GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

• It’s election day! Bloomberg leads Thompson by 12, with a slight narrowing in recent days. (Times)
• Would the race be closer if the UFT had endorsed Thompson? Some say maybe. (GothamSchools)
• DC 37 won’t pay the $800,000 that would save school aides’ jobs while their case is pending. (Daily News)
• Children attending city pre-K progams not in public school buildings won’t get H1N1 vaccines. (Daily News)
• A student was shot outside Bronx Regional High School during an apparent lunchtime robbery. (NY1)
• More than 60 school districts now assign some students to schools according to income. (USA Today)

• The superintendent of schools in Durham, N.C. is leaving for a post in the federal Department of Education.
• Henrik Hertzberg says Bloomberg has been “a very good mayor,” in part because of his education record.
• First Lady Michelle Obama has launched a mentoring program for high school girls.
• The Education Optimists look at connections between schools and prisons.
• Arthur Goldstein says the DOE has exacerbated overcrowding at Francis Lewis.
• Pissed Off Teacher says she finally received her students’ IEPs, only to find them unhelpful.
• Is it better to convert a failing school or shut it down? A simulation tool helps weigh costs and benefits.
• Obama and Duncan’s trip to Wisconsin may have more to do with mayoral control than Race to the Top.
• Liz Willen strategizes to make the most of parent-teacher conferences, but wonders if there’s a better way.
• Hey, did you hear? There’s an election tomorrow! Find your polling place here.

Is there anything that gets people’s dander up faster these days than comparisons of charter schools and traditional public schools?  On Thursday, reporter Meredith Kolodner filed a story in the Daily News on the relative performance of charter schools and what the NYC Department of Education calls “district” schools.  A fall, 2009 presentation emanating from the Department’s Office of Charter Schools, and posted on its website, reported on the charter school landscape in New York City, including the growth and location of charter schools, the composition of students attending them, the DOE’s accountability framework for evaluating charter schools, and some evidence on how charter schools were faring on the School Progress Reports, the crown jewel in the DOE’s accountability system.  (Regular readers may know that I’ve been critical of key features of the Progress Reports for elementary and middle schools.)

Kolodner drew attention to the fact that although elementary and middle school charter students had higher rates of proficiency on the state math and English Language Arts assessments this year, charter schools on average had a lower score on the progress component of the School Progress Reports.  And since the progress component makes up 60% of the overall score, charter schools also had lower overall scores on the Progress Reports than did district schools.  She quoted Patrick Sullivan, an appointed member of the Panel for Educational Policy that the DOE describes as its governance body, on the meaning of this pattern.  “Either the progress reports are invalid,” Sullivan said, “or charter schools are lagging.”

The Daily News article and a subsequent posting by Sullivan on the NYC Public School Parents blog prompted a quick reply from Peter Murphy, Director of Policy & Communications for the New York Charter Schools Association (NYCSA), here and here.  Murphy called into question the metric used by the DOE in its Progress Reports, especially the fact that student performance only counts for 25% of the overall score, whereas student progress counts for 60%.  This, he contended, is “woefully lopsided,” and unfairly penalizes schools that have had students scoring high for several years running.  If I read his second posting correctly, he concludes that the progress reports indeed are invalid.  (more…)

On the night of his primary election victory, city comptroller candidate John Liu stood in the city’s teacher union headquarters and thanked the United Federation of Teachers for delivering his win. In the mayoral race, by contrast, the UFT chose to sit on the sidelines and not endorse the Democratic candidate, as it has historically done.

How much of a difference has the UFT’s decision to sit out the race made for comptroller Bill Thompson’s campaign? The answer likely rests on the continuum between not much and not at all, election observers said today.

Those who argue that a UFT endorsement would have helped Thompson, if only modestly, point to the UFT’s powerful voter turnout machine. In an election predicted to see few voters, the ability to mobilize teachers and parents could be a deciding factor in who wins tomorrow.

