Comments on: Law keeping mid-year arrivals out of charters could have a fix

By: Guest

Guest — Wed, 30 May 2012 18:47:00 +0000

Perhaps that’s a reflection of the people you know, rather than the kids at Brooklyn Prospect?

By: SchoolFisher Blog - NYC School News – May 30, 2012

SchoolFisher Blog - NYC School News – May 30, 2012 — Wed, 30 May 2012 10:45:57 +0000

[...] Law keeping mid-year arrivals out of charters could have a fix Brooklyn Prospect Charter School students listen to a sports writer speak during February's Career Day. The phone calls are bad, but the visitors are the toughest to reject. That’s how Daniel Rubenstein feels about the admission requests that his charter school, Brooklyn Prospect, gets each summer from families who moved to the neighborhood after the school’s April [...] [...]

By: Norm

Norm — Wed, 30 May 2012 01:42:00 +0000

How dense is Leo Casey pretending to be. Charters dump kids, yes. And we believe they are looking to take “any” over the counter kid? Or will they be recruiting top level kids away from public schools who will become “over the counter?” And if a kid walks in, how about a little verbal test before saying there is room? And finally, as pointed out, where are those massive wait lists for charters we keep seeing on the front page of the NY Post? I have an idea, Let each public school choose some kids to send to the local charter and the charter must accept them. Let’s see how that flies.

By: Ellen

Ellen — Wed, 30 May 2012 01:21:00 +0000

Ah heck…sure they are needy. But that shouldn’t be the issue. The issue is false advertising or inflated reputations. Education that meets needs is the goal, not perpetual competition between systems.

By: guest

guest — Tue, 29 May 2012 23:51:00 +0000

I know a lot of kids who go to the Brooklyn Prospect Charter School, and not one of them is remotely needy. All the talk in this article about “needy” kids does seem fishy.

By: Barney

Barney — Tue, 29 May 2012 22:49:00 +0000

Hmm….Family is just off the boat, speaks no English; kids received a limited education in their war-torn country. But the first thing they do upon arrival in this great country is head over to Brooklyn Prospect to inquire about the International Baccalaureate program. Of course, they’re devastated to learn that although this school would LOVE to take them, their kids will be stuck going to their local middle school that received a C rating from the DOE.

Does anyone else find this a little fishy? It sounds like a way to grab some more rich kids so they won’t have to take the kids from the projects who might be next on the waiting list.

By: CarolineSF

CarolineSF — Tue, 29 May 2012 20:56:00 +0000

Yes, I saw those grandstanding lotteries in Waiting for Superman. For one thing, perhaps every charter that holds a big showy melodramatic lottery isn’t staging it, but lots of charters that don’t hold public lotteries falsely claim to have waiting lists at the same time they’re desperately trying to fill their seats.

For another thing, some (and likely all) of the charters with the melodramatic lotteries shown in WFS actually have such sky-high attrition that all the students on the waitlists would have to go is wait a few weeks till the pushouts start streaming out the door. Maybe New York charters then would not be allowed to admit midyear transfers from their waitlist, but at least two of the charters shown in WFS that have sky-high attrition (SEED and the Los Angeles KIPP school shown in the movie) are not in New York.

Given the enormous advantages charters enjoy (including unquestioning if not worshipful press coverage, not to mention torrents of private funding), I don’t think GGW needs to feel bad about the indignities they suffer.

By: GGW

GGW — Tue, 29 May 2012 20:00:00 +0000

1. I wonder about Jennifer F’s point, too. Charter XYZ serves mostly poor kids, and a wait list of a few hundred families. Why BLOCK the kid at the top of the waiting list, in order to admit a similar kid who just moved to town?

Seems zero sum. 2. For commenters who wonder about the lotteries: many NYC charters hold them publicly. You could attend. Typically they draw the names in order, including the whole wait list. 2b. Come to think of it, charter critics have sometimes argued that these charters are TOO public/transparent. Ie, if the event is public, then critics say “The school is manipulating families, herding them to show up when they know most families won’t get a spot.”Meanwhile, if the event is NON-public, then critics say “Ah ha! Must be making up the numbers.” No win! 2c. Kind of like charter enrollment. Get “too many” black kids, and it’s “segregated” (like the NYT article last week). Not “enough,” it’s “creaming.” Set aside slots to mirror district exactly by subgroup — breaking the law.

