Call me, K?

Posted by helen at 9:00 PM

A little-noted irony of the DOE's many student incentives, the cell phones meant to reward middle schoolers -- the ad campaign just won a prize in chic Cannes, France -- are still 100% prohibited on school premises, by DOE regulation.

So, figure this: Give the kids a phone, but ban its use. Or, alternatively, teach kids that what you say -- No Phones! -- is far from what you do: Are you a good student? Here's a phone, and you can 'earn' minutes, too.

No wonder kids say middle school is confusing.

Appeals court stands behind cell phone ban

Posted by Philissa at 9:56 AM

Bad news for critics of the citywide cell phone ban in schools: Yesterday, a state appeals court upheld the ban, saying that "the department has a rational interest in having its teachers and staff devote their time to educating students and not waging a 'war' against cell phones."

The author of the opinion also wrote, "If adults cannot be fully trusted to practice proper cell phone etiquette, then neither can children" — but that to me sounds like grounds for an etiquette lesson, not a costly rule that inconveniences families and causes students to feel alienated and persecuted.

Of course, many families won't let the ban stop them from sending their kids to school with a cell phone. Louise at Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn, for example, recently wrote that she's contemplating getting her soon-to-be-6th grader a cell phone to provide security during the trip to and from middle school next year.

City Council cell phone bill now in effect, sort of

Posted by Philissa at 7:05 AM

The Post's Yoav Gonen kicks off 2008 with a status update on the cell phone ban. He notes that the bill the City Council passed in July and then reaffirmed with an override of the mayor's veto in September allowing kids to carry their phones to school is now in effect. But it won't make a difference to kids and their families — the mayor isn't wavering on prohibiting kids from having their phones at school. Cell phone ban opponents go to court next month in their suit against the city, and council members hope their bill, ineffectual as it is right now, will be ammunition against the ban.

Acting as Council members, HS students just barely support cell phone rights

Posted by Philissa at 10:32 AM

I've been meaning to note for the last week an interesting article in the Times about CUNY's Model City Council program. Kids from around the city, drawn from those enrolled in College Now courses, learn about city governance, represent their districts, and debate the same issues as the real City Council. Recently, the model council voted on the cell phone bill that generated so much friction between the council and Mayor Bloomberg this past summer. But unlike the real council, which voted almost unanimously to give students the right to carry phones to and from schools, the model council was divided, passing the bill by only one vote. Was this a case of kids adopting an exaggeratedly adult mindset, or do many students actually think there's merit to the cell phone ban? I'd love to know.

Student Thought: A solution to the cell phone issue

Posted by Seth Pearce at 11:28 AM

Today, it was reported that the DOE's plan to install cell phone lockers outside of several schools has been put on hold. This plan was created as a possible resolution to the cell phone ban, the contentious rule that states that NYC students are not allowed to have their cell phones in school, even if they are turned off.

In short, the ban is wrong because it puts students, who commute up to four hours per day, into an unsafe situation because it takes away their main line of communication with parents and the police in the event of an emergency. This is in turn contributes to distrust between students and that makes the already difficult tasks of teaching and learning slightly more impossible.

This new plan of building lockers outside of school in which students would pay to store their cell phones is a waste of money. The safety issues that transparent outdoor lockers raise are to complicated to resolve. It doesn't adequately relieve the distrust in our schools. And it does not address the real issue that the cell phone ban is trying to address: academic integrity.

The main reason that Bloomberg has articulated in support of the ban is that students misuse cell phones in class. He says that students make calls and text messages in class and use their cell phones to cheat on tests. While my first instinct is to ask the mayor why he does not ban pen and paper from schools (because if you did a statistical analysis of cheating in NYC schools I'm sure you'd find that students use those as means of cheating much more often than they use cell phones), I believe that it is more important to propose a simple and effective solution to the issue of students misusing cell phones in class.

Instead of banning cell phones and creating a host of new problems, or building super-high-tech-theft-proof-safety-guaranteed-outdoor-transparent cell phone lockers and wasting too much of the DOE's valuable funds, why don't you just LOWER CLASS SIZES!

