GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

• Well-meaning skeptics of college for all ultimately are troublingly elitist. (David Leonhardt)
• Manhattan Beep Scott Stringer won’t get DOE data he asked for until it’s too late. (Daily Politics)
• After trying to teach respect all year, a teacher ponders why the lessons haven’t sunk in. (GS Community)
• The importance of strengthening the 60% of evaluation systems that isn’t test-based. (LoHud)
• Education is a strong weapon in black men’s struggle for survival, a teacher says. (NPR)
• A Philly Inquirer reporter explains her investigation into charter schools that fail. (Fresh Air)
• A reading teacher discovers the importance of building students’ metacognition. (ACSD)
• Meet a city teacher who’s affected by the budget deal, by having his sabbatical canceled. (JD2718)
• A retirement wish list from a teacher who is still just starting out. (Mr. Foteah)

The major item on the agenda at tonight’s Panel for Educational Policy meeting is more than a dozen charter school co-location plans. The plans are at the heart of a lawsuit, filed by the teachers union and NAACP, to halt school closures and stop some charter schools from opening, moving, or expanding.

The PEP already voted on the plans once, but in response to the lawsuit, the Department of Education revised all of them over the last several weeks, seeking to equalize allocations of shared space between charter schools and district schools. If the panel approves the new plans tonight, some of the equity charges made in the lawsuit could be neutralized.

I’ll be filing reports throughout the meeting.

10:30 p.m. Panel members have voted and, as expected, have approved all of the co-location plans before them tonight. Votes for seven of the plans each received four votes in opposition, from appointees of borough presidents. Those plans were for the co-locations at P368, Teaching Firms of America Charter School at P.S. 308; Democracy Prep 3 at P.S. 154; Promise Academy I and II at the Choir Academy of Harlem; Harlem Success Academy 1 at P.S. 123; and Upper West Success Academy at Brandeis High School. But with a majority of panel members being mayoral appointees, the opposition was easily outvoted.

Last week, lawyers debating the UFT-NAACP lawsuit called today “D-Day” for the case. That’s because the space-sharing plans approved tonight address many of the complaints lodged against the original plans in the lawsuit. Whether and how Judge Paul Feinman, who is assigned to the suit, takes the new plans into account remains to be seen, but last week he signaled that he might when he deferred making a final decision about whether to halt the city’s co-location plans.

9:45 p.m. Many of the testimonies tonight have criticized a few specific co-location plans: for P.S. 308 and P368, in Bedford-Stuyvesant, and Brandeis High School. P.S. 308 graduate Aquila Raiford, who went on to attend Stuyvesant High School and then Dartmouth College, testified that it was the quality education she received at Clara Cardwell that paved her road. She returned to P.S. 308 as an English teacher and now opposes any additional co-location at her school.

“Bringing in any school inside 308 is going to ruin the learning environment,” she said after her testimony. She pointed to safety issues of placing young children of incoming Teaching Firms of America Charter School on the building’s third floor.

9:30 p.m. As promised, I’m posting video (above) from the altercation earlier tonight between Hazel Dukes of the NAACP and charter school advocates. (more…)

With their schools’ budgets for next year finally in hand, principals are now being tasked with cutting nearly 2.5 percent.

Department of Education officials announced the cuts this morning in an online presentation to principals, many of whom had grown anxious about heading into summer vacation without knowing how much they would be able to spend next year. School-level budgets, usually announced in late May or early June, had been held up by city negotiations over Mayor Bloomberg’s threat to lay off teachers. A deal reached Friday night averted layoffs with a mix of union concessions and City Council funds.

Now, even though there will be no layoffs, schools will still suffer budget cuts of $178 million, or an average of 2.43 percent, according to the presentation. That follows a 4 percent cut last year, and school officials say many schools remain likely to trim their staffs.

“Given the current budget conditions, we expect that many schools will be compelled to excess teachers,” reads one slide of the presentation. “Many of the teachers placed in excess will be capable and effective teachers, and we are committed to creating opportunities for them to be promptly hired elsewhere.”

The DOE’s central administration budget will fall by 13.5 percent, according to the presentation. (more…)

A small gathering of protesters join Basilica Johnson (left), the parent of an autistic son who opposes a charter school co-location in her school building.

A Bedford-Stuyvesant school protest that was supposed to end up at Tweed Courthouse was cancelled abruptly this morning because too few people showed up.

