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Elected parent leaders in Manhattan are asking the city to reverse multiple school decisions, including ones that the city has used to manage severe overcrowding in many neighborhood schools, because they say they should have been involved in making the decisions. The demand comes in a lawsuit filed yesterday, the second in three months against the Department of Education over its adherence to state law that requires parent groups to be consulted before some decisions are made.

Members of the Community Education Council for District 2, which includes the Upper East Side and most of Manhattan below Central Park, say the city violated the law by not consulting them when it made decisions about opening and closing schools and how students were assigned to district schools. With the city teachers union, they filed a lawsuit yesterday over about a dozen cases in recent years where the DOE failed to consult the CEC about major zoning changes (one case dates back to 2001).

The suit details the ways council members say the DOE brusquely informed them of its “unilateral” decisions after they had been made. Among them:

• The parent council learned about the closing of Bayard Rustin High School in Chelsea by looking at the DOE’s Web site, parents allege.
• It learned of the opening of another school via an e-mail from DOE official John White: “Good morning. Please see new addition of Quest to Learn School.” (more…)