A student won't get away with using a cell phone in a class of 25! They just won't. And by lowering class sizes you will also increase the amount of actual education that goes on in our school because teachers will be able to develop better learning relationships with their students. As a high school teacher told me, "Lowering class size would fix everything." Everything including preventing students from misusing their cell phones in class and thus getting rid of the need for a citywide ban.

There you have it: a real solution.

Cell phone compromise plan on hold

Posted by Philissa at 12:25 PM

Whatever happened to the DOE's plan to install lockers outside middle and high schools for kids to stash their banned cell phones during the day? Nothing, it seems. As recently as July we were reading that schools had been selected for the storage pilot, but now the Post reports that the plan has been derailed because of safety concerns. The DOE is now saying the program will kick off by next fall. In the meantime, the DOE will spend this year finding a vendor to provide the lockers and ensure that by next fall every single child will have a cell phone.

With text message plan, DOE reforms officially absurd

Posted by Philissa at 6:25 AM

Is there any idea that wild and crazy Roland Fryer won't try? Last week the word was that he was arranging to give kids cell phones whose minutes would be dependent on school performance. This week's plan, according to the Times, is to have famous people, such as Jay-Z and LeBron James, send poor New York City kids text messages telling them to stay in school. Really. Because a rap artist who dropped out of high school and a basketball player who skipped college for a multi-million-dollar professional contract are the perfect figures to teach kids about the long-term benefits of doing well in school.

Even getting past the obvious ironies, this plan just seems weird. I have questions about why the program will roll out in KIPP charter schools, where students already have someone at home who recognizes the value of doing well in school enough to enter them in the lottery and make sure they are in uniform for each 9-hour day. And I'm not sure Fryer needed a focus group to find out that "reaching [teenagers] through a concerted campaign of text messages or through the Internet was far more likely to be effective than a traditional billboard and television campaign" — any parent or 9-year-old could have told him that. Finally, I wonder whether it's crossed Fryer's mind that one way to increase "demand" for education would be to make school enjoyable — by bolstering the quality of teaching, reducing the number of tests kids must take, and encouraging creativity in the classroom.

I don't think there's anything wrong, necessarily, with what's essentially a 21st-century version of this 1990 public service announcement. I just don't get it.

The text messages will start transmitting in January. I can already imagine one unintended consequence that could be a boon for DOE officials and cash-strapped parents. If their cell phones start spewing motivational messages, many kids might feel incentivized to leave their phones at home.

DOE-sanctioned cell phones may be on their way to schools

Posted by Philissa at 10:22 AM

Is this just a case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand is doing? Or is there something else going on in the DOE's chief equality officer's plan to reward high-performing students with free cell phones -- perhaps a conspiracy by the DOE to prop up Motorola?

The DOE's chief equality officer, Roland Fryer, told an audience at Harvard (where he is a professor) last month that he hopes to give high-performing students cell phones -- but they won't be able to use during school hours, when cell phones are banned. Good grades and behavior would mean more cell phone minutes, Fryer said, and the phones won't cost the city any money, reports the Times today. The DOE's press office says the department is considering the idea, but "this is a proposal that neither the mayor nor the chancellor has signed off on," according to the Times article. They had better hurry -- Fryer is hoping to get the first Motorola phones, possibly with Jay-Z-penned ringtones, to kids as early as this month. The Times article doesn't address where kids will be able to stash their phones during school hours.

Liveblogging the City Council hearing: Cell phone furor

Posted by Philissa at 11:33 AM

Council Member Peter Vallone just got angry about cell phones, an issue that's important to many, many parents.

