Weekly news round-up: picking leaves, golden parachutes, and wiffle ball

Posted by Lindsey at 1:39 PM

Good news! Do-gooders are building 11 new playgrounds at Bronx elementary schools this summer, but parents of leaf-picking toddlers just might face summonses, like one unlucky mother in Chelsea. Five public school students, who grew up playing on city fields, were picked in the Major League Baseball draft and face a tough choice -- go pro or go to college -- while students at the Bronx Early College Academy, who'd hoped to earn college credits in high school, now learn that there may not be space for their high school at all come fall.

The DOE and NYPD both report that crime is down in city schools, but a college-bound recent graduate was tragically shot and killed on the street in Rockaway yesterday. Brooklyn teens who gave their teachers a laxative-laced cake had their charges reduced while truly disturbing charges were filed against a teacher accused of abusing a disabled student.

Just when public hearings were scheduled on mayoral control of the schools, there is a bid for two new unions – one for public school parents and one for the students. Hard questions should be raised about bad record-keeping at the DOE and the ask-questions-later mentality of ACS workers. Outraged New Jerseyans questioned a superintendents’ golden retirement parachute, and some worry that questions about potential score inflation of New York standardized tests may never be answered.

Quiet week at Tweed and City Hall? Time for Times stories about higher education, like this one, this one, this one, this one, this one and this one. The Sun’s Elizabeth Green wrote about a well-regarded anonymous education blogger and the DOE’s “truth squad,” which monitors education blogs for net-speed inaccuracies.

Skewing to the summering-away crowd, the Times counsels parents not to worry if teens complain about the isolation of the family summer house -- once the kids go to college, they'll begin to enjoy the second home again. (Whew!) And in town, it seems that more parents are building mini-teen centers in their homes to keep their kids off the streets (and mini would be the operative word for most NYC apartments). But kids who created their own suburban summer fun are wrangling with lawyers instead of shagging wiffle balls. One, two, three strikes and we’re out! Have a great weekend.

Middle School Muddle: When parents are political pawns

Posted by inthemiddle at 1:07 PM

This has been a tough month for public school parents and activists in New York City, the kind who fight for better schools, support the ones their children attend and try to convince friends, neighbors and other parents to do the same.

These activists know that simply registering your child and walking away is not an option if you want enhanced art, music and science programs, to name just a few. They volunteer at lunch and at recess and run auctions, bake sales and endless fundraisers to create better programs for all children. And they are pretty sick of all the finger-pointing about whose fault it is when school budgets are cut.

Many of the most ardent public education supporters began battling for better schools in pre-kindergarten, but now they've discovered there are no certain spots in such programs -- and that even kindergarten in their zoned neighborhood schools cannot be taken for granted due to overcrowding.

They can't necessarily count on a spot a high-performing middle school either, because of a supply and demand discrepancy that exists when it comes to the best schools -- and because some districts and neighborhoods don't have a lot of appealing choices.

One of the most painful moments came last week, when Chancellor Joel Klein announced he'd have to make cuts as high as 6 percent at some of the most attractive and sought-after places like the Salk School of Science, where some 45 percent of 8th graders receive offers to attend the specialized high schools. Salk faces a cut of $133,762, or 5.25 percent. Klein told reporters that 74 schools would face cuts of more than 5 percent.

Klein is putting all the blame on state government in Albany, maintaining that state rules have restricted the way the city can spend education money, despite the historic lawsuit that was supposed to bring billions of dollars into underfunded schools. He says state officials are not allowing him to use $63 million in state aid to close a $99 million city budget deficit before that budget is due June 30.

Parents aren't buying it, as the New York Times pointed out last week, nor should they. (The City Council, which must approve the mayor's budget, isn't buying it either.) The average New York City public parent activist is too busy looking for decent public schools, fighting to maintain the ones their kids already attend and raising ever more money (like I said, it's a lot of cupcakes and rummage sales) to get caught in the middle of despicable politics as usual.

