of another federal investigation would seem inopportune for Mr. Cuomo, who is running for re-election next year, political observers seemed skeptical the investigation would lead to criminal charges.
“What’s new here?” said Hank Sheinkopf, the longtime Democratic political strategist. “This tactic has gone on since the beginning of politics,” he said, joking that they would need to interview aides to former governors as far back as Al Smith in the early 20th century.
Mr. Azzopardi went so far as to call it a “charade.”
“In this environment, anyone can ask about anything,” Mr. Azzopardi said, “but the fact is the longstanding practice of detailing staff from agencies to work in the executive chamber dates back over 50 years to at least the Rockefeller administration and extends to the White House and the Justice Department.
“Given that the federal Department of Justice and the White House have a long history of utilizing this practice, perhaps the F.B.I. can investigate them when this is charade is over,” he added.
New Yorkers are fed up with the corruption of Mayor Bill DeBlasio, but have 4 more years to cry over him.
Yep, he was re-elected. He is part of the well-oiled Clinton political machine, after all, so there are globs of immunity attached to him, his office, and the people who work with and for him. The DeBlasio culture is "play-if-you-pay" and "deny, deny, deny" if you are asked questions.
So sad to see the New York City stuck in such sewage.
The chairwoman of the New York City Housing Authority knew in the middle of 2016 that the agency’s inspectors had not been checking apartments for lead paint, in violation of federal rules and local law. But in the fall, city investigators found, she signed off on paperwork certifying that the inspections had been completed.
The finding came Tuesday in a short but damning report from the city’s Investigation Department that described how the agency, which runs the city’s 180,000 units of public housing, had for years failed to inspect for lead paint, but told the federal authorities that it was doing so.
And even after the chairwoman, Shola Olatoye, learned of the lack of compliance, the agency filed paperwork stating that it abided by the requirements, which are tied to federal funding.
“Although Chair Olatoye, the general manager and other senior executives were aware that Nycha was out of compliance,” the report said, “Nycha nonetheless submitted a false certification in October 2016, and had no reasonable explanation why this was acceptable.”
The issue of lead paint in city public housing is an element of an expansive and continuing federal investigation by the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York that came to light last March, and appears to include whether the agency filed false claims for payment from the federal government.
A spokeswoman for the Investigation Department, Diane Struzzi, said the findings had been referred to federal prosecutors, who ultimately decide whether or not charges would be appropriate. A spokesman for the Southern District declined to comment.
Asked of the federal inquiry last year, Mayor Bill de Blasio said that the administration would “fully cooperate” with the investigation, “and anything we find, we will fix immediately.”
The housing authority is struggling with the costly job of maintaining its sprawling network of aging buildings, and, after reaching a settlement with residents in late 2013, is already under supervision by a court-appointed special master to address mold.
Lead poisoning is less common in public housing than in private apartments, according to city officials, and the number of children with lead poisoning has declined by about two-thirds since 2005.
“Under Chair Olatoye, Nycha identified gaps in its lead-based paint inspections and is making operational changes to prevent lapses like this,” said Melissa Grace, a spokeswoman for Mayor de Blasio. “We do not believe there’s any evidence that anyone intentionally made any misstatements to H.U.D.”
According to the eight-page report, the city ceased conducting annual inspections of apartments for general conditions after the Department of Housing and Urban Development relaxed its rules for doing so in 2012; it was in the course of those checks that the authority looked for lead paint, which can cause serious health and developmental problems, particularly in young children.
The federal government did not end its requirement for annual inspection of all apartments where the possible presence of lead paint has not been ruled out. But the city did not institute a new plan for lead paint inspections. About 55,000 apartments in the city’s public housing system fall under the federal rules for annual inspection; of those, roughly 4,200 have children under 6 years old and must be inspected each year for lead paint under city law.
The city did not meet those requirements after 2012, according to the report, but filed paperwork saying that it had from 2013 to 2016 — the last year of the Bloomberg administration and the first three years of Mr. de Blasio’s tenure. The housing authority acknowledged as much in an amendment to its filing with federal officials in July 2017, after the Investigation Department and federal prosecutors had begun inquiries into lead paint in the city’s public housing.