Vallone: Have you consulted with parents about the cell phone ban?
Guerrier: OFEA doesn't actually manage cell phone policy.
Vallone: 99 percent of parents oppose the cell phone ban.
Guerrier: "It's unfair to deny the feelings of parents who oppose cell phones." I've heard from families whose kids were terrorized by other students using cell phones. But I think some families have issues that require phones. If I polled five parents, I might find one who opposes cell phones.
Vallone: Would it be safe to say that the parents you've communicated with on the issue of cell phones, are the majority in favor of kids carrying cell phones?
Guerrier hems and haws but settles on yes.
Vallone: ... If parents are against this ban, wouldn't it be part of Ms. Guerrier's job to help them?

Guerrier was right that cell phone policy isn't under her purview — Vallone pushed her pretty far on the issue and I have a feeling she'll be getting a reminder from Mayor Bloomberg soon, as Chancellor Klein did when he made the mistake of suggesting the possibility of a compromise back in May 2006. The mayor has made it clear that no matter officials' duties, they aren't to make concessions on cell phones.

Update: Council member Lew Fidler asks Walcott, "Can we — council representatives and parent representatives — sit down with the mayor's office and come to a policy we will all support ... that fosters respect for the rule and those who make it?" Walcott says, "I'm always open to dialogue but ... we will always be at odds." Fidler: "Deputy Mayor, we will see you in court."

Tales from the cell phone trenches

Posted by Philissa at 2:51 PM

When I wrote last week about the cell phone ban, I didn't know that random scanning and cell phone seizures were happening at the time at Forest Hills High School -- not a school that has a reputation for having students who carry weapons. As the Queens Times-Ledger noted, the scanning happened on the anniversary of Sept. 11 and a day after the City Council overrode Mayor Bloomberg's veto of a bill that would permit kids to carry cell phones to and from school. The day after the raid, NYC Public School parents blog had the damage: most kids were late to class, some skipped school altogether, and kids could choose whether their cell phones or iPods were confiscated. Commenters on that blog include Forest Hills parents and a teacher, who writes, "Parents in the suburbs and in private schools would not tolerate being unable to reach their child when necessary." All of this, in the best city school system in the country.

City Council overrides mayor's cell phone bill veto

Posted by Philissa at 11:36 AM

Yesterday the City Council voted almost unanimously to override Mayor Bloomberg's veto of the bill it passed last month permitting students to take their cell phones to and from school. But the mayor says the council's move "doesn't mean anything," because he controls what happens inside the schools, and he is set on not allowing any phones to ring. It's ironic that this saga is coming to a head six years after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, when cell phones proved an absolute relief to parents and kids citywide. And the news about the administration at Jamaica High School prohibiting school staff from calling 911 even in emergencies seems like yet another argument for kids to be able to bring cell phones to school.

At Jamaica, data-driven school staff ignore student needs

Posted by Philissa at 11:00 AM

Kids and teachers at Jamaica High School were surprised last week to find that the school had a new principal; now, they have a clue as to why Principal Jay Dickler was yanked from the school just days before the beginning of the school year, besides the fact that the school was recently added to the state's list of "persistently dangerous" schools.

Yesterday, the Daily News reported that an assistant principal issued a directive last year ordering school staff not to call 911 "for any reason," which might have contributed to the fact that an ambulance was not called for more than an hour when a Jamaica student suffered a stroke in April. One wonders how much more quickly the student would have gotten medical attention if she or her friends had cell phones, which students cannot smuggle into Jamaica because it has metal detectors.

The situation also adds to persistent questions about whether schools suppress information about violent incidents to improve their statistics. "This is a tragic result of what happens when everything comes down to data," UFT President Randi Weingarten told the Daily News.

Chancellor Klein said the DOE would investigate the situation, although both Dickler and the assistant principal who wrote the memo are no longer at the school. Dickler has been reassigned as the head of a suspension center and the assistant principal is now a teacher at Hillcrest High School, the Daily News reports.

Today, the Daily News notes that a student at a Brooklyn elementary school died in 2003 after suffering an asthma attack; staff members' reluctance to call 911 may have contributed to his death. That child's family filed a lawsuit against the DOE early this year. Shortly afterward, Chancellor Klein sent a memo to principals telling them to call 911 in emergencies. The directive at Jamaica came out after Klein issued his reminder.