Basilica Johnson, whose son Deron is autistic and one of 72 special- needs students enrolled at the Star Program, organized the rally because of concerns she had about a proposal to open Brooklyn Success Academy, a new charter school, inside the building. The Star Program would lose two classrooms this fall under the plan.

About a half dozen others joined Johnson at 8:30 a.m. for the protest, which was advertised to end with a larger rally outside of Tweed at 10:30 a.m. They distributed hand-outs and carried signs, but after about 90 minutes, Johnson called the protest off.

Many of her fellow parents weren’t aware of the co-location plans, she said. (more…)

Charter school parents and advocates protest outside UFT headquarters today.

Charter school parents and teachers took their fight against the UFT and NAACP’s school closure and co-location lawsuit to the headquarters of the main group that filed it.

About 250 people gathered this morning outside the United Federation of Teachers’ Lower Manhattan offices to demand that the union drop the lawsuit, which would stop 16 charter schools from opening, moving, or expanding. They emphasized that some charter schools are set to start their school years in as few as six weeks but don’t yet know where or if they will be opening.

The protest was the first that specifically targeted the teachers union since the lawsuit was filed May 18. Last month, a much larger group of protesters rallied outside the Harlem headquarters of the NAACP, which joined the UFT in the suit.

Protesters chanted a series of slogans for nearly an hour, at one point shouting “UFT: Apologize” for more than three minutes straight. The demand referenced a statement made last week by a union lawyer that he would not negotiate with charter school advocates until they apologized to the NAACP.

UFT officials took a softer line today, handing out baked goods and hats emblazoned with the union’s logo. Later, two UFT officials rolled a coffee cart along the side of the protest bullpen. (more…)

I wasn’t surprised when I came back from my end-of-the-year meeting with my principal, and found my students, as per usual, had gone wild in my absence. My few troublemakers never miss an opportunity to, you know, make trouble the second I’m out of the classroom. Still, I was surprised to find the teacher who had been covering me so upset and emotional.

“I have watched Mr. Brosbe teach you about respect all year and he makes time every week to teach you about respect, and I feel very disrespected right now,” she said.

And that sums up the problem pretty nicely. Despite devoting numerous lessons this year to respect as part of what I call “The Peacemaker’s Program,” many of my students still show no signs of truly grasping the concept of respect for others. In addition, my school unveiled a initiative called Respect for All, part of a city anti-bullying campaign. This is on top of the existing anti-bullying efforts my school had in place.

So, suffice it to say, my students have had a few opportunities to learn about respect, talk about respect, and roleplay respectful behavior. Nonetheless, problems with respect persist. There are times when students don’t respect property. There are times they don’t respect each other. And there are times they don’t respect teachers. Is teaching respect an impossible task? (more…)

• What counts for course credit varies widely from school to school, especially in gym classes. (Times)
• A memo at Flushing High School shows a grade floor and many chances for makeup work. (Daily News)
• Michael Goodwin: Dennis Walcott told me he wants to hear about cheating allegations personally. (Post)
• City officials: The DOE is paying the New Teacher Project even though it has no contract. (Daily News)
• A budget deal will prevent teacher layoffs. (Gothamschools, Daily News, Times, WSJ, NY1)
• The Post says that Bloomberg didn’t match actions to his budget threats, unlike Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
• Schools in the city and nationally are cutting librarians, even when doing so violates regulations. (Times)
• Teachers say student behavior is out of control at Harlem’s MS 344, which the city wants to close. (Post)
• An arbitrator upheld the city’s bid to fire a teacher who joked about students’ death on Facebook. (Post)
• The daughter of Brooklyn’s NAACP chapter attends a boarding school in New Hampshire. (Post)
• The Daily News says the NAACP should have fought “last in, first out” layoff rules, which aren’t needed.
• The new principal at Brooklyn’s PS 107 was an assistant principal at nearby PS 321. (Brooklyn Paper)
• Thurgood Marshall Academy grad Rokya Samake went from struggling to squash-playing. (WNYC)
• Chicago’s Austin Polytech has graduated its first class, but its success is anything but assured. (Times)
• A nonprofit called year Up provides job training for young adults using mostly private money. (Post)
• With budget cuts on the way in San Diego, many fear class sizes will rise. (Times)
• A Chicago high school that is trying to use data more rationally is beginning to see some results. (WSJ)

Plans to lay off 4,100 teachers were averted late Friday evening as part of a deal struck between the Bloomberg administration, the City Council and the teachers unions.

