GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

• Want to learn sustainably? Buy 100% recycled three-ring notebooks. (GS Community)
• The House has proposed cutting the Promise Neighborhood Initiative by 70 percent. (Hechinger)
• What happens if you live in the Harlem Children’s Zone but don’t go to its schools? (Sara Mead)
• A former Run DMC member is helping the city argue against child violence. (AP)
• It’s not testing standards that are the problem; it’s the tests themselves. (JD2718)
• A pitch for “productivity” as the next big education thing. (Joanne Jacobs)
• So long to handing in assignments. Welcome to “publish it” teaching. (Innovative Educator)
• Be the new administrative assistant to new Deputy Chancellor Sternberg. (SimplyHired)
• Ray Cortines, who used to be chancellor here, is retiring from his LA post. (AP)

Union president Michael Mulgrew called on the public employment review board to reinstate the dismissed teachers.

Ending a relationship via e-mail is insulting, but doing it via FedEx is probably worse.

That’s how 11 staff members at a Queens charter school discovered they’d been fired last Tuesday. Now the city’s teachers union is asking the state’s Public Employment Relations Board to give the teachers their jobs back. Teachers claim that they were fired for protesting the school policies and calling for union representation.

Speaking at a press conference at union headquarters today, UFT president Michael Mulgrew said the firings violated the state’s Taylor Law, which protects workers against discrimination for unionizing.

In 2007, an overwhelming majority of teachers at Merrick Academy voted to make the United Federation of Teachers their exclusive bargaining agent. Merrick became the first of several charter schools to unionize as part of the UFT’s campaign to bring the typically non-union schools under contract. (more…)

Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, speaking today on the steps of the Department of Education

When two courts halted the city’s plans to close 19 public schools this year, judges ruled that the city didn’t follow state law that requires it to engage parents and report the impact that the changes will have on students’ educations.

Now Public Advocate Bill de Blasio is arguing that the city is making the same mistakes when it decides to place multiple schools in the same buildings.

In a report released today, de Blasio charges that the city did not give parents enough information about how changes to space usage would affect instructional programs or about public hearings on the changes.

“They’re just doing the minimum amount of parent outreach so they can say they did,” de Blasio said today.

De Blasio’s office and the Alliance for Quality Education surveyed nearly 875 parents at 34 schools, about half of those that the city proposed moving into new, shared space last year. (Roughly half of public schools citywide currently share building space with other schools.) (more…)

As New York State grapples with improving its standardized tests, officials are asking the federal government for more time to make changes before schools are labeled as struggling.

In an interview on WNYC this morning, host Brian Lehrer asked State Education Commissioner David Steiner whether more difficult tests would mean more failing students and thus an increasing number of schools on the “In Need of Improvement” list. Schools land on the list if students’ test scores don’t increase by a certain amount for two years running. If the list grows, more schools could be closed or restructured.

Acknowledging that harder tests will be a new burden for schools, Steiner said the state was asking the federal government to withhold judgement until the changes are in place:

“What we’re asking them to do is give us a year or two to factor in the major change,” he said. ”We’re doing the same with academic interventions — that schools will have to give to so many more students — so that schools don’t have a huge unfunded mandate.”

If the U.S. Department of Education agrees to go a bit easy on New York schools, it’s unclear whether that would mean a temporary halt to “In Need of Improvement” designations.

Each day we come across inspiring people and organizations doing their part to stem the stream of waste in our public school system. Getting Tools to City Schools is one of these exceptional organizations that is trying to not only make our schools more sustainable, but also ensure that all students in New York City’s public schools have the tools they need to succeed.

Dennis Kitchen

Founded and directed by Dennis Kitchen, Getting Tools to City Schools sells eco-friendly 3-ring binders as a way to fund its charitable mission of providing free, basic school supplies to students in New York City’s low-income public schools. About two-thirds of the students enrolled in the city’s elementary and middle schools can’t afford lunch, much less basic school supplies. In fact, city teachers spend hundreds and even thousands of their own dollars each year to buy basic supplies for their students. So Dennis decided to start a charitable organization that would give these students the necessary supplies they need to perform well in school: a brand new three-ring binder, lined paper, pencil, pens, pocket divider folders and a pencil pouch.

As a way to fund the needed school supplies, Getting Tools to City Schools started selling eco-friendly 3-ring binders. The binders are made of 100 percent recycled paperboard, which is FDA-approved and FSC (Forest Stewardship Council)-certified. (more…)

• An obstacle to a state budget is how SUNY schools should be allowed to set tuition. (WNYC)
• Riverdale/Kingsbridge Academy is mourning a student who drowned on Sunday. (Riverdale Press)
• Investigators: PS 114′s ex-principal mismanaged the school. (GothamSchools, Daily News, Post, NY1)
• Wake County could adopt “controlled choice” admissions policy to foster diversity. (News & Observer)
• Chicago is laying off 400 teachers this week, possibly only temporarily. (Sun-Times)
• Philly’s charter school chief resigned in the city’s latest round of schools shakeups. (Inquirer)