Does Klein think he's going to be a hero if he announces he suddenly won't have to make such deep cuts after all? Unlikely. Regent Merryl Tisch recently told NY1 News that the "ugly political battle'' was creating enormous uncertainty about programs and staffing for next year.

That amounts to angst on top of anxiety. Say you are an activist 5th-grade parent who has long hoped your child would get into an excellent middle school like Salk. Number one, you haven't heard yet -- for some unexplained reason, the middle school process has been delayed this year.

Number two, say you had dreamed of having your middle school graduate go on to say, the prestigious Bronx High School of Science. Looking down the chancellor's list of budget cuts, you might see the Bronx Science is facing a 5.25 percent cut -- amounting to some $825,00 -- and no cupcake sale can make up that kind of deficit. For many schools, such cuts could mean the end of concerts, plays, after school clubs, sports, and at places like Stuyvesant, a lighter academic courseload.

Thousands of parents already support New York City public schools, and thousands more would like to. They do not appreciate being political pawns.

Read all of Liz Willen's Middle School Muddle

Public Advocate: Parent coordinators don't pick up their phones

Posted by Philissa at 8:03 AM

Parent coordinators are increasingly unavailable by phone, according to a report released recently by the Public Advocate's office, where staffers called 100 parent coordinators after school hours, only to leave messages for the vast majority of them. Many of those messages — 71 percent of those left by staff members posing as prospective parents, according to the Post — were never answered. When the Public Advocate's office conducted a similar study in 2005, 50 percent of parent coordinators responded to calls.

Parent coordinators are supposed to be available around the clock, and the DOE is supposed to provide them with a cell phone that should remain on all evening and on weekends. But over time, parent coordinators have lost their phones, their phones have broken, and departing parent coordinators have failed to hand their phones over to their replacements. I've had little trouble reaching parent coordinators during school hours by calling schools' main numbers and asking for them. But reaching them after school or by cell phone exclusively (if indeed that's what the Public Advocate's office tried to do) sounds like a different beast.

Of course, the real issue is that which a District 4 parent advocate notes in the Post: "You talk to a lot of answering machines when you deal with the DOE. ... No return calls, no-pick-up calls - it's true."

TODAY (3/17): PEP votes on 8th grade promotion policy

Posted by Philissa at 11:39 AM

At 6 p.m. today, the Panel for Educational Policy will convene at Tweed to vote on the chancellor's proposed 8th grade promotion policy. Unlike many recent DOE policies, this one has met some real resistance on the path toward finalization.

The Sun reports that both the Manhattan and Bronx borough presidents have advised their appointees that they do not support the proposed policy. Last week, members of the Coalition for Educational Justice "stormed" Tweed and demanded to talk to Chancellor Klein about the policy, the Daily News reported, and I predict CEJ members, who vocally opposed the policy at the first public hearing in Manhattan last month, will keep tonight's meeting lively.

None of this opposition is likely to prevent the policy from being approved, of course. Panelists are sure to be mindful of the "Monday Night Massacre," which took place four years ago today when the panel was considering the 3rd grade retention policy. When it looked like three members of the panel planned to oppose the policy, the mayor and Staten Island borough president replaced them just before the vote. NYC Public School Parents Blog has more on the lessons (not) learned since that night. Since then, the PEP has never even threatened to reject a proposed DOE policy.

CPAC dropping out of DOE's Lobby Day

Posted by Philissa at 9:06 AM

Today is the DOE's annual lobby day, where DOE representatives as well as parents travel to Albany to push the city's schools' agenda in the budget process. Usually, the Chancellor's Parent Advisory Council spearheads the effort to get parents up to Albany. But this year, unhappy at the city's response to budget problems — to pass the cuts along to the schools — CPAC voted not to participate in the DOE's lobby day, the Daily News recently reported. Instead, it and other parent groups will send their own delegation to Albany March 11. Is anyone planning to go?