At least two union concessions and restoration money from the City Council were negotiated into the deal in order to save the jobs.

The first concession is that all one-year teaching sabbaticals are suspended for the 2012-2013 school year. The sabbaticals allow teachers to remain partially-paid while they take an extended leave of absence. The agreement will not apply to the health restorations.

A city aide confirmed the deal and estimated that the suspended sabbaticals would save the city $17 million.

The second concession is that teachers in the Absent Teacher Reserve, or ATR, will be redeployed to fill substitute teaching positions, which are currently filled by teachers who work on a per diem basis. The daily rate for substitutes is approximately $154.97  (and $180/day for subs who have filled in for longer than 30 days). That money would be saved because the ATR, a pool of teachers without full time positions who remain on payroll, would be able to replace those spots. Under the agreement, each week teachers from ATRs can be sent to a different school in their district.

Put together, the concessions are expected to save the city a total of $60 million.

“I want to thank all the parties involved in this agreement for their willingness to come together to prevent the harm that would come to our students from a massive loss of public school teachers,” UFT President Michael Mulgrew said in a statement. “In particular I’d like to cite the key role played by Council Speaker Christine Quinn and her members and staff, along with Chancellor Dennis Walcott and the DOE officials who worked with us to find ways to prevent what could have been a disaster for our schools.”

The budget deal also found money to keep open 20 firehouses that were slated to close under Bloomberg’s budget. More than 1,000 jobs in non-uniform and non-pedagogical titles could not be saved from the deal, however.

It’s not immediately clear how long the agreement would last, or whether it requires approval from then entire union membership. A press conference with UFT President Michael Mulgrew is scheduled in downtown Manhattan at 10:30 p.m. tonight.

Chancellor Walcott emailed principals later Friday night to inform them of the budget agreement and said to expect their budgets by Monday afternoon. He alluded to the anticipated cuts, which he called “difficult, but necessary, decisions.”

“Each school will face difficult choices, but I am confident that you are the best group of principals in the history of New York City’s public schools and will meet these challenges head on,” Walcott wrote in the email. He did not specify the percent of the cuts.

The City Council still needs to vote on the final budget, which it has until Thursday, when the 2011 fiscal year ends.

• Special education teachers need more English and math knowledge. (Joanne Jacobs)
• If Cameron Diaz were a real teacher, a bonus probably couldn’t buy her breast implants. (JJ)
• Many are still waiting to find out where they will go to school in September. (Insideschools)
• Student on Teaching Fellows, TFA’ers: “students don’t want to learn from them.” (GS Community)
• Sarah Garland, of the Hechinger Report, is chronicling her education reporting in India. (LFA)
• Science and arts advocates are fighting for equal status with math and reading. (Ed Week)
• Joel Klein responds to Aaron Pallas’s critique of Joel Klein and achievement data. (Answer Sheet)
• Detroit Public Schools spent $1.6 million on travel as budget woes mounted. (Free Press)
• A look at the NAACP/charter battle through the eyes of a charter school student. (The Economist)
• A new web resource goes in-depth with data on K-12 and higher ed budget issues. (FEBP)
• Families: things to do this summer in the city from parks to reading to music. (Insideschools)

A desperate phone push to save thousands of teacher layoffs has yielded mixed results, depending on who you ask.

On Tuesday, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio launched a phone drive to implore New Yorkers to dial 311 – the city’s service line – and file complaints about Mayor Bloomberg’s plan to lay off 4,100 teachers as part of his budget proposal.

Since then, 311 operators have received at most 336 calls about the budget, according to data from the Department of Information of Technology and Telecommunications. That number spiked on Tuesday, with 109, and again today, with 83.

DoITT tracks all 311 calls, which amount to over 50,000 per day. Spokesman Nick Sbordone ran the data for three categories that are relevant to de Blasio’s phone drive: “NYC Budget Proposal”; “School Closures and Budget Cuts” and “Comments for the Mayor.”

Average daily calls specifically about school budget cuts doubled compared to the previous week, but the overall totals still fell below what some had hoped.

“That’s all the phone calls that came into 311?” asked Leonie Haimson, who organized her own efforts via email today. “I would have hoped that there would be thousands of phone calls.”

De Blasio, whose phone drive goal was to reach 2,500 people through his phone drive, was more optimistic about the turnout.

“That so many are flooding the phones in the lead-up to the budget decision shows just how big a priority this is for anyone with children in our public schools,” he said.