GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

Mayor Bloomberg’s school leadership has been characterized by secrecy, defiance of the law, and a heavy hand in school discipline, the New York Civil Liberties Union declared today in a report titled “The Price of Power.”

The report details NYCLU’s experiences with the Bloomberg-controlled Department of Education stalling on responding to Freedom of Information Law requests, refusing to comply with student safety-related laws passed by the City Council, and refusing to provide basic data about military recruitment that the organization said the U.S. Armed Forces provided freely.

The report deliberately avoids some of the major questions of the debate about mayoral control of the city’s schools, including whether the mayor should appoint the chancellor and whether the mayor should control the number of seats on the citywide school board. But it does offer recommendations on the law, which is set to sunset June 30 if it’s not renewed or revised.

The recommendations include making the public school system a city, rather than state, agency, which would bring it under a slate of good governance regulations about public notification of policy changes; opening the school system to audits by the city comptroller and public advocate; and requiring that schools contracts get publicly vetted.

Transforming the Department of Education into a city agency would also allow the City Council to make laws about the public schools that the DOE would be accountable for implementing. Like others recommending changes to mayoral control, NYCLU is saying that the city’s Independent Budget Office should get the right to receive and review DOE data, but the group adds the idea that the department needs an “inspector general” who would investigate systemic wrongdoing. (more…)

Only one of these four state lawmakers had praise for Joel Klein today during his testimony on budget cuts: The woman on the bottom right, Assemblywoman Barbara Clark of Queens.

How much do lawmakers in Albany dislike Joel Klein? The chancellor fielded a flurry of criticisms today after his testimony before a joint session of the legislature. And only some of the criticisms had anything to do with the subject of the day, budget cuts. The rest politely slammed Klein on the one Albany fight where he’ll really need their help: mayoral control of the public schools.

Klein desperately wants to preserve control as it is, but many lawmakers said they aren’t happy with the law or with how he’s led as chancellor. The criticism was so persistent that, at one point, Klein plead with lawmakers to keep their opinion of him out of their thoughts on mayoral control. “Whatever you think about me personally,” he said, “you need the stability of that kind of leadership to transform education.”

Assemblyman Herman Farrell of Manhattan dedicated all of his questions for Klein to the mayoral control subject. “We’ve had what I call a silencing of the lambs,” he said. “I don’t know who speaks for the parents, who speaks on behalf of the parents.” Farrell then proposed a way to bring debate back to the running of the schools: He wants to create a second position called “sub-chancellor” or “uber-chancellor” — someone to take on the regular chancellor.

Assemblyman William Colton, who represents southern Brooklyn, made a similar complaint: “There seems to be a feeling among parents that they don’t have the input or the ability to be listened to,” he said.

Other lawmakers criticized Klein’s policies. (more…)

Mayor David Cohen of Newton, Mass. The town faces school budget cuts after failing to override a tax cap. Boston Herald

Last Friday, the New York State Senate approved a 4% annual cap on school property tax increases for local school districts, excluding the state’s largest cities. To override the cap would require the vote of 55 percent of voters in a district. The New York Times reports that the bill is unlikely to pass in the State Assembly, where it is opposed by Speaker Sheldon Silver. The tax cap, proposed by the governor, is intended to provide relief to homeowners.

I grew up in Massachusetts under Proposition 2 1/2, a tax cap similar to that proposed for New York. In Lenox, MA, my hometown, when a tax override was considered to build a new school for our town’s increasing enrollment, voter turnout to town meetings swelled, Planning Board, School Committee, and Board of Selectmen positions were fiercely contested, and rhetoric in the papers and at meetings often turned nasty. Dollars for schools were painted as dollars taken away from the elderly. Our neighbors across the street even constructed a sculpture in their front yard depicting the schools going into the garbage! In the end, we got the new school, but the time and energy lost to fighting can never be recovered.

But don’t just take my word for it. Directors of school board associations in Massachusetts and California penned warnings to the New York State Legislature. Glen Koocher of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees, listed five ways the tax cap hurt schools, then concluded,

A bad public policy, once implemented, becomes entrenched and is difficult to rescind. If saving taxpayers money now is your priority, tax caps may be for you. But if maintaining a socially responsible, sound public education policy is important, New York policy makers would be well-advised to be extremely cautious as they consider a tax cap. A poorly crafted proposal will sacrifice the future for many in exchange for short-term benefits for some.

To see an example of Prop. 2 1/2 in action today, read about a proposed override in Newton, MA – and the costs to the schools when the override failed: in May, the town eliminated 79 positions, including all elementary school social workers.