GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

It’s déjà vu all over again for parents as the Department of Education reveals its latest round of school closures.

Last year, City Council members complained that the DOE announced school closures without first discussing them with community members. Like other parent advocates, council members argued that the DOE’s actions were in violation of the state’s education law, which requires the chancellor to “consult with the affected community district education council” before closing or substantially changing schools.

But despite the outcry, the district-wide community education councils aren’t any more in the loop this year.

“The CECs were notified the same day the staff was told” at each school, DOE spokeswoman Melody Meyer told me today.

For District 15′s CEC, at least, that notification came in the form of an e-mail yesterday afternoon, after the principal of PS 27 had already been told her school would be closing in June, according to the council’s president, Jennifer Stringfellow. (more…)

The same parents who earlier this fall battled a plan to move two Upper West Side schools are now planning to protest one of the city’s latest school closures.

The Department of Education announced today that MS 44, one of two middle schools currently located in a building on West 70th Street, will not accept any sixth graders for next year because of the school’s poor performance. Instead, a new middle school will open in the building, and current students will continue to attend MS 44 until they finish eighth grade.

Calling themselves the Coalition for Equity and Educational Diversity in our Schools, the parents told me today that they are planning to rally around MS 44, whose students are almost all black or Hispanic. They say the effect of MS 44′s closure could be similar to that of the district’s plan to reduce overcrowding, which they say will make some school buildings in the neighborhood less diverse.

The overcrowding plan, which DOE this week said it would implement, requires two schools to relocate. One of them, a citywide gifted school, the Anderson School, will move next fall into the MS 44 building. (more…)