GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

City officials often defend their strategy of replacing large, struggling high schools with smaller ones by arguing that it’s the only proven way to boost student achievement in those schools.

Today, a top official in the office that supports schools as they phase out said that the reasons for why that strategy works remain a mystery.

At a City Council hearing today called to discuss how the Department of Education monitors students in schools as they phase out, officials argued that as schools closing shrink by a grade each year, students receive more individualized support from remaining staff members.

Josh Thomases, the Deputy Chief Academic Officer of the DOE’s school support division, cited a 2005 New York Times story that described the final years of Morris High School in the Bronx, when students reported receiving more individualized attention as the school shrank. The piece recounts an incident in which a student left school one day, forgetting that she had a second Regents exam to take that afternoon. An attendance teacher was dispatched to pick up the student as she got off the bus near her home. (more…)

A delay in special education reforms is the first sign that plans laid out before Chancellor Cathie Black’s arrival might not be carried out as intended.

The Department of Education was supposed to expand changes to special education from 260 schools system-wide this fall. But that plan has been pushed back to 2012, Black told principals in an email earlier this week. The move was first reported by Insideschools, which reported that special education advocates said the city would not have been able to scale up the changes successfully on its original timeline.

The slowdown is notable because it marks Black’s first departure from the script set out for her by her predecessor, Joel Klein. Since being appointed chancellor, Black has largely indicated that she will stay Klein’s course. In her previous “Principals Weekly” emails, she expressed commitments to many of Klein’s priorities, last week inviting more schools to join the Innovation Zone he launched last year.

The special education expansion plan was ambitious from the start. An internal review completed in July 2009 called for substantial reforms. But by February, when the city began explaining its plans to special education advocates, few details had been fleshed out. Changes to state special education requirements and unanswered questions about funding are contributing to the delay, Insideschools reported.

Black’s complete email to principals is below. (more…)

If you take a close look at your school’s lunch menu this month, you’ll see a few entrees marked with a curious little “v,” such as Black Bean Casserole and North African Gumbo.

The “v” stands for “vegetarian,” and these two options are plant-based meals that have been developed by a non-profit organization, the New York Coalition for Healthy School Food, in partnership with the Department of Education’s Office of SchoolFood. Under the leadership of its executive director Amie Hamlin, NYCHSF has been actively working with SchoolFood to introduce more plant-based meals into city school cafeterias. Plant-based entrees contain no cholesterol, are low in saturated fat, and are high in fiber, making them an obvious choice in the city’s efforts to curb childhood obesity and improve overall health.

Founded in 2004, NYCHSF is a statewide organization now working in New York City, the southern region of upstate New York, and Long Island. Amie works out of her home in Ithaca, but she is frequently on the road to oversee projects and give presentations around the state. Currently in 18 city schools, Project Cool School Food is NYCHSF’s largest project. Working with Candle Café and Candle 79 Restaurants, the James Beard Foundation, Manhattan’s Food and Finance High School, and Henry’s Restaurant, NYCHSF develops and tests plant-based entrees that students will enjoy. SchoolFood kitchens develop the recipes before introducing them into the Project Cool School Food pilot program and making them available to other schools as well.

Creating recipes is only one aspect of the Project Cool School Food program. (more…)

• Parents said a plan to move a charter into a Harlem school building will cause overcrowding. (NY1)
• Environmental inspectors have found PCB leaks at PS 11 in Brooklyn. (Wall Street Journal)
• The Times argues the teachers union needs to propose a teacher accountability system or be left behind.
• A mini-school bus flipped yesterday in Brooklyn, injuring three children. (Post)
• Spike Lee will join Arne Duncan at Morehouse College to encourage minorities to go into teaching. (AJC)

Jamaica High School students, teachers and parents cheer a speaker at the school

For the past two weeks, education officials have spent nearly every weeknight holding public hearings at each of the 25 district schools the city wants to close next year. Seventeen of the schools are in this for the second go-around, after a union lawsuit foiled the department’s attempt to close them last year.

As a result, this year’s hearings are both formatted differently — part of an attempt to better explain the closure decisions and avoid another lawsuit — and less emotional, despite communities’ still-simmering anger and frustration.

GothamSchools reporters recently attended three of these hearings.

Jamaica High School

The group of students, teachers and parents that gathered in Jamaica High School’s auditorium was smaller than the large, boisterous crowd that packed last year’s hearing.

But, as several students pointed out, the school is also smaller this year. After the courts blocked the city from closing Jamaica and 18 other high schools last year, the size of the incoming freshman class shrunk dramatically. (more…)

Educators from across East Asia posed with GothamSchools advisory board member Genevieve Wachtell and editor Elizabeth Green Friday.