A spokesman for the union, Dick Riley, estimated that union volunteers had made about 200,000 calls and distributed 50,000 pieces of campaign literature this year on behalf of endorsed candidates in citywide, borough and city council elections. The union also sends out robocalls urging its members to vote for candidates and its president, Michael Mulgrew, made appearances with candidates at press conferences. (more…)

I wrote the column below, which originally appeared in the Oct. 15 Queens Chronicle, together with Leslie O’ Grady, the co-president of the PTA at Francis Lewis. Because NYC parents and teachers share common interests, we felt it would make a strong statement if we showed our alliance on the issues of class sizes, overcrowding and flagrant disregard of the Contracts for Excellence.

We felt our situation at Francis Lewis had been ignored for years, so this year we became very active in getting the word out about conditions at the school. As a result, we’ve been featured in the New York Post, the Daily News, the New York Times, WABC, and most importantly, right here at GothamSchools. Naturally we wanted to share our column with the GothamSchools community, and here it is:

Overcrowded, Oversized, and Overlooked

As the new school year begins, Francis Lewis High School is again challenged by severe overcrowding. Joel Klein promised the state as part of the city’s “Contract for Excellence” that our school would reduce its class sizes through “The Contract for Excellence” to 30 students per class this school year-on the way down to 25 students per class. Why, then, have we seen dozens of classrooms filled beyond the 34 allowed by the union contract, gym classes of 160 students, and a school “day” that literally doesn’t end till night? (more…)

Teachers union president Michael Mulgrew dismissed proposed legislation that would overhaul New York State’s teacher tenure and charter cap laws.

Mulgrew criticized Assemblyman Sam Hoyt’s bill in an interview with GothamSchools on Saturday, after delivering an address to approximately 3,000 parents assembled for the United Federation of Teachers’ annual parent outreach conference.

Proposed to make New York State’s bid for Race to the Top money more competitive, Hoyt’s bill contains a variety of measures, almost all of which the union has opposed. In addition to abolishing the state’s charter cap, the bill would increase the number of years a teacher must work before being considered for tenure and would lift the ban on using students’ test scores as a factor in tenure decisions.

“I think Mr. Hoyt should spend some time with people who understand education,” Mulgrew said. “I am always leery of those who propose education reforms who have never spent time in a classroom.” (more…)

Last Thursday I participated in the Bright Kids NYC parent information session about OLSAT test prep and general information about the NYC gifted and talented program. Bright Kids NYC is a program that prepares children in pre-K through second grade to take standardized tests.

I sat on the G&T panel and answered questions from prospective G&T parents. Along with three other parents, there were also two teachers on the panel — one who teaches gifted and talented students and another who actually proctored the OLSAT and BRSA tests for several years. Bige Doruk, founder of Bright Kids, gave a presentation beforehand.

About 40 parents attended the session scheduled from 6:30 to 8 p.m. After it was all said and done we didn’t get out of session until after 9 p.m. due to the high interest and interaction amongst audience members! (more…)

• The DOE is limiting transfers to overcrowded Francis Lewis HS, but some say more is needed. (Post)
• The UFT contract has expired, and negotiating a new one could be Bloomberg’s next challenge. (NY Mag)
• A Stuyvesant HS teacher says the new UFT contract should not protect mediocre teachers. (Daily News)
• School nurses are asking for support after a third student mistakenly got the H1N1 vaccine. (Daily News)
• The City Council grilled DOE officials about the high progress report grades given to most schools. (NY1)
• High schools’ progress reports won’t contain as many A’s, officials said. (GothamSchools, Daily News)
• Fewer than one in five students at the maritime-focused Harbor School could swim before enrolling. (NPR)
• The head of the teaching program at Williams College offers her vision for (free) teacher training. (Times)
• Jay Mathews looks at the complex teacher rating system being piloted in D.C. schools. (Washington Post)
• The school reform tensions boiling in D.C. right now aren’t anything new. (Washington Post)
• New York City’s school board, the PEP, is one of just two appointed boards in the state. (Times)
• The L.A. Times looks at a Pasadena High School that seems to have turned around successfully.
• Students and teachers are increasingly finding educational value in video games. (Times)