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Deputy Chancellor Eric Nadelstern is raising suspicion that this school year may be his last.

Nadelstern told school network leaders at a meeting earlier this week that he plans to stay with the Department of Education “at least through June,” leading them to speculate that the DOE’s most senior educator may be planning his exit.

Nadelstern, a 39-year veteran of the city school system, had been broadly considered a potential successor to outgoing Schools Chancellor Joel Klein. After Mayor Michael Bloomberg gave that post to publishing executive Cathie Black, some noted that Nadelstern was a natural choice for the new Chief Academic Officer position created as part of the deal that sealed Black’s appointment. That position went to another of Klein’s deputies, Shael Polakow-Suransky.

After the city’s deputy chancellor for finance and technology Photeine Anagnostopoulos resigned the day after Klein announced his departure, some DOE staff speculated that other departures were on the way.

City officials have been holding on-again-off-again meetings with the teachers union to discuss the fate of the nearly 60 schools that could be closed or have their principals removed this year.

A source familiar with the meetings said they’ve been going on throughout the fall and have been spearheaded, on the DOE’s side, by Deputy Chancellor John White. A union official said part of the reason for the talks is that the city is eager to avoid another lawsuit like the one last year that barred the planned closure of 19 schools.

“I think they’re making a real attempt to avoid what led us to win that suit against them,” said the official. “I don’t think it’s any glasnost, there’s no kumbaya here. But they’re making an effort to avoid getting sued.”

City and union officials would not comment on the substance of the discussions. As early as next week, city officials will begin announcing which schools they plan to keep open, which will close, and which will undergo one of several “turnaround” models mandated by the federal government.

City officials are also trying to iron out an agreement with the principal’s union that will let them use the turnaround method in some schools, according to the Council for School Supervisors and Administrators spokeswoman Chiara Coletti. (more…)

Cathie Black’s radio silence appears to be ending.

Today the chancellor appointee gave her first formal interview since Mayor Michael Bloomberg named her to the post more than three weeks ago. The appearance comes after criticism that the city has kept Black shielded from the public eye.

WABC 7 reporter Art McFarland accompanied Black on a visit to the Spruce Street School, an elementary school located at the Department of Education’s Tweed Courthouse headquarters. The DOE has already tweeted a photograph from the segment, which will air this evening.

A DOE spokeswoman did not respond to a query about whether other reporters will now have access to Ms. Black.

ABC didn’t get Black’s first sit-down. That honor goes to NBC’s “The Apprentice.” On an episode that aired two weeks ago, one contestant won a meeting with Black, but footage of the meeting wasn’t televised. Now it has been posted as a web exclusive on NBC’s site.

In the clip, Black gives business advice to the contestant, identified as Steuart, a “fledgling entrepreneur” with some failed ventures under his belt. Black shares the lessons she learned from her experience closing magazines at Hearst.

“What we learned was that in this economy, in the world today, in this changing media culture, that we have to do it with a much smaller team,” she said. “Whenever I hear about somebody starting a business, I say, ‘keep your overhead low.’”

Black was scheduled for another meeting today, with UFT President Michael Mulgrew, sources said. That meeting got postponed, though it’s not clear why.

Collin Lawrence is a former New York City teacher who is recounting his four years working at a Brooklyn high school. Read Collin’s previous posts.

The Brooklyn Arts Academy was the brainchild of the principal, a man who openly talked about how he hated public school growing up and only found himself after discovering music. He wanted to create a school that promoted student self-expression via elective course offerings taught by professional artists and musicians. While a lot of planning went into this aspect of the school, less thought was put into developing structures to support the core-subject teachers.

As such, by the second year of the school’s operation, the staff found itself struggling to address problems retroactively — problems that might have been avoided with more proactive planning. In all-staff and small group meetings, we were so overwhelmed that our conversations would meander from one issue to the next without resulting in a coherent plan of action.

Then, midyear, the principal decided to change course dramatically after he visited an international school in Queens. I was invited along to observe this school, which used a “grade-level team” structure. I sat in on a “team meeting,” wherein a group of teachers who shared the same students met to troubleshoot. What struck me most was how coolly calm these teachers were in comparison to us. The issue they were addressing in the meeting I observed was a student who wouldn’t put away his iPod. If this was their most pressing issue, I thought, than this school doesn’t even make sense for us to observe.