But long before that public acknowledgment, the report said, senior officials in May 2015 were aware that the required checks under local law were not being done and were meeting to come up with a plan. It was not until the following spring, the report said, that Ms. Olatoye learned of the violation of local law, and not until the summer of 2016 that the agency determined it was not complying with federal rules.
During that time, investigators determined that “Nycha failed to put in place a system to confirm the accuracy of federal forms before they were submitted.”
A spokeswoman for the agency, Jean Weinberg, said in an email that the agency “began addressing these issues more than a year ago” in connection with the federal investigation. “Nycha has acknowledged not only gaps in lead compliance,” she said, “but gaps in communications between senior Nycha officials and Nycha’s top leadership, which resulted in incorrect certifications to HUD”
She said that after the agency understood “the full scope of the issue,” and after consulting with the U.S. attorney’s office and federal housing authorities, the agency in July told residents of the issues, “along with the plan to address them.”
A spokesman for the federal housing department said in a statement that officials there were aware of the “deficiencies,” and that they had “requested that Nycha account for its noncompliance and provide an action plan” to ensure it meets and abides by the rules.
The uniformed cop followed NYCHA Chairwoman Shola Olatoye into the office building at 250 Broadway, across from City Hall, around 10:30 a.m., and appeared to be serving as her bodyguard.
He used his torso to try to block The Post from snapping a photo in the lobby, then accompanied Olatoye as she walked to a nearby Italian eatery about 90 minutes later.
Olatoye was spotted chatting on her cellphone inside the Gran Morsi restaurant on Warren Street, while the cop paced back and forth on the sidewalk outside.
An NYPD spokesman declined to say why it was providing Olatoye with that level of protection on the taxpayer’s dime .
Earlier, Olatoye ignored questions from The Post about Tuesday’s damning report from the city Department of Investigation, which revealed that she admittedly filed false paperwork with the feds last year.
Olaytoye instead smiled and said an NYCHA spokeswoman would be “happy to provide any statement that we’ve provided in the past, as well as answering further questions that you might have.”
“That’s the appropriate way to talk about this matter,” she added.
According to the DOI report, Olatoye — appointed by Mayor Bill de Blasio on 2014 — falsely told the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development that annual lead-paint inspections had been performed in 55,000 NYCHA apartments.
Legal experts have told The Post that Olatoye could be charged with making a false statement to the government, with former federal Justice Department prosecutor Peter Katz saying she “made almost a full confession.”
Councilman Rory Lancman (D-Queens) called the allegations against Olatoye “appalling,” saying that New Yorkers “need to have confidence that NYCHA is capable of performing the most basic of public safety functions.”
“Heads need to roll,” he said. “Somebody at NYCHA at the highest level is not performing the most basic function.”
In New York City students, parents and school staff, especially teachers, have protested the lack of appropriate discipline in NYC schools for many years. See:
Fatal Stabbing Highlights Persistent Problems at Bronx Middle School (2014) and, Safety Last: New York City's Public Schools Are More Dangerous Than Ever (2016) The key findings of Safety Last are:
" Alarming Spike in Violence in City Schools: The number of violent incidents in city schools rose sharply last year, under Mayor de Blasio and Chancellor Carmen Farina's first full year managing the Department of Education -- from 12,978 in 2013-14 to 15,934 in 2014-15, a disturbing 23 percent increase; School Violence Index at Recorded High: New York City's School Violence Index (SVI) rose by 22 percent in 2014-5, the highest level recorded. New York State uses the SVI to determine which schools are "persistently dangerous," as required by federal law. The School Violence Index is a ratio of violent incidents to enrollment in a school and is determined by the number of incidents, the seriousness of the incidents, and the school's enrollment; Data Suggests de Blasio Administration is Misleading Public: Data suggests that Mayor de Blasio's assertion that crime in city schools is down 29 percent since 2011-12, most recently invoked during his State of the City this month, is at best an incomplete picture. There were more than twice as many "assaults with physical injur[ies]" reported by city schools to the State Education Department than total number of crimes under Mayor de Blasio's calculations; Students at Grave Risk in City Schools: The alarming spike in violence in city schools makes it difficult for students to learn and leaves students in serious risk of danger and bodily harm: A violent incident occurs in district schools every 4.5 minutes; A weapon is recovered in district schools once every 28.4 minutes; Few students are protected: 93% of the city's district school students attend schools where a violent incident has occurred over the past year; In the five months since the 2015-2016 school year began, 42 weapons have been confiscated from 36 elementary schools across the city."