“Any questions?” I asked last Friday, staring at a room full of educators who’d just watched my standard 15-minute meet-GothamSchools presentation. A hand went up.

“What,” the woman asked slowly, “is the main function of your organization?”

I didn’t think this woman was asking the kind of existential question that sometimes keeps me up at night.* She just wanted the main function.

What was going on here? The person who’d brought the room full of educators offered me an explanation, delicately describing GothamSchools’ mission of offering independent news coverage of public education as “something of a surprise” to the group.

After all, the educators were all senior officials and professors from East Asia — countries including China, Thailand, the Philippines, Fiji, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Singapore. They’d come to GothamSchools as part of a visitor program organized by the U.S. State Department. Their tour, which began January 17 and will go through February, focuses on what the state department describes as “innovations in primary and secondary education.”

Our guests, the official explained to me, had struggled to understand us from the moment they stepped out of their tour bus and into our building’s elevator. “Is this part of the state or the federal government?” one person asked him. They had trouble conceiving of how or why a non-governmental organization would take any interest in public schools, he said. Understanding that journalists could also be independent was even more of a stretch for many. (more…)

• Top DOE deputy Eric Nadelstern is retiring. (GothamSchools, Times, Daily News, WNYC, NY1)
• A Bronx principal was fined for trying to grade teachers unfairly. (GothamSchools, Daily News, Post)
• Upper West Success charter school faces an uphill battle on the Upper West Side. (Times)
• The city is struggling to address new concerns about the prevalence of PCBs in schools. (WNYC)
• Explore Excel Charter School plans to give admissions preference to PS 114 students. (Daily News)
• A Chinatown school has started a club to get students’ grandparents more involved. (Daily News)
• The Post says that the TAPCo scandal means the principal should be scrapped, not Klein’s reforms.
• Michelle Rhee: The feds should require states to give information about school quality. (Times)
• The teacher suspended for blogging about her past as a sex worker has resigned. (Post)
• Parents rallied outside Department of Education headquarters against school closures. (NY1)
• In Harlem, opponents of a Success Academy are comparing the charter school to Hitler. (Daily News)
• Image consultants say Cathie Black needs to act quickly to avoid being tarnished by her gaffes. (Crains)
• Montclair, N.J.’s magnet school system could be threatened by budget cuts. (Wall Street Journal)
• Arne Duncan said the next round of Race to the Top might be open to school districts only. (MPR)
• Texas school districts are deciding how to use school buildings emptied by budget cuts. (Times)

• Ross Global charter is closer to closure after David Steiner declined to approve an appeal. (CityRoom)
• An AFT-commissioned report urges making it easier to dismiss teachers accused of crimes. (Ed Week)
• If most science is learned outside of school, why teach it in the classroom at all? (Ed Week)
• The intervention for a student targeted as needing help, and fast? Transfer. (Pissed Off Teacher)
• Joel Klein describes his Newscorp goals as moving to a “customer-focused” school system. (Reason.tv)
• To get students’ attention, advice to focus less on management and more on teaching. (Miss Brave)
• “Mr. Brosbe loves wrong answers!” his students often exclaim. But some students still worry. (Community)
• This is just a reminder that the Department of Education as a position in charge of pre-K. (SimplyHired)
• A newspaper’s editorial board urges charter schools and the district to “come together.” (Inquirer)
• The usefulness of encouraging students to asses their teachers. (Joanne Jacobs)

After 39 years, Deputy Chancellor Eric Nadelstern is leaving the Department of Education just as new Chancellor Cathie Black is beginning her tenure. In a brief interview with GothamSchools on the day he announced his retirement, Nadelstern gave his take on why he’s leaving and what he’s leaving behind.

What’s the right greeting here?  Congrats?

Well, it’s congratulations and good luck.

So why are you retiring now? And where are you off to?

After almost 40 years I’m ready for new challenges. I’ve had a number of very interesting offers — public, private, not-for-profit — all around my area of expertise. I haven’t decided yet, don’t want to rush it. I may wind up teaching at a university…very strong offer along those lines. Had an offer from a state education department outside of New York…I’m sure when the time comes, my dance card will be full.

In December you were telling people that you’d stay through the year. What changed?

That was my intention. A couple of things really — I turned 60 in October, hopefully you’ll have a chance to find out how reflective [you get] when you reach that milestone.

I had a pension consultation recently and there were financial advantages to making the decision sooner than later. That and talking it over with my family thinking about the kinds of things in life after the DOE. It seemed like the right time.

Does this have anything to do with Chancellor Cathie Black’s arrival?

It’s completely independent. In the weeks I’ve worked with Cathie I’ve not only come to admire her, I’ve come to like her…There’s an enormous amount to learn. I think in an earlier point in my career I [would have liked to work with her]. I think at this stage there are really other things that I’d like to do. (more…)