GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

Led by Anzhela Mordyga, students leave a "memorial service" for closed schools outside Tweed Courthouse today.

Carrying small coffins and wearing mostly black, a group of about 100 high school students held a “memorial service” today for schools the city has closed.

The teens were organized by the Urban Youth Collaborative, a coalition of activist groups that is advocating for the city to add new resources for struggling schools instead of closing them. A recent graduate, Anzhela Mordyga, wore a black gown as she conducted the mock funeral service outside Department of Education headquarters. Another student scattered flowers as the group recessed to City Hall Park.

“This funeral service represents the damages and pain when schools are closed,” said Joseph Duarte, a freshman at Samuel Gompers High School, where students are worried that their school could be next to land on the city’s chopping block. Students who spoke at the event said they mourned not only school closures — Mayor Bloomberg has attempted 91 since he took control of schools — but also a lack of public engagement in education.

The memorial service drew attention to an issue that is at the heart of the UFT-NAACP lawsuit currently working its way through the courts. (more…)

Among the many changes going on in the New York City school world are some incredibly small (but significant!) ones here at GothamSchools.

From new guidelines for commenting to a Community section submission policy to bios of our new staff members, all the changes are aimed at having a more productive, transparent conversation.

You can find everything on our new “About” page, which we just updated. Among the new information:

• Biographies of the fantastic new staff members whose stories have populated GothamSchools in recent weeks. Meet reporter Geoffrey Decker and contributors Chris Arp and Sarah Darville.
• Explanations of how we put together our daily Rise & Shine and Remainders posts — and information about how to help us with them.
• Guidelines for commenters, which incorporate suggestions our readers made when we first proposed a comments policy in January.
• A submissions policy for the Community section, for the first time ever. Here’s how to contribute your voice: (more…)

• The City Council could dip into its own health fund for retirees to avert some teacher layoffs. (Post)
• Most city charter schools cut costs by opting out of the state teacher penion system and into others. (Post)
• Advocates are pressuring the city to counsel students before suspending them. (Daily News)
• A judge delayed ruling on school closures and co-locations. (GothamSchools, Post, Times, NY1, WNYC)
• Unequal cosmetic upgrades within school buildings are at the heart of the dispute. (NY1)
• High schools’ often troubling CUNY remediation rates will factor into their next progress reports. (Times)
• Staten Island’s Tottenville High School’s baseball field is getting top-of-the-line upgrades. (S.I. Advance)
• Students in Ridgewood, N.J., learned about physical disabilities into their academic classes. (Times)

• Bill Clinton received a lifetime achievement award at the National Charter Schools Conference. (GPB)
• An argument that Clinton was an advocate for charter schools but not a groundbreaking on. (Edspresso)
• Six city schools are among 63 schools in the state on a list of the nation’s best high schools. (Newsweek)
• Jay Mathews adds the rankings, which he started, to his School Rating Scoundrels Club. (Class Struggle)
• Jon Huntsman, a Republican and former foe of NCLB, is running for president. (Politics K-12)
• N.J. Gov. Chris Christie really doesn’t want you to know where his kids went to school. (Atlantic Wire)
• Collin Lawrence on why he turned down a job offer to stay at his frustrating school. (GS Community)
• Joel Klein has hired Diana Rhoten, a founder of Startl.org, to be senior VP for strategy. (Marketwatch)
• Diane Ravitch lists the reasons she’ll march at a national rally in D.C. July 30. (Bridging Differences)
• Students at the private Dwight School use Twitter and Facebook in social media classes. (City Room)
• A founder of School of One says the model will expand nationally, even if not by that name. (Mind/Shift)
• Michigan’s bid to recreate Detroit’s school system will require union cooperation. (Teacher Beat)

A highly-anticipated day in court in a fight over school closures and co-locations ended in a draw Tuesday afternoon, with both sides agreeing to keep a restraining order on any immediate plans for new schools.

Judge Paul Feinman extended a temporary restraining order against the city’s plans but said he needed more time to decide whether the plans should be halted permanently.

That means the Department of Education is still prohibited from moving forward with any construction or renovation plans meant to set district school buildings up for co-location.

That isn’t a huge concern at the moment, though, because school doesn’t end for another week. The earliest planned construction for a co-location is at Brandeis High School, where the Upper West Success Academy is slated to open in the fall. That construction is supposed to begin July 1, but in a separate lawsuit, Feinman ordered a temporary stay construction there as well.

Feinman isn’t likely to make a decision until after June 27, when the Panel for Educational Policy holds its next meeting. At that meeting, which some lawyers referred to as “D Day,” the PEP will vote on revised co-location plans for almost all of the charter schools listed in the lawsuit. (more…)

BaShan Taylor reads a script opposing school budget cuts over the phone. (Photo: Chris Arp)

With less than 10 days before the city’s budget deadline and no deal yet on education cuts, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio is encouraging parents to take to the phones.