Parents boycotting some tests; others ask why give them

Posted by Philissa at 8:09 AM

Looks like parents at PS 40 and PS 116 in Manhattan are taking the advice of Robert Pondiscio — and the legions of parents who would do the same thing if they could find enough allies — and boycotting some of the testing mandated this year by the DOE. The parents are upset that their kids were selected to take "field tests" to help testmakers devise future exams, in addition to having to take the real state tests in math and ELA and diagnostic tests to generate progress report data.

“I don’t think [the field test is] going to be a strain on any particular child, but it replaces classroom teaching, and it’s a waste of everybody’s time,” a PS 40 parent told the Times. But according to Louise at Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn, individual kids are feeling the strain of one test after another. Louise, who says she's sick of testing, wrote yesterday that her 5th-grade daughter became distressed last week that the following day she would have to take "what seemed a sudden standardized math test that her teacher told me had something to do with appraising teacher performance." Louise asks, as did the Manhattan parents boycotting the tests, "Why put a kid through this kind of anxiety?" Perhaps Louise should spearhead a boycott at PS 321. I'm sure she'd have no trouble finding followers.

Opportunity NYC paying some parents to meet with teachers

Posted by Philissa at 7:09 AM

With new incentive programs being announced what seems like every other day, it's easy to forget where the city's presentation of financial incentives for good behavior began — way back in June, with the announcement of the Opportunity NYC program. The program, which offers cash incentives not just to poor students but to their families as well, has gotten quietly underway this fall; according to a DOE memo, the program apparently is being administered in "bi-monthly periods" and the first one comes to a close at the end of the month. Before then, parents will have a chance to earn $25 for every parent-teacher conference they attend. (Check out the Insideschools calendar for conference dates.) Principals have been instructed to tell their teachers to sign forms documenting parents' attendance. This is the first I've heard about the actual mechanics of the program — has anyone come across any other information?

THIS WEEKEND: Events for teens and parents

Posted by Philissa at 10:54 AM

On Saturday, the United Federation of Teachers is holding its annual parent conference, from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. This year's theme is "Strengthening the Home-School Partnership." Registration was required but if you're interested in attending the conference, which attracts more than 3,000 parents, you might still be able to get in. For more information, call 212-598-9205. Map

And Saturday evening, teens in Brooklyn will be throwing a concert to benefit Darfur relief. "Teens for Darfur" is the third annual benefit concert thrown by the vibrant Brooklyn teen rocker community; in previous years teens raised money for street children in the Philippines and relief efforts in New Orleans. This looks like a fun way to support kids' artistic and philanthropic interests, neither of which get enough attention in their schools. 6 p.m. at the Old Stone House in Park Slope. $5 for kids; $10 for grown ups. Map

In N.J., homework isn't just for kids

Posted by Philissa at 3:02 PM

The internet is abuzz today with discussion of a Times article about a teacher in Montclair, N.J., who gives weekly homework to the parents of his 9th grade English students -- and the kids' grades can be docked if their parents fail to participate. The goal is to keep parents involved in their kids' schoolwork at precisely the time when parent involvement drops off. The policy has generated a ton of discussion among Times readers, who call it everything from "excellent" to "absurd."

The idea, while interesting, appears to be of limited application. The Montclair students have a lot going for them: they all have computers at home, almost all have parents who are fluent English speakers, and their English classes have an average of about 22 students. Their teacher can afford to focus on getting kids and parents to talk about literature because kids have the basic skills to read books and write about them. I'm also guessing the parents who actually buy into the assignments are the ones who are most involved in their kids' educations anyway. I can't imagine any teacher even attempting this at the vast majority of New York City high schools, where teachers can't even get parents to come out for conferences twice a year.

Parents: If your kid's teacher asked you to read the same books your child is reading, would you do it?

Liveblogging the City Council hearing: Council members react

Posted by Philissa at 12:21 PM

Council Member Lew Fidler nailed the central parent engagement issue this morning when he pointed out about Guerrier, members of the Office of Family Engagement and Advocacy staff, and parent coordinators, "There is a huge fatal flaw. Each is hired and answerable to the DOE, not parents. ... You [Guerrier] felt the need to defend the rigid position of the DOE, not advocate for parents, and that's a problem." Fidler got applause for this statement, and he deserved it.