No one is doing anything about it, except covering it up. The case of Eileen Ghastin is a case which shows the New York City Department of Education policy of not giving violent students the appropriate help and guidance they need. The boy who told Ms. Ghastin that he was a boxer and was going to beat her up was given a short suspension and when he returned to school, he broke a window in anger. He needs help, not discipline.
I see the "all students are little angels" policy at work in 3020-a charges, where the NYC Department of Education always blames the teacher: a fight between two or more students shows a lack of classroom management; intervention by a teacher to stop a fight is corporal punishment and misconduct by the teacher; telling a student to stop hurting other students is charged as verbal abuse in 3020-a Specifications, etc.. In Eileen's case, she tried to stop the student from beating her up by telling him she was going to "kill him". She saw that she needed to do something to stop him, and believed that this was the only way. Of course she did not mean it. The arbitrator gave her a fine because he was convinced that the student was embarrassed by the media coverage of the event in the NYPOST, even though the newspaper did not name him. See:
In 2010, two years before the Sandy Hook shooting in Newtown Connecticut, I received a telephone call from an anxious parent whose children had attended the school, and she begged me to help her get services for special needs students in Newtown before somebody went "postal" and people would be harmed. I made many calls to the school board and policymakers. All requests fell into a black hole.
But we know that special education services are not being supplied properly, and the NYC Department of Education is covering this up too. See:
What the NYC DOE needs to do is hire a General Counsel who can set up an Office of Accountability and Guidance. This office will be given the responsibility of providing each event with a team to find out who did what, and how. I suggest disbanding the Office of Special Investigations and the Office of Equal Opportunity, as wholly-owned agencies of the NYC DOE and compromised by their allegiance to the bias ingrained in the Department against holding the true culprits accountable for anything. Discipline is not always the answer. There is no set standard for what kind of suspension will "teach him/her a lesson to not harm someone" again.
A bright and popular 15-year-old Bronx boy was stabbed last month in one of the places he loved most — school.
New York Times, By JAN RANSOM, OCT. 12, 2017
The pint-size youngster with an oversized backpack stood on the corner of Mapes Avenue several feet from home, and for a moment contemplated crossing the street. He knew he wasn’t supposed to leave home alone, but he wanted to go to school just like his older brother though he was not old enough, his mother recounted.
Even as a baby, Matthew McCree would cry to go to school, said his mother Louna Dennis. “I’ve never met a kid who just loved school.”
That love of school never faltered. The 15-year-old was a bright and popular student at the Urban Assembly School for Wildlife Conservation in the Bronx, said his parents, classmates and a former teacher’s assistant. Then, nearly three weeks into the start of a new school year, he was killed during history class when the police say a classmate plunged a knife into his chest and back. That student, Abel Cedeno, 18, is also accused of seriously injuring Mr. McCree’s friend, Ariane Laboy, 16, who tried to step in. Mr. Cedeno has been charged with murder.
“Nothing will ever be the same,” Ms. Dennis, 34, said through tears during an interview at her attorney’s office in Brooklyn. “Matthew was a light; he lights up everybody.”
The effervescent teenager had big dreams. Standing at 5-foot-10, 156 pounds, Mr. McCree, a junior, wanted to attend Fordham University and become a professional basketball player. If that didn’t pan out, he said he planned to join the Marines, Ms. Dennis said.
His stepfather, Kyle Victor Sr., 36, said he taught Mr. McCree how to play basketball. He was a fast learner, said Mr. Victor, who raised him since he was 6. The teenager played basketball with friends at Crotona Park and in the courtyard behind his building. His school did not have a basketball team.
Mr. McCree grew up in a two-bedroom apartment at Mapes Court, two six-story brick buildings a half a mile from the Bronx Zoo.
