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." more ›

New York City schools chancellor Joel Klein (not pictured) brought a gloomy forecast to Albany yesterday, pleading with state lawmakers to reduce proposed budget cuts and to give the city more flexibility in how state aid is spent. According to Klein, a proposed $84 million cut from the current school year’s budget could "really wreak havoc" and force school administrators fire an estimated 15,000 employees, many of them teachers. more ›

The 144,160 parking placards registered in the city inventory have been reduced by over 25,000, Deputy Mayor Edward Skyler announced yesterday. The cutbacks are targeted at what many frustrated drivers see as an abuse of a system that lets police, teachers and civil servants park for free at meters and many off-limits areas. Initial cuts have focused on the 80,770 placards issued to 68 city agencies, exempting the 63,390 placards used by the Education Department. more ›

The Sun reports Mayor Bloomberg doesn't think Muslim holy days should become school holidays. His reason? "The truth of the matter is we need more children in school. More, not less." more ›

Turns out the number parking placards sloshing around New York is over 142,000, twice the number guesstimated by Mayor Bloomberg’s office when he announced a 20% cutback on the placards, which allow police, teachers and civil servants to park for free at meters and many off-limits areas. The new total does not take into consideration the number of counterfeit and expired placards, and the city is still not done counting, so this preliminary total is expected to increase even as they try to decrease it! more ›

It wasn’t built on an old native burial ground, but two councilmen are up in arms over a Queens high school's location. The Department of Education failed to disclose that Information Technology High School in Long Island City, which opened in 2003, was built on the former location of the Gould Mercereau metal-plating warehouse – one apparently chock full of lead and petrochemicals. more ›

City Councilman Bill de Blasio, whose Brooklyn district covers Borough Park, Carroll Gardens, is asking the Department of Buildings to stop all of architect Robert Scarano's current projects. According to the Sun, DeBlasio says Scarano, who has hundreds of projects in various stages of progress, "should not be allowed to build while under investigation by the State Education Department for professional misconduct." more ›

The public school year will end on a scandalous note. An aide at the prestigious Hunter College High School was arrested on charges of raping a 15-year-old student. Timothy Avery, a 25-year-old Staten Island resident, was charged with statutory rape and endangering the welfare of a child. The NY Times reports that "friends of the girl had expressed concerns about the girl’s behavior to school authorities."

Laurel Wright-Hinckson, a spokeswoman for the city Education Department’s Office of the Special Commissioner of Investigation, said that the 15-year-old girl had not been a student of Mr. Avery’s... more ›

A lesson in quotas and school bureaucracy for an 11-year-old: The Post reoprts that Nikita Rau was denied a place at a magnet school because she's not white. Rau and her parents hoped she would attend Mark Twain School - IS 239, a magnet school in Coney Island (recently reported to have the best Math and English scores for Level 4 students) but a 33-year-old federal ruling is preventing her entry. more ›

Lights at the historic Tweed Courthouse, which houses the Education Department headquarters, were still blazing at 3:50 a.m. more ›

Well, it depends on the situation. The minimum driving age in New York State (NYS) is 16, with a NYS learner permit. However, for drivers under the age of 18, the driving regulations get a bit sticky, and restrictions vary depending on where you live in NYS and the time of day you want to drive - and making sure you have a licensed driver in the car with you at times. People under 18 are not allowed to drive in New York City unless they are 17 AND have passed a NYS Education Department approved driver education course. This includes drivers who hold licenses from other states. Out-of-state drivers are expected to follow the restrictions of both your home state and the NYS restrictions. For those of you, like Gothamist, who are already totally confused, the DMV provides a chart here with the specific restrictions for each type of license. (Perhaps at this point the subway is sounding better and better?) more ›

We don't know about you, but sometimes we find ourselves fascinated with the ways in which for-profit education works within the education community in general. Despite the large number of for-profit schools out there, unless something is going wrong they just don't get that much press, especially regarding their inner-workings. Which is why we're interested in keeping an eye on the recent troubles that have hit Technical Career Institutes (TCI) and its sister college Interboro Institute, both of which are owned by the EVCI Career Colleges Holding Corporation. more ›

This Thursday, World AIDS Day, sex education in New York's public schools will receive a politically charged facelift, the first major change to the curriculum in thirteen years. The major additions? Redesigned AIDS/HIV language and a better, more in-depth, discussion of the female condom. Fourth graders will now be told "HIV can be transmitted by sexual contact with an infected person. When you are older you will learn more," replacing the previous lesson which explained, much to the dismay of many parents, that condoms are used to "prevent transmission of semen, blood or vaginal fluids." Meanwhile abstinence is "strongly encouraged" in all grades. more ›

The Daily News also reports that Mayor Bloomberg donated $100,000 out of his billionaire pockets to the fund to reopen the Statue of Liberty - great - but then noted some of his other donations: $6 million to the Education Department's Leadership Academy to help train city principals and $5 million to bring the Republican National Convention the NY. Of course, the ideal timing for the Bush White House is for the Statue of Liberty to open in time for the convention, but Secretary Norton was vague about timing. more ›