While being questioned by council members, Guerrier gave a few more details of the precise role parent bodies will play this year. They will help decide "how school closures happen" and where charter schools and new schools are sited based on community needs. She agreed with Council Member Vallone's characterization of those discussions in the past as "a dog and pony show."

Guerrier wants to train School Leadership Teams and help Parent Associations do better outreach to get more parents involved. Guerrier also revealed that one reason the DOE's new parent engagement website is not up yet is that developers are working on allowing parent associations to disseminate audio and video of their meetings online. In general, she said, parents should be making the decisions "that impact students directly."

Coming up: testimony from community leaders, including Advocates for Children's Kim Sweet

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."

Liveblogging the City Council hearing: Martine Guerrier

Posted by Philissa at 10:45 AM

Martine Guerrier's up and she sounds sincere. She says was concerned she would have to give up her role as a parent advocate when she took on her position as chief family engagement officer, but that hasn't been true. Instead, she says, she's convinced of the "sincerity on the part of the administration to change the tone" of interaction with parents. Of course, she has to say things are getting better, but her willingness to admit the flaws of the past — untimely and poorly explained information, parents having to travel to regional offices to get help, etc. — is refreshing and gives me hope that these flaws will be remediated.

Guerrier's talking about forging a "broader definition of parent engagement that goes beyond training and supporting parent coordinators." She's going to be holding parent nights all year to take discussion about schools to parents' homes, neighborhoods, and community organizations. Public forums will also be conducted in foreign languages.

The Office of Family Engagement and Advocacy has a broad range of responsibilities: training and overseeing parent coordinators, engaging Community Education Councils, managing translation and interpretation unit, making sure all schools have a functioning School Leadership Team (a fact that will factor into principals' grades — but by how much, I don't know).

Guerrier says the "relationship between schools and families is a key determinant in whether kids can take advantage" of resources provided by schools. Parents want more communication of academic progress -- short conferences not enough and some families only find out about kids' progress when there isn't any. That's where OFEA will collaborate with the office of accountability.

Next up: questions. Here's a taste:

Jackson: What is your opinion on parents? Are they full partners in their kids education?
Guerrier: Yes.

Liveblogging the City Council hearing on parent engagement

Posted by Philissa at 10:32 AM

Education Committee chair Robert Jackson opened today's proceedings with some familiar complaints: why don't people know what's going on at the DOE until after decisions are already made? how do you know who to call at the DOE when you need help? what's wrong with 311?

Now Deputy Mayor Dennis Walcott and OFEA CEO Martine Guerrier are testifying. Walcott has gone over the familiar litany of efforts the DOE has made in the last few years to formalize parents' voice — and they're nothing to shake a stick at. Walcott also notes that "the Mayor's doors at City Hall are and always have been open to parents." I had no idea — has anyone ever tried to meet with the mayor in his City Hall office?

Walcott has just said "probably 95 percent" of parent coordinators originally hired are still employed by the schools that hired them. There's no way that's even close to being true. Does anyone want to fact check? Still, the creation of the parent coordinator position was a huge step forward for the DOE and the best of the parent coordinators are tremendous assets to their schools.

2007-08 the year of parent engagement?

Posted by Philissa at 3:03 PM

We can hope so. If recent experience with the DOE is any guide, though, it's more likely to be merely the week of parent engagement.

Today, Chancellor Klein, along with Office of Family Engagement and Advocacy CEO Martine Guerrier, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, and Alonta Wrighton, principal of PS 11 in Brooklyn, held a feel-good press event to announce the DOE's newest family engagement efforts. The highlights: the creation of District Family Advocates to replace the old Parent Support Officers; Guerrier's office's "year-long, citywide public information campaign," soon to be found on subways and buses; expansion of access to translation services; and better support for the Community Education Councils.

