Results tagged “doe”

A management consultant and hypnotherapist got paid $374,000 from the Education Department to help save money by improving managers' morale and boosting productivity. William Howatt Ph.D. had previously served as a consultant for Bear Stearns, and then the firm went under. Luckily for him, a former Bear Stearns manager got hired by Chancellor Joel Klein after the firm crashed, and he gave Howatt a job helping managers "adapt to change."

Okay, so the school Bake Sale is on its way out, and with that the kiddies vending machines will also be trimmed of their fat. The NY Times reports that under their new regulations the Department of Education are stocking up schools with healthier choices; "New vending machine contracts expected to be approved on Wednesday could mean less junk food — and less money for schools."

Even though the state has required developmental screening for pre-K students for years, parents are confused as to why the city has just begun to enforce it. Developmental screening for subsidized and public preschool programs is supposed to identify children who may need extra help, but parents and teachers think the tests come too early. "I don't think the test can give an accurate picture of where a child is," teacher Crystal Salas told the Daily News. The test requires toddlers to play with blocks, draw pictures and identify shapes and colors. Can't they just give the kids the marshmallow test and call it a day?

The NY Times reports, "A parent council in Manhattan and the city’s teachers’ union sued the Department of Education on Monday, contending that the department had not adequately consulted with the council in deciding which schools to close and in altering school boundaries." While the community education councils—which include parents of students—are supposed to be have power over school zoning, District 2's council (representing the East Side and Lower Manhattan; there are 32 districts total) contends that the DOE has been unresponsive to their concerns. Council president Rebecca Daniels tells the Times, "We were trying very hard and we just weren’t getting the kind of communication we needed. The reporting to parents and hearing their feedback was just not happening." She blames mayoral control for squeezing parents out of the equation—and leaving them and their children helpless when schools close. The state is in the process of determining whether to continue mayoral control; a Times editorial backed continuing mayoral control of schools, but noted, "Some fine-tuning aimed at giving parents and communities more access is in order."

Schools Chancellor Joel Klein faced a tough crowd in Albany yesterday, as state lawmakers grilled him about mayoral control of the public school system. State Sen. Bill Perkins (D-Harlem) said, "Mayoral control has been a disaster for parents. It has not gotten better... In communities of color, parents are fleeing their schools." To which Klein replied, "Truly, I see it so differently from you. When you create options for parents, what you're doing is giving them a lifeline for their children. The politics of it is very different from the reality." State Sen. Micah Kellner (D-East Side) said, "I think we’re all fed up that the Education Department spends a lot of time and money on spin doctoring what we know are problems." Some lawmakers suggest that the mayor appoint fewer members of Panel for Educational Policy (the PEP replaced the Board of Ed. and Bloomberg appoints eight of 13 members and fire them whenever he wants) and/or that the members are given terms so they can't be fired as easily.

The NYC public school system, the largest in the country, is way too crowded, according to the Daily News. Some of the statistics: One school in the Bronx is "at 200% capacity"--kindergarten students are bused to other schools, the halls are used for tutoring-- while another school "was built for 800 students, but enrollment is currently 1,147." An Upper East school is "supposed to have 433 students but has 647," and Tribeca's coveted PS 234 "is a 501-seat school that houses 748 students," thanks to the surge in residential development downtown. A group called A Better Capital Plan will be rallying for the city to build schools based on what the neighborhood needs, versus looking at the whole district. And overcrowding is not a new issue.

Worst second day of school ever! Over 20 five- and six-year-olds students from Achievement First Charter School in Brownsville were stuck on a bus for five hours when their driver "got lost but wouldn't admit it." One parent told the Daily News, "I was going crazy. I was thinking the bus was in an accident." The driver, Joseph Gray, 53, was already an hour late, arriving at 4:45 p.m., and didn't finish dropping kids off until 9:20 p.m. One parent said her "traumatized" daughter saw Gray "looking at a paper" (maybe a map?). The bus company's lawyer said, "We are trying to find out exactly what happened with this driver, because the conduct so far appears to be bizarre," adding if the Department of Education installed GPS on the bus, it could have been found sooner. So far, the DOE has just suspended Gray.

The Department of Education has hired a former Bear Stearns managing director to be the new CFO. George Raab has accepted the $180K/year job--which involves overseeing $20 billion--but the Sun says the the "appointment will not become official until a background check is completed." The Post points out that the DOE is "currently the only major agency not plugged into the city's electronic budgeting system" and gets a quote from District 1's Community Education Council president Lisa Donlan: "I assume this [hire] is in response to all the crap they've been getting about playing loose and fast with the budget and rewriting the rules for themselves."