June 17, 2010

By Meredith Kolodner

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2010/06/17/2010-06-17_class_act_taking_a_budget_hit_successful_middle_school_program_faces_ax.html

By Helen Zelon

The New York City Council passed a resolution this week unanimously endorsing the proposed School Turnaround Zone (STZ), a strategy designed to help struggling schools improve their performance and avoid closure.

Developed by the parent-led Coalition for Educational Justice, the STZ would integrate school-improvement strategies with strong leadership, giving schools three years ‘in the zone’ to demonstrate progress.

 The STZ also has the support of Council speaker Christine Quinn and Public Advocate Bill DeBlasio. But the decision whether to adopt it ultimately rests with the Department of Education (DOE), which is independent of the City Council.

If adopted, the STZ would represent a significant departure from the DOE’s current approach to struggling schools. To date, the DOE has closed 91 schools and is attempting to obtain court approval to shutter 19 more.

Schools Chancellor Joel Klein has met with education advocates to discuss the STZ proposal, and has referred the matter to Deputy Chancellor Marc Steinberg, says Megan Hester, spokesperson for the Council for Educational Justice.

DOE spokesman Jack Zarin-Rosenfeld would not comment directly on the Council’s resolution.

In an email to City Limits, he repeated verbatim an earlier response to City Limits’ inquiries about the STZ: “President Obama agrees that in order to prepare all of our children for college and the workplace, it is critical that we turn around our lowest performing schools. This can include, in some cases, transformation. We will continue to engage parents and community leaders as we work to turn around our lowest performing schools, win federal dollars for our students, and build on the progress we’ve made in improving student outcomes.”

Click here to read the City Council resolution.

by Lisa Fogarty

The City Council took a stand against school closings Tuesday by unanimously passing a resolution that calls upon the Department of Education to fix, and not give up, on low-performing schools.
  The School Transformation Zone, proposed by the advocacy group NYC Coalition for Educational Justice, calls for the use of federal School Improvement Grants and other funds to implement reform plans in the city’s lowest-performing schools.

   Since 2002, the DOE has closed 91 schools. Ten Queens high schools risk closure because of low graduation rates and Progress Report grades: Jamaica, Beach Channel, August Martin in Jamaica, John Adams in Ozone Park, Flushing, Newtown in Elmhurst, Grover Cleveland in Ridgewood, Long Island City High School, Queens Vocational and Technical High School in LIC and the Business, Computer Applications and Entrepreneurship Magnet in Cambria Heights.
   Struggling schools would have the opportunity to turn themselves around by applying five school improvement strategies: expanding the school day and year; providing a rigorous curriculum that includes access to Regents courses and Advanced Placement or other college-level classes; taking steps to attract, train and maintain quality teachers and principals by reducing class size and offering professional development and mentoring; giving students strong support services that include small group and individual counselors; and ensuring active parent and community participation by including them in policy and decision-making.
   “Resolution number 157-A reflects the view of many parents, educators, advocates and elected officials, including myself and many other Council Members, that DOE has a responsibility to help struggling schools rather than just taking the easy way out by closing them,” said Education Committee Chairman Robert Jackson (D-Morningside Heights).
   The CEJ said the resolution is timely because state school districts must submit their plans within the next two weeks for how they will use School Improvement Grants to transform their lowest achieving schools, 34 of which are located in the city.
   The DOE has maintained that school closings are a last resort and that the department is open to turning around schools.
   “President Obama agrees that in order to prepare all of our children for college and the workplace, it is critical that we turn around our lowest performing schools,” DOE spokeswoman Ann Forte said in a statement. “This can include, in some cases, transformation. We will continue to engage parents and community leaders as we work to transform our lowest performing schools, win federal dollars for our students and build on the progress we’ve made in improving student outcomes.”

NEW ZONING NEEDED: Parents and advocates rally for the creation of a School Transformation Zone on Wednesday at City Hall. (Aloysio Santos/The Epoch Times)

NEW YORK—Over 50 parents and advocates assembled in front of City Hall on Wednesday to voice their support for the creation of a bill that would save schools on the verge of closure. The bill would establish a School Transformation Zone for low performance schools where parents and teachers will work together to increase the quality of education.

“We think that we can come up with the ideas like the school transformation zone, like the extended day, ensuring that every child gets individualized, differentiated instruction that meets their needs, and this is what is going to turn the schools around,” said Daniel Dromm, city councilman and former city public school teacher.