He lived with his mother; brother, Kevon Dennis, 17; and his sister, Kayla Dennis, 4. His stepbrother, Kyle Victor Jr., 10, was always eager to visit on weekends. The family had a cat named Elmo, and a Maltese named Baby.
Mr. McCree shared a small room with his older brother, which after his death bore little sign of him. Ms. Dennis said she and her older son disposed of most of his belongings because they reminded them that Matthew was gone. All that remained was an unfinished mural that read: “Money Matt” and “You’ll Live Forever.”
“He had the most annoying laugh ever,” Mr. Dennis said with a slight smile in the courtyard. Mr. Dennis, who attended Wildlife for middle school and then left for a different high school, sat near a growing memorial of blue and white candles, enlarged photos of his brother, a basketball and countless hand-scrawled messages, including one that read: “No student should be scared to walk the halls.”
Ms. Dennis said Wildlife had a better reputation when her eldest son attended. The principal was active, accessible and frequently accompanied students on school trips. The school also had a program in which staff walked students home, creating a bond, but the program ended.
“Nobody had the kids under control,” Mr. Dennis said. “Every day the cops were outside. It just got bad.”
The school administration and the education department declined to comment.
Mr. Cedeno told police that his peers had been bullying him about his perceived sexual orientation, though Mr. McCree and Mr. Laboy had never been in contact with him before that day. Police said Mr. Cedeno began carrying a knife to school.
A grand jury is hearing from witnesses about the stabbing on Sept. 27, according to the district attorney’s office and Sanford Rubenstein, Ms. Dennis’ attorney. Mr. Rubenstein said the family will not take legal action until after Mr. McCree’s funeral. A wake for Mr. McCree will be on Friday evening at the Castle Hill Funeral Parlor in the Bronx. His funeral is at 7 a.m. on Saturday. He will be buried in Canarsie Cemetery in Brooklyn.
Ms. Dennis and Mr. McCree’s friends said he never mentioned Mr. Cedeno. Relatives and classmates said that Mr. McCree was not a bully.
Mr. McCree’s neighbor, Doreen Jimenez, 33, whom he called his “Spanish mom,” said that she has been married to a woman for three years and that the teenager never judged her. She said Mr. McCree was often at her house for dinner, or hanging out with her three daughters who were close friends of his.
A longtime friend of Mr. McCree’s, Hensehk Bernardez, 16, who transferred out of Wildlife in the ninth grade, said Mr. Cedeno “was a socially awkward kid,” and that “Matthew would never bully a gay person; he knew better than that.”
The mother of a New York City public school student, a plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit, spoke about her son’s mistreatment outside the Education Department’s headquarters on Thursday.
A group of public school families and a pro-charter advocacy group filed a lawsuit in Federal District Court this week alleging that the atmosphere at New York City public schools was depriving students of their right to receive an education free of violence, bullying and harassment.
The class-action suit, filed on Wednesday in New York’s Eastern District against the New York City Education Department and its chancellor, Carmen Fariña, claims that violence in schools is increasing, and that it is often underreported. The suit also says that school violence disproportionately affects certain groups of students, like those who are black, Hispanic, gay, bisexual or transgender.
The suit, which claims the Education Department has failed “to address and remediate in-school violence in New York City’s public schools,” was filed by 11 students and their families. They were joined by Families for Excellent Schools, a pro-charter advocacy group that has been a fierce and frequent critic of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s education policies.
The group’s chief executive, Jeremiah Kittredge, held a news conference on Thursday morning in front of the Education Department’s headquarters in Manhattan, to encourage other public school parents to join the suit.
The group’s picture of violence in the city’s schools directly counters Mr. de Blasio’s. In a statement, the mayor said he viewed “each incidence as obviously troubling,” but challenged the group’s facts, saying that “this year to date, the major crime in our schools is down 14.29 percent and other crimes down 6.77 percent.”
The new curriculum for New York, "Next Generation", seems to be just as nonsensical as it's predecessor "Common Core".
Have teachers been sufficiently trained in the new curriculum to implement all it's parts successfully? I don't think so.
Once again, New York is giving teachers no chance to escape the dreaded "Ineffective" rating, and giving parents and the youngest children entering the school system a lifetime of heartache.
