GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

• State ed chief David Steiner said the state would take years to recover from Gov. Paterson’s cuts. (AP)
• Paterson’s proposed budget would cost the city schools 8,500 jobs, Joel Klein reiterated. (WNYC)
• Klein also begged lawmakers for rules that would make it easier for teachers to be fired. (Post)
• State Sen. Carl Kruger told Klein not to ask for help without taking lawmakers seriously. (Daily News)
• More than 3,000 charter school parents lobbied lawmakers. (Albany Times-Union, GothamSchools)
• Gov. Paterson told charter school parents that he’ll continue to push for more charters. (AP)
• A charter parent advocate argues that charter schools are again getting deeper budget cuts. (Daily News)
• The principal of JHS 226 in Queens was knocked out while intervening in a student fight. (Post)
• More on that fourth-grade fight club in Queens: The two teachers say nothing happened. (Daily News)
• Students at Parkchester’s PS 106 were allowed to move from dingy trailers into the school. (Daily News)
• Board of Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch likes Harold Ford for Senate, to her brother’s chagrin. (Times)
• The city’s oldest Catholic school will definitely close in June, the New York Archdiocese said. (NY1)
• Supporters of abstinence education have been invigorated by the new study showing it can work. (Times)

• Sen. Carl Kruger criticized Chancellor Klein for taking the legislature’s money, but not its advice.
• If Paterson’s cuts go through, the total budget gap for the DOE will be $1.2 billion.
• Arne Duncan apologizes for the Katrina comment.
• Diane Ravitch: the closing of neighborhood schools is the collateral damage of the DOE’s priorities.
• The DOE wants you to know the UFT filed a grievance over teachers having to write out students’ goals.
• Maura Keaney is “exactly the kind of woman we need at the Department of Ed,” Bloomberg says.
• A UFT blogger wonders why the city, state, and federal gov. all use different criteria to define failure.
• David Dashefsky: Seth Andrew and other charter operators shouldn’t just quit New York State.
• The DOE is hosting a new high school fair this weekend across the street from Tweed.
• Creative writing morphs into creative spelling in one class.
• The message from charter school parents to Albany today was: restore our funding.
• Jay Mathews isn’t betting Rhee will succeed if she remains unwilling to compromise.
• Kevin Carey says there are actually 3 movements within the school “reform” movement.
• And New Orleans may cancel school the day after the Super Bowl.

Principal Edward Tom unveiled the school's new library, which came after two years of lobbying for one.

When School Construction Authority officials first stepped foot in the Bronx Center for Science and Mathematics to build a $1.1 million library, Principal Edward Tom had some specific instructions.

“I told them not to think about high school libraries,” Tom said at a ribbon cutting ceremony held at the school today. “I told them: ‘Think Starbucks.’”

That directive, and SCA’s apparent willingness to oblige, have made their mark. Along with having couches and frosted glass, the library’s walls are cappuccino-colored, the floor tiles look like they were dipped in half-and-half, and the bookshelves and chairs are a dark mocha.

Funded by donations from Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr. ($660,000), and City Councilwoman Helen Foster ($440,000), the library is also outfitted with desktop computers, printers, and a SMART Board. The one thing it’s missing — a librarian — is in the planning stages, a school official said. (more…)

Parents of students at Community Roots Charter School in Brooklyn boarded a bus for Albany before dawn, as school leaders checked in with other parents.

Hundred of parents of charter school students from all over the city climbed into buses bound for Albany in the pre-dawn hours this morning. Once they got there, parents and advocates are spending the day pressing legislators to change state law to allow for more charter schools and better funding and facilities access for them.