As of today, Jay Dickler's name is still on the Jamaica's DOE website. The interim principal, Walter Acham, was most recently the safety administrator for the Queens Integrated Service Center. My suspicion -- and I hope I'm wrong -- is that the DOE sees Acham as a warden to shepherd Jamaica until it is restructured.

1 day down; 179 to go

Posted by Philissa at 7:09 AM

Reporters must have been disappointed yesterday because according to all accounts, the first day of school went smoothly. "Classes without clashes," proclaims the New York Post, which also notes that the cell phone lockers that were supposed to be available at selected schools this fall have been delayed by at least a few months. The Sun says "cooperation is the theme" for DOE leaders this year, although parents continue to feel slighted. Joseph Berger highlights kids' "excitement and jitters" at the start of a new school year in the Times, and the Times also notes that the hotly anticipated Khalil Gibran International Academy opened not to protests but to a rally by supporters who outnumbered the 55 6th-graders.

Student Action: What is the NYC Student Union?

Posted by Seth Pearce at 9:30 AM

In my first post, I made a quick reference to the NYC Student Union. You might be wondering (and for purposes of this post I hope you are) "What is this so-called NYC Student Union?" Ashu Kapoor, an NYCSU member and organizer puts it this way:

The NYC Student Union (NYCSU) is an emerging collective organization of NYC high school students whose goal is to be a voice for student issues and rights, empower students to take ownership of their education, work with administration and DOE officials to secure an education students deserve, build connections across the NYC school system, and take collective action. The NYC Student Union is entirely organized and run by NYC high school students and is open to all NYC high school students interested in working to make a change in our schools.

The union was started by students from three Manhattan schools in spring 2006 to combat the cell phone ban. Representatives testified at the City Council Hearing on the issue, protested on the steps of Tweed (using cups and string as cell phones), and later had a letter to the editor published in the New York Times. From there we decided to expand.

After launching a student-created and run web site, the union held its first citywide student meeting Sept. 25, 2006. Students from around 15 schools attended. At the meeting, students aired their grievances about their schools and the school system.

For the rest of the year, NYCSU tried to take action on these problems. In addition to holding meetings like the first one every other Monday at the UFT, the union lobbied politicians on issues such as class size, security and funding; conducted workshops with middle school students on becoming engaged in their high schools; held a forum on youth involvement in the education system at Pace University with Future Voters of America; and then ran the Education committee of the 2007 New York City Youth Congress.

This year NYCSU wants to do even more. I'll keep you posted.

If you want more info or are a student who wants to join the union visit NYCStudents.org or contact union@nycstudents.org.

New York school cell phone ban unusual

Posted by Philissa at 12:14 PM

New York may have better public transportation, restaurants, and sports teams, but Washington, D.C., has at least one thing on us -- kids in the surrounding counties can carry their cell phones to school. The Washington Post today reports that "school boards everywhere are revisiting decade-old bans against portable communication devices in the classroom" because parents and kids view cell phones as a necessity and because fears about how cell phones would undermine discipline and learning simply haven't come true. The last Washington-area school system to allow cell phones in school will finally do so this fall.

Of course, New York isn't like most places, and the mayor and chancellor are holding firm on the cell phone ban, even in the face of City Council opposition. With school starting next week, I haven't heard anything more about which schools will receive cell phone lockers as part of a "compromise" pilot program. Has anyone else?

Lots of spin at PEP meeting

Posted by Philissa at 8:48 PM

Despite the rain and cool weather, a healthy crowd gathered outside Tweed for the rally in support of Khalil Gibran International Academy, apparently split pretty evenly between the school's supporters and journalists.

Inside, a much smaller group of people assembled for the August meeting of the Panel for Educational Policy. Marcia Lyles, deputy chancellor for teaching and learning, gave an overview of the new middle school reform initiative. In selecting which remedies to put in place for struggling middle schools, Lyles said the task force and the DOE "looked at what the schools that were performing well had and what the schools that were not performing well didn't have" — and came up with Regents-level courses and good professional development. Lyles continued the pattern established last week of the DOE taking credit for the City Council's work; Lyles called it "my first initiative" as deputy chancellor, even though work on the task force was underway long before she moved into the position, and began her presentation by detailing how the DOE's Children First program has supported middle schools.

