NYC Coalition for Educational Justice

By Ben Chapman, Daily News

Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott vowed Tuesday to shut down the city’s failing middle schools, in his first major policy speech since taking office in April.

Walcott also promised to open 50 new middle schools across the city within two years – and remake others. He chose to focus on the city’s 405 middle schools, he said, because students in grades 6 to 8 are falling behind.

“We have a responsibility to do something about our middle schools,” said Walcott in his policy address at New York University, noting that middle school students perform worse than other kids on state exams.

Just 35% of city eighth-graders passed state reading tests this year, in the third straight year of declining scores.

Walcott hopes to boost student performance by replacing and revamping middle schools around the city. Federal grants will help fund the new schools.

Existing middle schools also will get new resources, Walcott said, including $15million in new, nonfiction textbooks.

Advocates lauded Walcott’s goals but said that trying to fix troubled middle schools would be difficult.

“Just closing the schools is not going to work – they need more support,” said Zakiyah Ansari, parent leader at the Coalition for Educational Justice.