GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

Tonight, as members of New York City’s teachers union celebrate the union’s 50th anniversary with a line up of political and labor celebrities, some of their members will be sitting at home or in schools filling out ballots.

That’s because the United Federation of Teachers is in the midst of an election for its president and governing executive board, as well as hundreds of other positions. To outsiders and even some teachers, UFT elections are a little puzzling. This year, there have been no stump speeches, no public debates, and the only tangible evidence that candidates are campaigning is the fliers distributed in teachers’ school mailboxes and ads printed in the union’s newspaper.

The thousands of ballots counted on April 7 will decide the future leaders of America’s largest union local, and one of the most influential in the state. The UFT’s power to set education policy and craft pension deals  in the city and statewide is so formidable, its former leader was once called “governor” in a newspaper editorial. And no matter how much the city detests the union’s policies, even Mayor Bloomberg admitted today that “they are part of the solution.” (more…)

My first teaching job was in a pretty rough school. So imagine my surprise one day when one of my colleagues said, “This is a great school to work at.” I waited for him to elaborate and tried not to fall over. He added, “Because of the parking!” He was right about that. We had a small section of the street that was reserved for teachers, but there was also ample street parking. The issues at that school were too vast for me to consider staying, but I still miss the ease of parking there.

Being a perpetual early bird, I didn’t find it too difficult to park when I transferred to my current school 10 years ago, even though there was a lot less street parking that wasn’t reserved for the school. I had my placard and usually had no problems, save for the very rare occasion when there was an accident on the Cross Bronx Expressway and I arrived later.

Much as we loved the city, my husband and I decided to buy a house and were unable to afford the city. We decided to head north, to Putnam County, where our daughter could have a yard and a small-town childhood. Since I loved teaching in the city, and still do, I didn’t look for a new job. Once I’d left Queens, I found myself leaving earlier than ever, but I wanted to make sure I could get a parking spot. And I have always relied heavily on that hour before school to get myself mentally ready for the day and set up any materials I needed. I am also neurotic about punctuality and am almost never late.

This worked well for me until last fall, when Mayor Bloomberg decided to strip most of our parking passes, citing abuse and a desire to see more people using mass transit. (more…)

• Klein said budget cuts could mean 8,500 teacher layoffs. (GothamSchools, Daily News, WNYC, NY1)
• But the Assembly passed a budget plan with less severe school cuts. (Times, Albany Times-Union)
• In the Post, Assemblyman Sam Hoyt asks teachers to freeze their salaries to stave off budget cuts.
• High school admissions letters are still delayed. (GothamSchools, Daily News, Times)
• The superintendent of Brooklyn’s District 16 may be to blame for its troubles. (NY1)
• Opportunity Charter School hopes to show charters can successfully serve special ed students. (WNYC)
• National reading scores have stalled in New York and the U.S. generally. (GothamSchools, Times, WSJ)
• Some parents are upset over a PEP re-vote to bring Eagle Academy to southeast Queens. (Daily News)
• City-run after-school programs are shuttering because of budget cuts. (Daily News)
• Times readers weigh in on Susan Jacoby’s arguments in favor of a national curriculum.
• A make-believe “jail” on a playground in a Brooklyn housing project has sparked controversy. (Times)
• Errol Louis argues in the Daily News that the play jail shows how the city sets children up to fail.

• The nation’s reading scores plateaued, but low achieving students did make gains.
• Jay Mathews writes that the flat scores can be read as an “epitaph” for No Child Left Behind.
• The Assembly’s budget plan would restore $193 million to NYC schools.
• UFT president Michael Mulgrew is attending a re-election fundraiser for Charlie Rangel.
• A retired teacher says he’s voting for Mulgrew because he’s a mature leader, unlike the opposition.
• Rick Hess says Arne Duncan’s list of political favors will hurt his credibility and RttT.
• A Florida bill that would pay teachers primarily based on test scores is dangerous, writes Valerie Strauss.
• Center for American Progress calls for teacher effectiveness reforms to have a larger role.
• The UFT chapter leader of Tilden HS asks two tough questions he wants Mulgrew to answer.
• UFT elections are coming soon and in the last few days before break, the campaigning is heating up.
• Staten Island could lose 150 teachers, or 5 percent of its total, if the budget cuts go through.
• Across the city, class sizes could grow by five students as a result of the cuts, Klein warned today.
• Assembly member Deborah Glick argues for smaller class sizes and keeping the charter cap in place.
• Florida aced the NAEP reading test that was released today, writes Jay Greene.
• For a few hundred dollars, principals can find out how their high school grads are doing in college.
• And calling all education reporters — Hechinger is looking for someone to blog about community colleges.

