GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

After warning that overcrowding in public schools will be worse this year, teachers union president Michael Mulgrew is trying to publicly assure his members that he plans to be tough on the issue.

During the first few weeks of school in New York City, class sizes fluctuate as new students arrive and others transfer schools, making it difficult to pin down which buildings will experience severe overcrowding. But the union is already going to court to reduce class size at one chronically overcrowded Queens high school.

The United Federation of Teachers asked for a court order today that union officials said would confirm an arbitrator’s March order that the Department of Education reduce class sizes at Francis Lewis High School. City officials said that they have a plan to lower class sizes and that the arbitrator has given them until September 23 to comply.

“It is hard to understand why the UFT would prematurely rush to court when we’ve been working together, with an arbitrator, to find a sustainable solution for the school,” said a spokesman for the DOE in an email.

A union official said that without the court order, Francis Lewis teachers would have to file new grievances and go through arbitration again. (more…)

It’s officially education-conversation season! In the next two days alone, two city officials will debate their critics at public forums notable for their relative mainstream-ness. (Venues this month range from the 92nd Street Y in Tribeca to The Economist’s two-day ideas festival.)

Since we’re co-hosting one of these events — a panel next Wednesday on the future of teaching — I figured I’d do a quick roundup of the highlights from the calendar. Here are four opportunities to debate, including one that doesn’t require you to leave your computer.

1. Chief Accountability Officer v. Chief Critic: A Lunchtime Smackdown

Tomorrow, head to New York Law School on your lunch break to watch Leonie Haimson, the executive director of Class Size Matters, debate sit on a panel with Shael Suransky, the city’s deputy chancellor for accountability. Haimson is a devoted student of the flaws in the city’s progress reports, which Suransky makes, and which will be coming out soon.

(UPDATE: The panel won’t have a debate format, reports its moderator a New York Law professor.) (more…)

Students in some city schools get to eat mountains of fresh produce straight from local farms. In others, ketchup counts as a serving of vegetables.

The disparity is in some ways a product of increased attention to food quality in schools, from Jamie Oliver’s Emmy-Award-winning reality show “Food Revolution” to First Lady Michele Obama’s calls for better school food to combat childhood obesity. You’d think that in such a climate, with a mayor committed to public health issues, we’d start to see some genuine improvements to the food in city’s public schools. Unfortunately, in many ways we’re seeing just the opposite.

A $24 million budget cut to the Department of Education’s Office of SchoolFood is not only limiting meal choices at lunch time and decreasing the hours of kitchen staff, but also reducing the number of schools participating in the Universal Free Meals Program. (more…)

SAT scores of city public school students rose slightly over last year’s scores, bringing a four-year trend of declining performance to an end, according to data released by the Department of Education today.

The average city SAT score was five points higher on the reading portion of the test, four points higher on the math, and two points higher for writing. The gains are statistically significant, but not yet great enough to cancel out several years of loses. Today, the city’s average scores to roughly where they were two years ago.

City students’ average score was 439 out of 800 on the reading section, 462 on math, and 434 on writing.

The score increases are mainly due to improved results from Asian, white, and Hispanic students. Black students’ scores stagnated, except in the case of the writing SAT, where they fell by three points. (more…)

The cyclical nature of teaching is at once comforting and disturbing. A new school year means a fresh start, a chance to “get things right” or try new things. After your first few years it’s also a return to the familiar as you reestablish the rules, routines and procedures that have come to define your classroom. And in one way, it can be terrifying, because you may meet reincarnations of past students, including the archetypal “problem children.”

Now, of course, children are as unique as snowflakes, and no two are identical. But once you have seen your fair share of students you start to notice certain recurring characters in your classroom drama, some of whom you wish you could avoid. Today I met a student who reminds me in many ways of my ALP, my old arch-nemesis from my first year of teaching. He’s very bright, very verbal, and loves to push the boundaries of acceptable behavior.

Luckily, while this may be a new cycle of the school year, I haven’t lost the lessons from years past. While ALP was able to antagonize me and basically usurp control of my classroom in my first year, I don’t foresee anyone under five feet taking over my classroom this year. I have learned countless ways to exert and express authority over the 28 (yes 28!) new little people in my classroom without the shouting matches and frustration that characterized my first year of teaching. So while it may be a bit daunting to see a new version of an old challenge, in the familiarity I’m able to see my own growth, and that’s encouraging.