I hope these much-needed improvements make a difference for parents who have felt for years that the DOE doesn't adequately address their questions and concerns. But how will the DOE make sure that these engagement efforts pay off? Remember, as the press release points out, "principals will be evaluated in part based on the effectiveness of their School Leadership Teams, half of which is comprised of parents."

Oversight is a central issue at two meetings tomorrow focusing on the DOE's parent engagement initiatives. The City Council's education committee is holding a hearing on the initiatives starting at 10 a.m. (Map) and the Chancellor's Parent Advisory Council also has parent engagement on the agenda for its 10 a.m. meeting in Tweed, where Guerrier and Klein are expected to appear (Map). We hear there may also be some kind of press event on the steps of City Hall at 11 a.m. It looks like it will be a busy morning for the DOE's parent engagement gurus -- we'll let you know what we find out from those meetings, but if you are able to go, please let us know your take as well!

Student, parent, teacher survey results now out

Posted by Philissa at 7:39 AM

Remember the "learning environment" surveys the DOE was pushing parents, teachers, and students to take last spring? Their results are now available in the "statistics" section of each school's DOE website. Each report has a ton of information to wade through, but the New York Times has a useful summary. Some of the most interesting tidbits:

• 26 percent of parents overall answered the surveys, far fewer than the DOE originally said it wanted but a reasonably good sample (though not representative — response rates were much lower in schools with poorer students).
• Most parents' responses indicated that they are generally happy with their schools, just as researchers have discovered pretty much every time they've ever surveyed parents, regardless of the quality of schools from which those parents are drawn.
  
• Perhaps for this reason, Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum thinks the survey was "nothing more than a multi-million dollar P.R. effort."
• But there's actually a surprising amount of criticism of principals, coming mainly from teachers. I checked out the reports of a couple of schools that I know are having leadership problems, and it looked like teachers reported freely that their principals don't adequately respect or support them. I wonder whether the DOE will take a closer look at schools like these, even if the final grade into which the surveys are being factored isn't low.
• A quarter of parents said the single improvement they'd most like to see in their kid's school is smaller class size, a request that Mayor Bloomberg immediately downplayed. Small class size advocates mobilized around the surveys, so the results might be a little distorted, but it's still telling that parents almost universally chose class size reduction over "more effective school leadership" and "better communication with parents." And it's simply bizarre to see the disdain Bloomberg has for an idea that makes an unimpeachable goal, even if it isn't immediately attainable.

I'm impressed that the DOE released the survey results in such a straightforward manner. The next step is for the DOE to give parents, teachers, and students a real say in crafting the surveys (that way, perhaps special education would get addressed) and to translate the wealth of information into a language that's more understandable for those of us who aren't trained to analyze data.

Public advocate launches education hotline

Posted by Philissa at 9:30 AM

After her staff called almost 100 phone numbers at district offices and received responses to fewer than half, Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum released a report yesterday saying what many observers have long known: the DOE's reorganization has left parents in the dark. "The start of the school year can be a stressful time for parents and students. The DOE makes matters worse by providing very little information and support," Gotbaum said in a New York Post article.

Gotbaum has set up an education hotline for parents to find out information that district offices should be making available. Right now, the hotline is just getting started, but it should be fully up and running soon. Call 212-669-7250, and let Insideschools know what you find out!

As always, you can call also Advocates for Children's helpline at 1-866-427-6033 with your education issues.

Comment now on proposed changes to SLT regulations

Posted by Philissa at 12:14 PM

Last week, the DOE posted proposed revisions to Chancellor's Regulation A-655, which governs School Leadership Teams. The new regulation is almost twice as long as the old one and includes a lot more details on the selection of SLTs, as well as a grievance procedure for parents to complain about the SLT election at their school.

The most significant change appears to be the one addressing the role of SLTs in setting schools' budgets. As the regulation currently stands, SLTs are required to "consult with the principal in developing a school-based budget"; the revision makes it clear that while SLTs should have "input" in developing the budget, principals have the final say. This makes sense, since the dominant trope in the new reorganization has been about giving power (and accountability) to principals.

The DOE is accepting comments on the proposed changes by email until Sept. 16.