Chancellor Joel Klein threw out a surprise at today’s City Council hearing on next year’s education budget — that the number of teachers currently in the Absent Teacher Reserve pool has now dipped to 1,092 teachers, down about 600 people since the fall.

In its teachers contract demands this year, the city has asked for the power to fire teachers who remain in the excess pool for more than four months. Assuming the teachers currently in the pool have been there since the fall, if not longer, they would lose their jobs under the city’s proposal. (more…)

Schools Chancellor Joel Klein argued before the City Council today that firing teachers, perhaps en masse, is the only strategy left to handle expected budget gaps next school year. “There is very little fat left to trim,” Klein said, discussing a gap that his top budget official said will be at least $600 million and at worst $1.2 billion.

It’s still unclear whether state budget cuts to education will necessitate layoffs at the scale Klein described — a total of 8,500 teachers in the most draconian scenario. The state legislature is working towards an April 1 deadline to pass a budget, and while the Senate and governor’s proposed budget would cost the city schools more than $400 million at a minimum, the Assembly is reportedly planning far less severe cuts.

But at the City Council today Klein stuck to his doomsday predictions, outlining how the 8,500 layoffs would hit each school district. Under the state’s current “last in, first out” method of cutting the most recently hired teachers first, neighborhoods from the South Bronx to the Upper East Side — which have the highest density population of younger teachers, due mainly to either high turnover rates or enrollment spikes — would lose nearly a fifth of their teachers immediately next year, Klein said.

Eight other districts in those areas, mainly in Manhattan and the Bronx, would all lose more than 15 percent of their teachers to layoffs. (The Department of Education’s full list of how each district would be affected by layoffs is below the jump.) (more…)

School co-locations don’t have to be a bad thing.

My children both attended schools in one of the city’s oldest multi-school sites, the Julia Richman Education Complex on the Upper East Side. JREC is a prime example of effective school co-location. The building serves a diverse student population: preschoolers, middle schoolers, English Language Learners, future performing artists, children with autism who share resources and even classes at times. Herb Mack, a co-principal of Urban Academy High School, located on JREC’s campus, told me that staff from each school have met weekly for the last 15 years to make sure the campus functions effectively and in the interests of the children who attend school there. Unfortunately, the city has proposed disrupting the successful co-location at JREC by moving the schools more than 40 blocks south and giving the site to Hunter College.

The problem with co-location right now is the arbitrary process that decides which schools will share space — or more correctly, it’s the lack of a process that is transparent, accountable, and inclusive. To that end I propose a moratorium on co-locations until the following “seven rules of co-location” are implemented:

1.  All district schools that the Department of Education considers to be underutilized must undergo a comprehensive review and analysis of current utilization by an independent entity (such as the Independent Budget Office) to assess the availability of space and the potential impact of co-location on the existing school. All findings of the independent review should be considered binding.
2. Schools, parents and community members (including elected community education councils) must be informed before a review begins that they are being considered for co-location. (more…)

Among the contracts and school siting proposals on the agenda for last night’s school board meeting, one unusual item stood out — an “inquest on employee termination.”

The ominous event occurred behind closed doors before the public meeting, and officials would not say whose case was being heard. But they did explain that an inquest is one way for a teacher accused of incompetence or misconduct to be tried. The more common path is through a hearing before an arbitrator. An inquest is what happens if the teacher doesn’t request a hearing within 10 days of being charged.

During an inquest, a Department of Education attorney presents the city’s case to panel members, who come back with a final decision within a few weeks, said Claude Hersh, a lawyer with the state teachers union. Hersh said teachers or other pedagogical staff members under inquest do not have union lawyers representing them. 

I didn’t receive a comment yet from school officials about the inquest process. But Hersh described it as an easy win for the city, which presents its case to a school board made up mostly of mayoral appointees. “The determination is always termination of employment,” Hersh said. (more…)