Some schools, like Harlem Success Academy and Democracy Prep, are each bringing hundreds of parents on multiple busloads. Others, like Brooklyn’s Opportunity Roots Charter School, pictured here, filled one bus, or shared a bus with other schools. All in all, 80 city charter schools sent a total of 60 buses to Albany today. (more…)

• The schools set to replace closing schools in Queens each have a specialized curriculum. (Daily News)
• The city is planning for all schools to serve students with disabilities. (GothamSchools, Daily News, Post)
• The city’s oldest Catholic school may be in danger of closing. (NY1)
• The ingredients of city school lunches will soon be posted online. (Daily News)
• More than 150 students protested cuts to student fare cards outside MTA headquarters. (Post)
• DOE and UFT officials disagree on whether the city will be eligible for more federal funds. (Daily News)
• A Queens teacher is charged with instructing students to resolve a dispute through fistfights. (Post)
• The Post decries the NAACP’s insertion in the UFT’s lawsuit to keep low-performing schools open.
• A study found abstinence education persuades a majority of students to delay sex. (Washington Post)

• The DOE announced Maura Keaney’s hire on the same day the city fined her $2,500.
• Deputy Mayor Dennis Walcott says the NAACP’s decision to join the UFT’s lawsuit is “mind-boggling.”
• Hundreds of charter school parents are journeying up to Albany tomorrow to lobby lawmakers. (no link)
• Norm has video of Klein trying to make himself heard above the shouts at last week’s PEP meeting.
• Bloomberg’s offer to the UFT looks brazen, but another take is that it’s meant to avoid PERB’s decision.
• People who run schools like businesses have got it right, writes one blogger.
• Leo Casey says the DOE’s new grading system for next year ensures more schools will be closed.
• A teacher has concerns about the way New York’s RttT application alters removal hearings.
• Leonie Haimson: the school closure meeting was both inspiring and awful.
• Jay Mathews wants Rhee to stay, but he thinks she owes the city’s teachers an apology.
• Alyson Klein reports on the details of Obama’s new education budget.
• Illinois is preparing to cut funding for special education in Chicago.
• Andy Rotherham reminds Obama that he needs Congress to pass his $1 billion incentive plan.
• And today is the first day NYC parents can begin submitting kindergarten applications.

The city’s teachers union and the NAACP filed suit against the Department of Education today, claiming that the city lost the right to close 19 schools when it violated the law that governs school closures.

Those who have read the law — or the “carefully crafted multi-tiered public process,” as the lawsuit states —can testify that it is not a simple one to follow.

Part of the mayoral control legislation that barely made it through the state legislature last summer calls for the city to hold hearings at each of the public schools slated for closure, for “stakeholders” to be consulted, and for the city to study and report on the effects closing schools would have on their surrounding communities. All of this had to be completed a certain number of days before the citywide schoolboard, the Panel for Educational Policy, voted on the closings. (more…)

School officials outlined a plan to change the way city schools serve students with disabilities at a closed-door meeting this morning with special education advocates.

The plan’s first step: Telling schools they have to accept, and “embrace,” students with special needs.

“For too long, educating students with disabilities has meant separating them from their general education peers,” Schools Chancellor Joel Klein said in a statement. “Today we are building on the premise that every school must be able to educate the vast majority of these children.”

That premise represents a badly needed advance for the city schools, according to special education advocates.

“The principles in [the plan] are wonderful, but they’ve been law forever,” said Maggie Moroff, who coordinates the ARISE Coalition but was not speaking on the coalition’s behalf. “The overarching goals are exactly what they ought to be, it’s just that in my mind they’re not so novel.” (more…)

• The UFT is set to file a lawsuit today to stop the 19 school closures approved last week. (Daily News)
• The new NCLB could give districts funding based on progress, rather than demographics. (Times)
• Charter leaders say they’ll give up on New York if the state doesn’t get more supportive soon. (Times)
• A teacher found to have spoken lewdly to a student has sat in the rubber room for almost 10 years. (Post)
• The head of NYPD’s School Safety Division was promoted to another position. (Daily News)
• The Daily News says the many people who spoke at last week’s PEP meeting weren’t representative.
• The city wants to make it harder to get a top progress report grade. (GothamSchools, Times, Daily News)
• A Daily News survey says school lunches in the city are still full of unhealthy components.
• The yummy lunches at Harlem’s Promise Academy Charter School continue to be healthy. (Daily News)
• A city program that gives summer jobs to more than 50,000 teens is at risk from budget cuts. (Daily News)
• A former member of Joel Klein’s team will lead Teach for America in Providence. (Providence Journal)
• More D.C. residents don’t like Michelle Rhee, even as they say the schools are better. (Washington Post)
• A study released last week says many states keep bad teachers and send good ones away. (AP)