When Chris stopped by the “11th Hour Phone Bank” at de Blasio’s 1 Centre Street office earlier this evening, about 20 people had turned up to make phone calls. Organizers said they hoped to ask 2,500 people tonight to call 311 with their opposition to the budget cuts and planned teacher layoffs. (more…)

A street fight preceded the courtroom fight today as supporters and opponents of a lawsuit to stop 22 school closures and 17 charter school co-locations held separate rallies before the suit’s first legal proceedings began.

About 50 supporters of the lawsuit gathered outside the building with signs that read “Separate and unequal” and “Thank you NAACP.” The suit’s opponents, mostly charter school advocates who have been agitating against the NAACP since shortly after the group filed the suit along with the city teachers union, had also called a rally to precede the hearing.

Geoff is on the scene at 60 Centre Street, the Manhattan State Supreme Court building where the hearing is taking place.

His first report is that lawyers for the UFT and NAACP started the day by removing three of the contested co-locations from the lawsuit. The charter schools involved are the same as those referenced (clumsily) in the press release — later retracted — that announced an agreement last week: Girls Preparatory Charter School, on the Lower East Side, and the two Promise Academy charter schools in Harlem.

The other two schools dropped from the lawsuit are run by the Harlem Children’s Zone, whose CEO, Geoffrey Canada, has been involved in talks to resolve the suit out of court.

One might think that a first agreement could augur more, but that’s not what city lawyers are arguing. (more…)

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.

I had a lot to think about as my third year of teaching at the Brooklyn Arts Academy wound to an end. In mid-May, I’d received an email from a friend who taught in a well-regarded public high school in Manhattan. Her school had an opening for a history teacher, and I applied. After an interview and a demo lesson, in mid-June, I was offered the job.

Under most circumstances, I would have accepted this position without thinking twice, as the school clearly functioned much better than my own. However, I was planning a temporary move to China following the end of the next school year. So I had a difficult decision to make. Should I start all over at a new school or commit to the Brooklyn Arts Academy for one final year?

I felt the urge to leave for many reasons. For one, the relationship between teachers and administrators at my school continued to be strained. Some teachers were seemingly targeted for U-rated observations, creating tensions for everyone. The principal, moreover, had recently reacted combatively to current and former staff members. For instance, I heard about a dispute between the dean and the principal. The dean had wanted to attend prom and take pictures of our seniors, but was told he could not. When he showed up anyway, security reportedly barred his entrance. In a different case, a couple of former teachers from the school reported that the principal had made them feel that they were not welcome to attend the school’s first graduation.

The school itself continued to be chaotic, a result of inconsistently enforced rules and a lack of clear policies regarding student discipline. In one instance, a computer was stolen from a senior classroom. The principal responded heavy-handedly by cutting the locks off of student lockers and searching them. But the computer was not found. More typically, students engaged in disruptive behaviors and used hats, headphones, and cell phones in class. Teachers and administrators were inconsistent, and too often lax, in how and how often we addressed these issues.

But despite all this, I felt pretty good about my own year of teaching. (more…)

A lot has happened since May 18, when the city teachers union first filed a suit against the Department of Education’s plans to close 22 schools and co-locate 17 charter schools in the 2011-2012 school year. There were mass protests, low-key concessions, more lawsuit threats and signs of settlement.

There was also a request for a preliminary injunction to place an immediate halt on all interim co-location and school closure plans, which is what today’s court date is about. In these preliminary hearings, Manhattan State Supreme Court Judge Paul Feinman will listen to arguments and decide whether or not to grant the request.

Here is a rundown of the latest news and analysis of the lawsuit and its implications for how it will affect school co-locations and closures for the upcoming school year.

1. What’s a preliminary injunction?

A preliminary injunction is an early court order that requires the defendant to either proceed or cease with a specific action. In today’s hearing, Judge Feinman will decide if the DOE and co-locating charter schools can proceed with plans to move into district school buildings until a final ruling is made. The injunction — if granted — would halt any construction, renovation or facility upgrades that the schools planned for its co-locations.

The key to winning the injunction for the UFT will be to prove, among other things, that the co-locations are irreparably harmful in the interim weeks (as opposed to when the school year begins) while the lawsuit is pending. They will also need to prove a high likelihood of ultimately winning the case.

2. What’s at stake? (more…)

• Many — 25-30 percent — graduates who enroll at CUNY drop out, even from top high schools. (Post)
• UFT chief Michael Mulgrew is trying to revive a potential deal to avert teacher layoffs. (Crain’s NY)
• Chancellor Walcott is pushing to bring back January Regents exams. (GothamSchools, Daily News)
• It’s the first court date in the UFT-NAACP lawsuit over school closures and co-locations. (GS, WNYC)
• As the storied Brother Rice High School closes, members of its basketball team are scattering. (WSJ)
• A plan to boost Detroit’s schools involves letting private groups manage the worst ones. (AP, WSJ)