Why can't New York State Education Department policy makers set up a well-planned strategy based upon valid research into the unique ways children learn, instead of buying the next set of books handed to them by a political ally.
MANHATTAN — When it comes to testing and how your kids and their schools are evaluated, changes are underway, as the state on Monday passed a new plan under the federal government’s Every Student Succeeds Act.
The plan aims to boost equity in education by expanding measures for student success, New York State Education Department officials said.
It requires new kinds of improvement plans for the lowest performing schools and strategies to support educators’ professional growth, according to officials. It focuses on a culturally responsive education that supports the academic needs and social-emotional development of all students, including English language learners, immigrant students and homeless youth.
ESSA was originally created under President Obama's administration to replace the controversial No Child Left Behind Act, and it gives more power to states to decide how to evaluate schools and help those that are struggling.
“Developing this plan has been an opportunity to incorporate the voices of communities, teachers and parents as we rethink how we look at accountability, equity and serving the whole child,” Board of Regents Chancellor Betty Rosa said.
The agenda will be supported by the $1.6 billion that New York receives each year from the federal government in ESSA funding, and the state expects to revise how it uses federal funding, especially as new reporting on per student funding becomes available, the plan noted.
The state will send its plan to Washington, DC, on Sept. 18 for review and expects it to be approved in early 2019, officials said.
New York no longer refers to the “Common Core” when it comes to the state’s learning standards. The new approach is branded "Next Generation Learning Standards."
The state is considering working with educators to develop new measures of student learning, including designing capstone, project-based assessments in areas like "science or civic and cultural awareness and civic readiness," where students might have to do a research project and defend a thesis either in writing or orally, the plan said.
2. Changes to testing and evaluation for students with special needs and English Language Learners.
Besides eliminating a day of testing for both the state’s math and English exams, the state is seeking a waiver from the federal government for students with certain special needs to take exams for lower grade levels.
The state is also seeking a waiver for schools with newly arrived English Language Learners to delay their evaluations on those students’ English proficiency from two years after arriving to four years.
On last year’s English tests, only 4.4 percent of English Language Learners passed the exam and 9.3 percent of students with special needs passed. For math, 11.3 percent of students with special needs passed, while 14.7 percent of ELLs passed.
State tests, however, aren’t going away, and some worry that the changes might water down high expectations for students, while others say the changes still don’t go far enough in their over-reliance using test scores to evaluate schools.
Education activist and public school parent Kemala Karmen, who is with the grassroots NYC Opt Out group, had a seat at the table on the plan’s creation through serving on the Standards and Assessments work group of the state’s ESSA “Think Tank.”
But Karmen — whose child went to Carroll Gardens' Brooklyn New School, the city's epicenter of opting out — felt that many concerns of parents of how testing was reshaping what goes on in classrooms were not heeded when it came to testing overall.
“There was the possibility of the state to come up with something innovative and different — not radically different, but substantially different — from No Child Left Behind,” Karmen said. “New York just blew it.”
For instance, she said that she had consulted with ELL teachers, who said it takes five to seven years for language acquisition, so the four years wasn’t long enough.
Meanwhile the Education Trust-New York, an education and civil rights group, had concerns about whether the plan ensured that schools were meeting expectations for all students.
“It will be critical to continue building on and strengthening that framework to ensure transparency for parents, maintain high expectations for all groups of students and address underperforming schools with urgency and support,” Ian Rosenblum, executive director of The Education Trust–New York said in a statement.
3. Schools will have “data dashboards” for parents and others to see how — and why — they perform in certain ways.
To provide more transparency on schools, the state wants them to have “data dashboards” that would include more than just state test scores.
The new plan also focuses a lot on chronic absenteeism, noting that students who have missed more than 18 days, or 10 percent of the school year, have much lower rates of academic success.
In striving to address equity issues, the state hopes to include out-of-school suspension rates, along with other school measures like access to art and technology classes, access to highly effective teachers and students’ physical health and well-being.
The state will also regularly publish data on school climate, teacher turnover rates, parent involvement, class size and per student funding.
The goal of looking at the various measures, according to the plan, is to use these indicators to diagnose school needs and better track progress.