But my principal came away with a different impression. (more…)

• Protestors fighting Cathie Black’s appointment are threatening legal challenges. (GS, NY1)
• Howard Wolfson falls into the “losers” category for bungling Black’s debut. (City Hall News)
• A Cardozo HS student and track star is fighting a rare blood disorder. (Daily News)
• The PTA treasurer of Sojourner Truth Elementary stole over $1,200 from the school. (Post)
• Michelle Rhee has joined the transition team of Florida’s governor-elect. (Washington Post)
• A filmmaker is exposing Orange County’s history of segregation in schools. (LA Times)
• Readers respond to Diane Ravitch’s suggestions for the GOP’s education platform. (WSJ)

• Bloomberg says Cathie Black isn’t a public servant yet, so her school visits aren’t public. (DN)
• The Awl slams the Department of Ed’s press strategy for Black’s debut. (The Awl)
• A student skips schools, but dazzles subway riders with his math skills. (GS Community)
• A teacher finds that a classroom problem he’d solved has reappeared this year. (GS Community)
• Rubert Murdoch’s new media project may employ Klein’s education knowledge. (CNBC)
• Surveying the work of Generation Klein 9th graders, a teacher doesn’t see progress. (NYC Educator)
• Students and staff at Sheepshead Bay HS are protesting the school’s possible closure. (Ed Notes)
• New York has fewer students than Texas, but similar numbers of special ed students. (Flypaper)
• Education credentials aside, is Black even prepared to manage the DOE? (More Thoughtful)
• NJ Gov. Christie is ordering another district to lower its superintendent’s salary. (WSJ)
• Massachusetts, Ohio, and other states are seeing districts opt out of RttT. (EdWeek)
• House voted up a bill that would increase free meals in schools, improve nutrition. (WaPo)

Wearing red to demonstrate their opposition to Mayor Michael Bloomberg's choice of publishing executive Cathleen Black for chancellor, protestors gathered on the steps of DOE headquarters at Tweed Courthouse today.

Although publishing executive Cathleen Black cleared the last formal hurdle to her appointment as chancellor on Monday, opponents of her appointment aren’t giving up yet.

More than 100 people converged on the steps of the Department of Education’s headquarters at Tweed Courthouse this evening — the largest protest yet against Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s choice for chancellor — and legal action to block the appointment may be coming within days.

Roger Wareham, an attorney working with City Councilman Charles Barron and the Freedom Party, said he plans to file suit against State Education Commissioner David Steiner, who this week waived the legal credential requirements that Black needed to become chancellor. (more…)

Soon-to-be Chancellor Cathie Black is not visiting schools today — not even privately — but she is making phone calls to elected officials.

Black put in a call to Assemblywoman Joan Millman, a former New York City teacher who urged State Education Commissioner David Steiner to deny Black the waiver she needed to become the next schools chancellor.

“Cathie introduced herself and the assemblywoman said, “It’s not personal, no offense, but as a former educator I’d like for there to have been a public search and I think the chancellor should have an education background,’” said Millman’s Chief of Staff Paul Nelson.

“It was a very brief conversation, less than five minutes,” he said.

Millman’s staff is in the process of drafting a bill that would prevent someone like Black, who has years of experience in the publishing business, but none in the education world, from becoming chancellor. It would take away the commissioner’s ability to give a candidates a waiver if they don’t have the education credentials required in state law. (more…)

Yesterday was the day of my formal observation. While I can’t say it was a home run, I know that I executed a well-planned, focused lesson that included all the elements of balanced literacy. I fully expect to have earned an “S” (Oh, the joys of a binary rating system).

As so often happens with observed lessons, at least for me, my mind wasn’t completely engaged on the immediate task at hand. While I taught, I tried to simultaneously see my classroom and my teaching through the eyes of my observer. It can be a bit disorienting, and I imagine it probably detracts from the instruction. But I can’t help it, and if nothing else, it prepares me for the impending constructive criticism.

So what did my observer and I see? For one, I expect to get pointers on modeling more effectively and giving students a clear sense of the task. This is an area I’m continually working on. However, I’m also expecting to hear about a problem that is new, sort of, and that’s classroom management. (more…)

The Department of Education is filling its top finance role, empty for three weeks, with a veteran of outgoing Chancellor Joel Klein’s central administration.

Veronica Conforme will serve as the department’s new Chief Financial Officer, city officials announced today.

Conforme is taking over part of the role that was previously filled by Photeine Anagnostopoulos, who served as Deputy Chancellor for Finance and Technology until she resigned the day after Chancellor Joel Klein announced that he was leaving.

Conforme joined the DOE in 2003 and has worked as the Deputy Director of Finance and Administration as well as Chief Operating Officer for the Empowerment Schools network. She’s currently the Deputy Chief Schools Officer for Operations in the Division of School Support and Instruction.

Conforme will not have a “deputy chancellor” title, but she will be part of the Cabinet, the elite group of advisors who have the most access to the chancellor.

A DOE spokeswoman said that the department was still considering who should take on Anagnostopoulos’ work in the area of technology. (more…)