PEP member Patrick Sullivan asked why the DOE didn't adopt the task force's recommendation to lower class size in middle schools. Lyles didn't rule out more aggressive class size reduction for the future but said that principals "recognize that that is not the sole ingredient" in getting kids to achieve.

Julia Levy from the press office showed off the new version of the DOE's website, due to launch "hopefully later this week." Many of the improvements in navigation, search, and content reflect the priorities behind Insideschools' own redesign, which we're working on now. But I don't think the DOE is going to put us out of business — Levy said the redesign will not replace all of the old, outdated content on the DOE's site, just "sit on top" of the existing site.

Finally, Elayna Konstan, the CEO of the Office of School and Youth Development, reviewed changes to the discipline code and announced that preliminary data shows a "dramatic decrease" in violent and major crime in schools last year. She said at least a couple of the nine schools currently designated as Impact Schools will likely come off the list soon. But schools will continue to discipline kids who bring cell phones to school — in response to Sullivan's question about whether the City Council's recent cell phone bill conflicts with the discipline code, Konstan said, "We have to wait for the litigation," signaling that the cell phone ban is headed to court.

Mayor vetoes City Council's anti-cell phone ban bill

Posted by Philissa at 11:35 PM

Earlier today Mayor Bloomberg vetoed the City Council's recent bill that would allow kids to carry their cell phones to and from school. I'm somewhat surprised by this development because the line from the DOE when the council was discussing the bill was that kids are not prevented from taking their phones to school, just from taking them inside once they get there.

In a statement reported by Staten Island Live, Bloomberg wrote that he vetoed the bill because it represented "an invalid attempt at imposing the (City) Council's views on how the public schools should be managed." But council members were explicit about the fact that they don't control the schools.

It seems pretty clear that the mayor is overstepping his bounds here by vetoing the council's bill because of what he thinks are its supporters' intentions. The council plans to override his veto, and Bloomberg seems eager to set up a court battle over the cell phone ban. I'm curious what he seeks to gain from this showdown. Certainly he won't have a chance of winning the support of the city's parents -- though of course we know he isn't terribly interested in that anyway.

BREAKING NEWS: Cell phone ban challenged by City Council

Posted by Unknown at 12:12 PM

Today the City Council voted overwhelmingly (46-2) in favor of a law giving students the right to carry cell phones with them during the commute to and from school. Monday's New York Sun article sums up the issue nicely, and at 1:30 today the proposal went before the full council. Seth Pearce, of the New York City Student Union, weighs in on the vote over at NYC Student Word. He writes, in part:

Today, as a student, I would like to applaud the City Council's decision to let students have their cell phones during the commute to and from school. I am glad that it has become clear to them that for us students, this is not a matter of convenience but a matter of safety.

Plainly, students should not be scared to go to school. Just as our School Safety Agents work every day to keep us safe inside, City policy should protect us outside the walls of the school building. A student should not have to be afraid that in the event of an emergency, they will be isolated and imperiled because they were forced to leave their cell phones at home.

Definitely check out his full post, and keep an eye out for more of Seth's contributions.

Update: The Staten Island Advance has posted an article on today's result as well.

Cell phone compromise plan going into action

Posted by Philissa at 5:07 PM

Over at Staten Island Live, Yoav Gonen reports that beginning in September, Port Richmond High School and McKee High School will be among 16 schools citywide allowing students to store their cell phones off-campus in secure lockers. The 16 schools are piloting a storage solution the DOE is allowing as a compromise to the stringent cell phone ban that so many parents and kids hate. The lockers will accommodate only a quarter of students, Gonen reports. Has anyone heard which other schools will be part of the pilot, or how schools were selected for it?