Comments on: ‘Restart’ partners say they plan to ease into management role

By: urban annapurna

urban annapurna — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 16:48:00 +0000

and if the EPO’s don’t succeed, will they take responsibility? or will they blame the teachers?

By: urban annapurna

urban annapurna — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 16:48:00 +0000

and if the EPO’s don’t succeed, will they take responsibility? or will they blame the teachers?

By: Just Some Teacher

Just Some Teacher — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 21:04:00 +0000

Imagine how we feel “the teachers who serve the neediest kids in the city” and then find another school with even LOWER SCORES, but are not put on any list or given any punitive measures at all because they are a “EMPOWERMENT SCHOOL”like Central Park East 1 and the DOE looks the other way because the parents of those students are more affluent. Imagine THAT!

By: Just Some Teacher

Just Some Teacher — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 21:04:00 +0000

By: bkteacher

bkteacher — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 18:42:00 +0000

Respectfully, the spending is what it is. I think a more purposeful use of resources would be a look into who these organizations are.

What are their track records in New York City? What leads them to believe they have the capacity and ability to significantly change these schools?

By: Philissa Cramer

Philissa Cramer — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 18:23:00 +0000

Edwina — that’s an average per EPO. The PEP’s agenda doesn’t show how much would be spent per school. We’ll look into the spending in more depth next week.

By: Edwina Hawkins

Edwina Hawkins — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 18:16:00 +0000

Are you talking per school $1 mill average?

By: GC

GC — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 17:29:00 +0000

Also reminds me of Larry the Liquidator (Danny Devito) in Other People’s Money or Gordon Gekko in Wallstreet. They come in as the savior when in reality their purpose is to make the most $ possibly by breaking up the business and selling off the most valuable parts. Maybe they should be called OPMs, not EPOs – Other Peoples’ Money.

By: Guest

Guest — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 17:25:00 +0000

There are different prices for high schools, middle schools, size of staff, etc and the types of services offered also affect the price. It is not as cut and dried as represented here. At the full price quoted here by New Visions, after the DOE takes it’s “cut” of about 200,000 for central admin., you would wind up paying them out of your school’s budget on top of the full SIG $ for the full measure of services of the most expensive EPO (on top of the July 2.4% budget cut). I believe that the network cost must still be paid as well.

By: bkteacher

bkteacher — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 16:43:00 +0000

Having dealt with one of these “EPOs” before, I felt as if I was in the movie Goodfellas. For those who don’t remember the movie, there is a scene where a restaurant owner goes to Paulie for help and he “reluctantly” decides to help the restaurant owner. In helping the restaurant owner he loots and liquidates him for all he is worth.

The line that is repeated over and over is, ” F–k you, pay me.”

That is how at least one of the EPOs operates. They are in this business to liquidate schools. They do not have a vested interest in the school. They load up the schools with a ton of expensive consultants. Some charging upwards of $1000 a day.

Then at the end of the contract they walk away with their money and little to no accountability for what just happened.

Like Paulie’s goons in Goodfellas, the consultants and the EPOs metaphorically burn the place down and walk away.

By: Guest

Guest — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 16:16:00 +0000

345000 – 850000 depending on the EPO – What do they do?
provide professional developmentj, tutoring, analysis strengths/weaknesses and remedies, related services like counselors, social workers, on site supervision, setting up small learning communities, performing the functions of a superintendent. Each EPO may have a different theme or focus. Basically what they do is provide duplicative services that are already offered by DOE, differing in degree, depth, and approach, another layer of bureacracy, another master to please (NYCDOE, USDOE, NYSED), an impossible task because each has different priorities, goals, and approaches. What does a Principal do if the State says one thing, DOE says another, still another federally, or when recomendations/solutions do not comply with NCLB, NYS Law, Joint Intervention team recomendations, Quality Review recommendations, … confused yet? Imagine how the staffs of these schools feel, when they wound up on a list mainly because they serve the neediest kids in NYC, and they not only have to do this but deal with the ministry of doublespeak and rich folks with an agenda

By: anonymous

anonymous — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 15:50:00 +0000

This is presumably for multiple schools right — different EPOs service different numbers of schools, which may (partially) explain the differences in contract sizes. It would be more useful to know how much they’re receiving per school and how much additional restart funding is provided directly to schools for their budget. Also, does this money replace what the schools would otherwise pay to their support network? Finally, what are the EPOs supposed to do with this money? Is it covering their costs to manage the schools or is some of it flowing through to secondary organizations such as Turnaround and the CUNY program that are discussed in the article? I assume those costs will come out of the restart money beyond what is going to the EPO, but it’s unclear.

By: Confused Citizen

Confused Citizen — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 15:42:00 +0000

A million dollars a year? For what? I’m not in education so I don’t understand what these companies are supposed to do. Who in a school would usually do this work, whatever it may be?

By: Mary Conway-Spiegel

Mary Conway-Spiegel — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 13:59:00 +0000

EPO costs vary, but from what I’ve heard $850K is accurate. Each school gets roughly one million per year, subtract whatever the EPO annual fee is, the balance goes to ____?

I second bkteacher’s ask. I would love to see a 5 – 10 year overview.Once again, my heart goes out to parents, guardians and students who don’t understand where the “millions” really go.

By: Philissa Cramer

Philissa Cramer — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 13:49:00 +0000

The PEP agenda for next week was just updated to include these contracts, which the panel must approve, so I’ve added the information to Sarah’s story. The contracts average just over $1 million a year and range from $690,000 for SREB to $1,885,000 for New Visions.

By: bkteacher

bkteacher — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 13:46:00 +0000

This sounds like another poorly thought out idea from the USDOE and the NYCDOE. If I were an investigative reporter or just any reporter I might include the following in my report:

1) The track record of the “EPOs” in current city schools. For example, New Visions and CEI-PEA have worked with and in many city schools in recent years. Are the schools they work with producing better then average results/data, about the same as the average school, or worse than average?

(This will take a little bit of data analysis, but it would provide crucial context to your readers. Are we being repeatedly being scammed by the same rip-off artists or are we actually getting a great deal, because these “EPOs” have an excellent track record?)

2) Place the “restart” start in a national context. Where has it worked? Where has it failed? What is the track record?

By: Edwina Hawkins

Edwina Hawkins — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 13:41:00 +0000

I heard the EPOs are getting $850K for this gig. Can Gotham confirm?