GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

• Education Secretary Arne Duncan said principal quality will be a second term priority. (Politics K-12)
• NJ Gov. Christie and teachers union chief Weingarten discuss the merit pay contract. (Morning Joe)
• Report: NJ’s teacher evaluation approach could be challenged by capacity limitations. (Hechinger)
• City & State calls NYSUT’s Dick Iannuzzi a ‘winner’ for giving $4.5 million to state senate races.
• A government report shows New Mexico’s salary tier system may be ineffective. (Teacher Beat)
• A performance group created a comic webseries about the teaching profession. (TEACHERS)
• Two New Jersey teachers share their Common Core curriculum ideas. (Learning Network Blog)
• USDOE is giving $50,000 to Aurora Public Schools to help shooting recovery efforts. (USDOE)

The number of suspensions that principals and superintendents handed out to students is down in the second year since the Department of Education was required to report the data publicly, but it’s still much higher than it was a decade ago.

City schools gave out 69,643 suspensions in the 2011-2012 school year, down from 73,441 in 2010-2011. As was the case last year, the vast majority of suspensions were principal suspensions, meaning students were not allowed to attend school for between one and five days. The number of principal suspensions declined slightly, from 58,386 to 56,385. The decline in the stricter superintendent suspensions was even more significant—those dropped from 15,055 in 2011 to 13,258 in 2012.

The data shows that a decline in suspensions preceded the department’s move to soften the discipline code by making fewer offenses grounds for suspension. Officials attributed the declines to efforts to reduce the penalties for minor behavioral problems and introduce more student-teacher conferences as alternatives to suspension.

“Many schools now are using conflict resolution and peer mediation, which has helped to address issues in a timely fashion,” said department spokeswoman Marge Feinberg. “We started implementing more and more training for these programs prior to 2012.” (more…)

The end of the 2012 election season means that the 2013 campaign season has begun. In New York City, all eyes are on who will succeed Mayor Bloomberg after 12 years in charge of the city — and, uniquely among city mayors, of its schools.

Will the next mayor preserve Bloomberg’s policies? Or will he or she be less friendly to charter schools, more welcoming of parent input in decision-making, or less critical of the teachers union? The Democratic contenders for the mayoral nomination have six months to differentiate themselves on these issues and more.

On Monday, GothamSchools will play a role in trying to figure out just how each of the candidates would rule the schools. Along with Lindsey Christ of NY1, I’ll be moderating a panel on education policy featuring all six likely candidates. (more…)

Several readers sought to assuage high school teacher William Johnson’s fears, shared this week in a Community post, that new standards will render his English class “deadly boring” with its emphasis on informational texts.

The Common Core standards, which the city is rolling out right now, ask students to read more non-fiction than they traditionally have in school. A nearly 50-50 balance of fiction and non-fiction in eighth grade is supposed to shift to 70 percent non-fiction in 12th grade.

Several commenters said they thought the addition of more “informational texts” need not be a bad thing, and in fact could be a boon to some students. But one commenter used a poem, by William Carlos Williams, to let Johnson know that he is not alone in his fears.

(And speaking of the new learning standards: Please join us Nov. 26 to talk about the Common Core over wine and cheese!)

A.S. Neill said he is not a fan of the Common Core – but he still thinks there is an upside to its reading requirements:

Research shows that males read less and more poorly than females but girls prefer narrative fiction, romances, poetry, plays while boys prefer science fiction, fantasy, special interest, and news. (more…)

• A budget watchdog warns that $2 billion in federal school funding could be cut by the fiscal cliff. (Times)
• Juan Gonzalez: A school with some higher-than-average test scores are facing closure. (Daily News)
• To build better principals, the city wants to recruit and train top teachers earlier.  (GothamSchools)
• The UFT is suing the education department to see more of Joel Klein’s emails. (GothamSchools, News)
• Teenagers with a history of substance abuse receive specialized treatment in a Queens  school. (News)
• Attendance in displaced schools ticked up as students are getting used to plush bus rides. (Schoolbook)
• Thousands of Kansas students have gotten a free pass in science. (Lawrence World Journal via HuffPo)
• A test administrator lost the SAT answer sheets for 30 Staten Island students last month.  (NY Post)
• Sen. Schumer is pushing the state to create two new types of diplomas. (HuffPo, Democrat & Chronicle)