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If Mr. B’s class takes tests on 10 of the last 25 school days, what are some ways to express this as a fraction?

If Mr. B’s class will take simulation exams on six of the next 10 school days, what is the new fraction?

If each test takes up two periods, how many periods will the class spend on testing in all?

For early finishers: If each period is 3/4 of an hour, how many hours will be spent on testing in all?

*In my day we called them word problems.

• After another day of talks, there’s still been no charter cap bill deal. (Daily News, GothamSchools, Post)
• State Sen. John Sampson said he thinks New York could win Race to the Top’s second round. (NY1)
• The Daily News puts the burden on Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver to stop the state from losing again.
• The head of a welfare group says the city needs charters schools that serve the neediest children. (Post)
• At the same time charter supporters want the cap lifted, there are questions about oversight. (Times)
• Police chief Ray Kelly unveiled a program to prosecute students who attack school safety officers. (NY1)
• Debbie Almontaser, the ex-principal of the Khalil Gibran school, won’t sue over being fired. (Times)
• Students at Riker’s Island’s public school participated in a cooking contest. (GothamSchools, NY1)
• Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin is letting go of plan A for the education jobs bill he is sponsoring. (Reuters)
• Hawaii reached a budget deal that will end the state’s practice of shortening the school year. (AP)
• New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie says teachers unions are used to getting everything they want. (Post)
• The Times says rational teachers in Texas should ignore politicized social studies standards.

• A bill to help states forestall teacher layoffs may have more than just Republican opposition.
• Parents in Brooklyn’s District 13 are petitioning the city to add more elementary school options.
• Teachers who have been in the rubber room found last night’s “Law and Order” finale sympathetic.
• The Onion AV Club says the episode broke with L&O routine and ended too “overheated.”
• The Daily Politics has a partial list of Bloomberg’s public school graduation engagements.
• Diane Ravitch lists her top 10 reasons why states and districts should tune out Race to the Top.
• In the community section, Alexander Hoffman questions the question: why bother with merit pay?
• Leonie Haimson and Mona Davids argue against the bill being touted by charter school supporters.
• Econ class in Texas comes with an emphasis on the “free market and its benefits.”
• Illinois wants to make teachers learn more and get higher test scores before entering the classroom.
• Fordham’s Andy Smarick says goodbye before heading off to be NJ’s Dept. Edu Commish.
• A new report from Ball State Univ. finds the states are underfunding charter schools.
• And HS grades are a good predictor of college success, but only if the grades mean anything.

A student makes spicy chicken pastelitos in a training kitchen at Island Academy, a high school for incarcerated students on Rikers Island.

A clock ticked down, and two teams of women in chef’s jackets scurried around a kitchen, rolling pastry dough and sauteing fish. Corn chowder simmered on a stove and buttermilk biscuits baked in the oven. When the clock hit zero, the anxious cooks presented their creations to accomplished visiting chefs, who tallied their judgments of the meals’ creativity and flavor.

But many of today’s “cheftestants” may have to wait a while to fulfill their culinary dreams — for now, they are incarcerated students at the city’s Island Academy school at Riker’s Island correctional facility. This cooking contest was part of one of their classes, and the chief celebrity judge was Alain Sailhac, the former dean of the French Culinary Institute. (more…)

As parents and advocates, we are convinced that the bill being promoted by the charter school lobby to raise the cap on charter schools would seriously harm the city’s children who attend both district and charter schools.

We have seen how the city’s charter school operators have misused public funds for their own private ends because of lax financial oversight. We have seen how too often, children enrolled in charters have received inappropriately harsh discipline, and have been suspended or “pushed out” of school, especially those with learning issues or disabilities. We have seen how the city’s Department of Education has pitted parent against parent in fighting over space, in a school system that is badly overcrowded. And we have seen how both the DOE and charter school operators have deprived parents of a voice in how their children are educated.

Unlike the bill earlier passed by the Assembly, this bill would bar the State Comptroller from auditing the books of charter schools, despite the financial scandals that have erupted in New York and throughout the country regarding conflicts-of-interest, self-dealing and misuse of public funds. It would continue to allow for-profit management companies to try to make a buck off our children, despite the cuts that are decimating school budgets. And it would deny parents from having any say in where these schools are located, intensifying bitter battles that already are ripping communities apart and leading to more overcrowding and the loss of critical cluster spaces and libraries.

Class Size Matters and the New York Charter Parents Association have developed a framework of shared principles for district and charter parents, calling for enhanced accountability, transparency, and protection of parent and student rights at both sets of schools. (more…)

We’re told that are layoffs coming. But how many people will be laid off? Who will they be? And will you or your child’s teacher be among them?

“I wish I had more money and I wish I had more clarity,” was Chancellor Joel Klein’s answer to these questions a few weeks ago, speaking to principals by conference call.

The process of laying off teachers in New York City is so complex that few people have clear answers right now. But after studying the state law that sets teacher hiring and firing rules, talking to union and city officials, and looking back to the 1970s — the last time an  economic crisis forced thousands of teacher layoffs — I have some clues. Here are answers to questions I’ve heard from parents and teachers (send more!).

Will there be layoffs?
Several scenarios exist that could reduce — but probably not eliminate — the number of layoffs.