If the bill is approved, schools in the transformation zone program will have three years to improve their performance through federal grants and funds. In the zone, teaching and learning will be redesigned to improve student achievement. Buildings that are normally closed down at the end of the school day will operate longer to provide extended pay for teachers and learning time for children.

The city’s Department of Education did not return a request for comment on school transformation zones.

Speaker Anita Gomez-Palacio of the Council of Supervisors and Administrators said she was concerned with how the schools end up on the closing list and what role the superintendents of the schools played to try and avoid it.

“Where is the process that [Department of Education] is using? It is not obvious to us how these schools got on the list to begin with,” she said.

Among the advocates stood parents from the Coalition for Educational Justice (CEJ) who spoke of the consequences their family and their children face after a school shuts down.

Carol Boyd, a parent leader with CEJ and mother of three, was able to transfer her children from a school under registration review in their neighborhood into better schools. Others, she said, are not so lucky.

“I am outraged because the child who lives next door to me, the child who lives above me, the child who lives below me or across the street—they don’t have those opportunities. They are the ones stuck in all those school that are on that closing list.”

In a letter to Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein, over 70 advocates, allies of CEJ and 14 city council members have signed to support the school transformation zone bill.

Gotham Gazette

Gotham Schools

NY1

New York State is months from knowing whether it will win coveted Race to the Top funds, but already community groups are offering ideas for how to spend the money.

The Coalition for Educational Justice held a rally on the steps of Tweed Courthouse today calling for the federal stimulus funds to be spent on lengthening the school year and increasing the school day by 30 percent for low-performing schools. The proposal also calls for schools to place less emphasis on standardized tests and to offer more arts education and Advanced Placement courses.

Teachers union president Michael Mulgrew, who seems invigorated by UFT’s renewed war with the Department of Education, criticized the department for ending a program that had given some schools extended days. “The city does not have a plan to help these students,” he said.

NY1

Parents rallied outside the Department of Education headquarters in Manhattan Tuesday where they called for a longer school day and school year.
The Coalition for Educational Justice, the teachers union, and local politicians are pushing for a new academic calendar, with 30 percent more time added to each day for low performing schools.

“The main point is to redesign and expand the school day. We feel that the best public schools, traditional public schools, and the best charter school have redesigned the day,” said rally participant O’Cynthia Williams.

“We can talk about how to take a school structure that was created 100 years ago and bring it into the 21st century. I’m not sure it was ever in the 20th century but we’ll leap right over the 20th century and bring it into the 21st century,” said City Council Speaker Christine Quinn.

The parents group proposes funding the extended time with federal stimulus dollars, but New York is already competing against other states for that funding.

Coalition members acknowledge the tough budget climate, but say changing the school calendar should still be a priority.

CBS

Local parents have launched a campaign for longer school days. Supporters say instead of closing schools, New York City could close the achievement gap by expanding learning time.

More than 100 parents rallied outside the Department of Education on Tuesday calling for school days to be re-designed, adding about 30 percent more time for learning. The target is low-performing schools.

“It’s about changing the culture of the way we think today about how education looks. This system was designed 100 years ago,” said Zakiyah Ansari of the NYC Coalition for Education Justice.

“How do we get our children not only into college but prepared and ready to stay in there and finish?”

The idea is already in play at the Eagle Academy for Boys in the Bronx, a public high school where students take everything from culinary arts to mentoring to music. Students often spend Saturdays in school and are here during the week as late as 7 p.m.

“It made school more fun in the sense that I stay after school normally without even noticing that it’s late and realizing ‘Oh it’s time for me to go home,’” student Marc Peralta said.

Marcus Eley was in special education and then mainstreamed at Eagle Academy, where his mom said the mentorship program changed everything.

“He has a mentor who, for instance, he turned 14, set up his working papers so now he can get a job on the weekends and in the evenings,” Maria Sanders said. “His mentor is also instrumental in helping him. He’s doing mentoring and music, so he’s learning about the music industry and he’s taking field trips. He’s learning about finance and music.”

Added David Banks of the Eagle Academy Foundation: “Our young men get a chance to go visit colleges and universities all across the country. They get a chance to be engaged and study abroad programs, internships.”

The parents and teachers at the school said the success is also in the numbers. The graduation rate among Latino and African American boys in New York City schools is less than 40 percent. At Eagle Academy it is 80 percent.

The school is funded through everything from government money, to corporate donations.