• The SAT scores of New York State students continued a slow decline last year. (Post)
• Nationally, more high school students than ever took the college entrance exam. (Times)
• Some families were turned away from their crowded neighborhood schools last week. (Daily News)
• A family says the principal of Queens’ PS 135 was angry when they asked about test scores. (NY1)
• The principal of Voyages, an alternative school in Queens, is up for an award. (P0st)
• Anthony Weiner argues that the time has come for city students to get e-textbooks. (Daily News)
• A new study found black middle school students are suspended 3-4 times as often as white ones. (Times)
• In the past, schools kept files about students’ character and appearance. (Times)
• President Obama’s back-to-school speech today will focus on ambition. (Washington Post)
• Some districts are trying to increase the percentage of eligible students who eat free lunch. (USA Today)

• The Perkins v. Smikle race is all about charter schools, but maybe only in the media. (Capital New York)
• A show about the public school on Governor’s Island airs tonight at 9 p.m. (NYC media)
• Obama’s back-to-school speech hasn’t attracted the controversy it did last year. (Rick Hess)
• From the first day of 8th grade, talk of high school admissions is in the air. (InsideSchools)
• The number of high schoolers taking the SAT increased this year. (New York Times)
• Scores went up a little in math, but were flat in reading and writing. (Edweek)
• A teacher says the city is not good at showing teachers how to use technology. (Pissed Off Teacher)
• When a teacher and his school hit barriers, Michelle Rhee stepped in. (Class Struggle)
• An online forum plans to collect teachers’ thoughts on policy, then bring them to lawmakers. (VIVA)
• If teachers’ jobs depend on test scores, cheating will go overlooked, writes a teacher. (Indypendent)

Last week, a Teach for America alumnus, one-time KIPP teacher, and Harlem charter school founder declared that he does not believe in education “reform” — at least as it’s currently imagined. That’s despite the fact that Marc Waxman, who has moved to Denver since founding the Future Leaders Institute, is on the verge of opening a second charter school.

In the piece, published by Education News Colorado, Waxman said that the education historian Diane Ravitch’s public change-of-heart — in her book “The Death and Life of the Great American School System” — moved him to make his own views public. He wrote:

It’s not that I agree with everything Ravitch says.  It’s just that I felt like it was a courageous act on her part to write it.  Frankly, it was inspiring and motivating.

Now, Diane Ravitch has responded to Waxman in a letter published in our Community section and on Education News Colorado. Read it here.

Also of note, from Ravitch’s stuffed speaking schedule, is news that she will address an audience of KIPP and Teach for America educators next month. Her calendar item:

October 14, 2010 (Houston): KIPP, Teach for America, and Rice Education Entrepreneurship Programs, Ley Student Center at Rice University, Grand Hall, 7:10–7:50 p.m. (open to the public).

In the wake of new evidence that New York State’s standardized tests have become easier to pass, education officials and state legislators have focused on moving on and improving the exams. But Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr. would like to revisit the past.

In a letter to Senator Suzi Oppenheimer, who chairs the State Senate’s education committee, Diaz demanded that Oppenheimer call State Education Commissioner Richard Mills in to testify at hearings about the exams. Mills oversaw the State Education Department for 14 years and retired in 2009.

“Many of the issues occurred under his watch and he has a responsibility to answer the many questions that these recent results have raised,” Diaz wrote.

Oppenheimer has already said she plans to hold hearings in Manhattan that will focus on the now-lowered passing rates and re-calibrated proficiency standards, but she told the New York Post that she doesn’t want to drag Mills to the witness stand.

“‘I see no value in it,” she said. “He did what was best back then.” (more…)

In the following letter, education historian and author Diane Ravitch responds to an opinion piece by Marc Waxman, an educator based in Denver. Education News Colorado published Waxman’s piece, “Why I Don’t Believe in ‘Reform,’” on Sept. 7. This post is cross-posted at Education News Colorado.

Dear Marc,

I was surprised and delighted to read your essay explaining your loss of faith in the now-dominant narrative about school reform. These days, everyone seems to be either in one camp or the other; most everyone seems to have rock-solid beliefs; and all too few people seem willing to re-examine their beliefs.

I was trying to do that in my book, and as you know, it is painful. It is also risky. In your case, you risk alienating friends, allies, even financial supporters. I had more freedom than you; my work life is behind me, I don’t need any financial supporters, and my children are on their own. But it is scary to take risks, and not many people are willing to do it.

I was heartened to read your admission, in light of your experience, that charter schools are not a panacea. That is a bold admission to make at a time when three new movies are trying to persuade the American public that charter schools are indeed a panacea. The charter movement unfortunately has built a narrative around the ideology that charter schools are not only a panacea but that they can beat regular public schools by the only metric that matters: test scores. (more…)