GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

Days before the deadline to decide how it plans to overhaul low-performing schools, the city is considering going in a new direction.

Over the last year that the city has been deciding which of four federally mandated school improvement strategies to use in these schools, it has only publicly discussed two plans: transformation and turnaround. Both of them call for major changes in school personnel and how schools use time, meaning that both of them have to be negotiated with the teachers union.

But with the deadline for the city to submit its proposal only four days away, and the city yet to reach a deal with the teachers union, the Department of Education is considering a third option.

Known as the “restart” model, the plan involves closing a school and reopening it under new management — either as a charter school or as a district school run by a school management organization (for example, New Visions). Because this plan does not require the city to fire teachers or principals, it can be used without the union’s cooperation.

“We would obviously love an agreement on those two models [transformation and turnaround], but we felt we had to cover our bases and be prepared to do restart,” said DOE spokesman Jack Zarin-Rosenfeld. (more…)

Teach for America is calling on its sizable alumni base to help entertain new teachers while they wait for the hiring freeze to be lifted.

Despite halving the size of this year’s cohort and directing many teachers to charter schools, TFA still hasn’t found jobs for 118 of its 300-odd new teachers, according to an e-mail sent to graduates of the program yesterday. While TFA officials “continue to be optimistic” that the Department of Education’s freeze on outside hires will be lifted, they anticipate that “a substantial number” of new corps members will remain jobless when the school year begins, the e-mail said.

The organization is putting together additional training for the unplaced teachers, according to the e-mail from Jemina Bernard, director of the program’s New York region. It is also asking the more than 2,000 graduates of the program who live in the city to provide “social and cultural opportunities,” such as home-cooked meals and walking tours, between now and the end of October for the new teachers. ”I want to be very clear how critical this period of time is for our 2009 corps and how extremely important it is that we come together as a family to fully support them,” Bernard wrote.

Teach for America told its new members this spring that they would be guaranteed a salary for 40 business days after the start of classes, even if they hadn’t found a position. (more…)