GothamSchools — daily independent reporting on NYC public schools

With their discretionary funds eliminated and their schools’ budgets deflated, city teachers are supplicating strangers to fill in the gaps.

There are 1,793 projects posted by city teachers – mostly from high poverty schools – on DonorsChoose, a website that allows teachers across the country to describe small-scale projects that need funding. The requests paint a depressing picture of what many classrooms are lacking.

There are the occasional requests for cutting edge technology, such as iPads, tablets and digital cameras. And many of the more ambitious projects range from the creative (violins, costumes, wireless microphones) to the healthy (soccer balls, juicers, pedometers) to the icky (fetal pigs, butterfly larvae, composting worms). But most teachers seem to be asking for classroom staples such as pens, paper, and glue.

Here’s what we saw when we checked out DonorsChoose today:

• More than half of all NYC projects relate to literacy and language, a focus of the Department of Education’s this year. Many teachers, hoping to make their reading areas more appealing, are asking for beanbag chairs, rugs, library shelves and books. Ms. Coneys, from Thurgood Marshall Academy in Manhattan, is requesting a class set of “Things Fall Apart”  for her students. She writes: “School supplies have become less of a priority, and asking students to go out and buy a book they have never heard of is even more difficult. That being said, it’s apparent that my students have the desire to learn something new.” (more…)