By: dirk

dirk — Tue, 29 May 2012 20:00:00 +0000

I actually think charters can already accommodate these mid year students through their admission policy, by not rank ordering their waitlists and just relotterying when openings develop. While I do work with charters I have to agree that many do have formal and informal methods of selecting (or deselecting) students and that this can create inequities. Though lets not forget those charters that target and overrepresent higher needs kids (Mott Haven, Lavelle Prep, Inwood, NYC Autism etc). Its also unconscionable to me that if you are in DoE space that you would not backfill empty seats– and DoE should make that a condition of occupancy.

By: CarolineSF

CarolineSF — Tue, 29 May 2012 19:44:00 +0000

Oh yes — a friend who works in a school that gets a lot of dumpees from an “it’s a miracle!” charter says the dumpees will show up in her school’s office to enroll, with both the parent and the student in tears. Then the charter claims that all the departures are voluntary.

By: Jennifer F.

Jennifer F. — Tue, 29 May 2012 19:42:00 +0000

It’s not clear why families who call over the summer are more deserving of seats than those who applied in the lottery process. Why shouldn’t charters keep waitlists and fill seats from those? If DOE allows this, it should also allow screened public school programs to admit outside of the application process, if space becomes available.

By: Please!

Please! — Tue, 29 May 2012 19:29:00 +0000

The other side of this story is that the reason charters have so many slots to fill mid-year is because they are systematically dumping their most needy students and families back into the district schools in their neighborhoods. Families are constantly counseled out (“Our charter school just isn’t a good fit for your son”) or bargained with (“If you take your daughter out now, our charter school will promote her to the next grade”) with what is essentially unregulated expulsion.

With school cultures that are fragile due in part to already transient populations, district schools are legally and morally obligated to take these over-the-counter charter school rejects–and our district schools do so with love and with honor. These students are welcomed and taught and helped. It isn’t news. Ask any principal in a low-income area and you’ll learn how many ex-charter students come in each month.

By: Ellen

Ellen — Tue, 29 May 2012 18:51:00 +0000

oh, and by the way,I loved Merriman’s quote “It’s important, but given all that’s going on it isn’t the most important thing,” said James Merriman, director of the New York City Charter School Center, about the issue of over-the-counter students. “It’s an interesting issue and one that my guess is we will see more discussion about over time.”
Notmportant to who? to all of the children clamoring to get into the charters? Oh no! Maybe it’s not! Maybe the charter school folks really don’t care since they are making money and wreaking havoc upon their comptetion, the PS system.
OR
The charter lobby is afraid to admit that there aren’t 4 or 5 appliucants for spots.
which one is it Mr. Merriman?

By: Ellen

Ellen — Tue, 29 May 2012 18:36:00 +0000

and wny is the quote…”need to be in a good school…” even used? That is a subjective comment by a person who has a vested interest in promotion. Why does every reorter take these charter school reps at thier word, but always doubt the word of public school principals?
Report after report indicates that charters do no better than their neighbors and olny slightly better than the conglomerate number of school in a district. Who’s swallowing the bait, hook line and sinker? Certainly nut folks with a day to day knowledge of education.
Maybe,with the lack of good investigative reorters as models, the younger members of the fifth estate just don’t know how to ask the hard questions.

By: Mary Conway-Spiegel

Mary Conway-Spiegel — Tue, 29 May 2012 17:49:00 +0000

They are not different in NY

By: michael

michael — Tue, 29 May 2012 15:28:00 +0000

Hey Gotham News, how about some investigative work for a change instead of rubber stamping second hand news?

By: CarolineSF

CarolineSF — Tue, 29 May 2012 13:24:00 +0000

Ms. Cramer, have you independently confirmed that these operators actually have more applicants than seats and truly have to hold lotteries? Here in California, it’s a standard cliche for charters that in reality are struggling to fill their seats (including KIPP schools, by the way) to flimflam reporters with the false claim that they have so many applicants they have to hold lotteries. Perhaps things are different in NY.