Parents, angry about DOE survey, post their own

Posted by Unknown at 10:59 AM

If you visited the DOE website recently, you probably saw ever more frantic calls to fill out the DOE Parent Survey. The survey was part of a major plan to get parental input, and Chancellor Klein assembled a parent focus group to help put it together.

Some of those parents were seriously disenchanted when the final survey was published, and it lacked questions about parent support for mayoral control, trust for Klein and Mayor Bloomberg, and other issues about public school policy-- all questions that those parents had called for during their focus group meetings. In response, some parents put together their own survey, one that asks questions the DOE survey didn't include.

The parent survey is sponsored by Class Size Matters, a NYC organization that has been at odds with much of the Klein reforms. Class size matters called for a boycott of the DOE parent survey, asking parents to return the form with the questions crossed out, instead writing "We want real parent input – as well as smaller classes, less testing, and new priorities at Tweed to deal with the real problems in our schools."

The survey includes questions like: "How responsive do you feel Joel Klein and the leadership of the New York City Department of Education have been to the needs and priorities of parents?" and "How much stress to standardized tests cause your child? (a) too much stress (b) too little stress (c) the right amount of stress, or (d) don't know."

Coming soon: cash for successful students

Posted by Philissa at 11:18 PM

In Ben's last post, he took a look at merit pay for teachers. Now, New York City is going to pioneer offering merit pay for students — offering kids cash prizes for academic achievement.

Last week, when the first rumors of the mayor's plan to introduce monetary "incentives" for strong school performance hit the newspapers, I hoped they would prove to be just rumors. But today the city announced a pilot version of the incentive program, in which families will receive cold, hard cash for getting kids to school, showing up at parent-teacher conferences, and applying for a library card. At the high school level, it looks like the money will go straight to teenagers who take the PSAT and Regents exams and who make progress toward graduating. The incentive schedule includes a $400 graduation bonus.

This program is just one of three privately funded initiatives that make up what the city is calling "Opportunity NYC" and billing as "the nation's first conditional cash transfer program." In addition to paying for school performance, Opportunity NYC includes financial incentives for adults who maintain health insurance and who hold down a job or enroll in a job training program. All of the programs will be launched this fall on a pilot basis — the education program will be open only to families living in one of six neighborhoods whose income is below 130 percent of the poverty level and who have at least one child in grade 4, 7, or 9. Schools can also volunteer to participate in a trial of a program that will pay students for high scores on the interim assessments that all schools are supposed to give next year.

These programs represent a major achievement for Roland Fryer, the Harvard economics professor who has spent his career (short so far; he is just 30 years old) investigating whether incentives can convince people to change their environment. A fascinating 2005 New York Times Magazine cover story about Fryer suggested that DOE officials were already interested in his plan, but that he was having a hard time selling it to principals, who worried that paying kids for test scores would send the message that learning itself is an insufficient incentive. Last month, Fryer pitched his plan in a letter to principals of empowerment schools. I'm curious what has changed to get principals on board now.

While I'm always eager to hear about innovative strategies to motivate students and their families, the notion of exchanging cash for school performance just doesn't sit right with me. I wonder whether the incentives are large enough to persuade people to improve their behavior, or whether some families will just be rewarded for what they are already doing well. I also wonder, as others have, whether cash incentives will make tests even more stressful for kids than they already are. These are probably questions that Roland Fryer is eager to answer — I just wish it weren't the city's kids and their families who have to be his test subjects.

SATURDAY: Martine Guerrier public Q&A session

Posted by Philissa at 3:19 PM

If you're like us, you have a few questions about what the school system will look like -- and how it will work, or not work -- after June 30. Tomorrow morning you have an opportunity to ask those questions of Martine Guerrier, the new CEO for parent engagement, and several other DOE officials at "Ask Martine and Friends," a public meeting at Brooklyn Tech High School. The event runs 11 a.m.-3 p.m., but if you get there early, you can have brunch starting at 10 a.m. Lunch will also be provided. Map