In its leaderless, unpredictable state, Albany could rewrite the budget forecast as I type these words. Governor Paterson’s budget, and the budget passed in the Senate, cut about $500 million from New York City schools. When you add in the city’s increased operating costs, the losses come to $750 million. Klein has translated that to mean roughly 6,400 lost teaching jobs next year. Of that, 2,000 would be lost when teachers retire or move and the city plans to cut the other 4,400 through layoffs.

If the State Assembly decreases the education cut, the layoff numbers could go down. Another possibility is that the city’s teachers union, the United Federation of Teachers, could cut a deal that would freeze teacher salaries in exchange for fewer layoffs. And yet another unpredictable element is S. 3206, the Keep Our Educators Working Act. Sponsored by Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin and backed by the Obama White House, the bill would devote $23 billion to helping states avoid teacher layoffs. If Congress approves the bill, New York City would get a $400 million lifeline.

How will the city decide which teachers lose their jobs?

Rules for layoffs were first written into New York’s education law in 1976. They say:

Whenever a teaching position is abolished under this chapter, the services of the person holding a position within the tenure area of the position which is to be abolished who has the least seniority in the city school district, including all full-time equivalent substitute service and all full-time equivalent service as a paraprofessional, shall be discontinued, provided that the services of a person who has acquired tenure within such tenure area shall not be discontinued if another person holding a position within such tenure area has not acquired tenure.

You mean you didn’t understand that?
The law means that the city has to lay off teachers based on how recently they were hired, with some leeway. Rather than taking all the most recent hires and firing them without considering what subject they teach, the law allows officials to make layoffs according to subject area.

Hypothetically, hundreds of elementary school classroom teachers could lose their jobs, but only a dozen science teachers could be laid off and almost no special education teachers would have to go. Right now, city education officials are puzzling over exactly how deeply to cut from each kind of position.

One way to decide which subjects to cut the most would be to let principals decide which positions they can live without. But the city has calculated that these decisions could take far too long to make, and so officials are instead making projections themselves.

According to a source, officials will calculate how many teachers will have to be cut from each subject area by studying schools’ past behavior and looking at hiring trends.

Does where I teach matter?
These cuts will happen on a citywide basis. This means that if the city estimates it has to cut 500 middle school social studies positions, the middle school social studies teachers who will lose their jobs are the 500 newest hires across all five boroughs. It doesn’t matter if your principal likes you and can afford to keep you on staff; you’re the rookie and you’ve got to go.

New schools that hired their entire staff in the last two years are likely to be hit the hardest by layoffs. And of all the boroughs, the Bronx would suffer the most as it employs many of the city’s most recent hires.

City officials have predicted that elementary school classroom teachers are likely to bear the brunt of the cuts. They’ve also said that teachers working in hard-to-staff subjects — like high school special education or chemistry — will probably see fewer layoffs.

But Klein keeps saying he wants to lay off teachers based on their ability. Could that happen?
Even the most diehard, anti-seniority-based layoffs city officials currently view this as a pipe dream. The law is the law, and there aren’t any signs this will change in the next few weeks.

Who’s going to be teaching my child next year?
In the worst case budget scenario, if your child’s teacher was hired in the last two years and teaches a subject that’s not in high demand, chances are good that she will lose her job. Another teacher may take her place if the school can afford to fill the vacancy, in which case the newly arrived teacher will be more senior and come from another school that either couldn’t afford him or that he left of his own volition.

If your school’s principal can’t stretch the budget to fill the vacancy, class sizes will probably rise. If it’s a high school, the principal may have to drop certain classes from the school’s offerings.

When will I know if I’m being laid off?
Department of Education officials hope to give principals their budgets for next year by June 1, so you could find out shortly afterward that your position has been eliminated at your school. But that doesn’t mean you’ve been laid off.

The teachers union contract says you have to be told about layoffs on or near June 15, but you shouldn’t view that as a hard deadline. If any of the moving parts change — if Albany alters the budget cut or if the federal government passes the education bailout bill — the news may come quite a bit later.

If I’m a teacher and I am laid off, do I get severance pay?
No. You will be paid through the summer and for the vacation days and sick days you didn’t use.

How long will my health insurance last?
Your city health insurance will expire 90 days from the day you are laid off. At that point, you can extend your health benefits with COBRA, which allows you to keep your insurance temporarily but requires you to pay the entire premium. It’s cheaper than getting individual health insurance.

In the words of one school official: “Go see your doctor; go to the dentist; go to the gynecologist, do it all.”

What happens if I’m laid off and then economic conditions improve?
The city has to keep what’s known as a “recall list” of all the teachers who’ve been laid off by order of seniority within their subject area. If jobs become available, the city can recall you. This process can be just as chaotic as layoffs are because, like layoffs, recalling is done on a citywide scale. This means that if you were laid off from a job in the Bronx you could be recalled and offered first rights to a job in Staten Island, even if your old school has an opening in your license area and wants to hire you back. First rights to that job could go to another teacher who’s ahead of you in the recall line.

In the mid-1970s, the last time layoffs of this scale were carried out, the city laid off 15,000 teachers and then tried to recall 10,000 of them. Only 3,000 ever returned to the system.

Send more questions to tips@gothamschools.org.