Results tagged “publicschools”

The Department of Education sent public school children home with letters asking parents for consent to give the students the H1N1 vaccine. While the CDC confirmed that 11 children died of swine flu last week, it remains to be seen whether parents will opt for the vaccine. One told WCBS 2, "I've decided not to give my kids the vaccine because it's just too new I just feel it's not a lot of research, so I don't know what the side effects are."

Today, the 1.1 million students in NYC's public school system return to class, making it the unofficial "Parents Liberation Day." Indeed, parents told NY1, "I'm excited because my son, you know, the summer was basically recreation all day long and it's just time for him to get back into that groove of his education," and "I'm happy. So happy to get them out of the house." Of course, one looming issue—besides tests, tests and more tests that may not even help the kids prepare for college—is swine flu, though the city says its ready to combat that. Gotham Schools is liveblogging Schools Chancellor Joel Klein's five-borough school tour: At PS 111 in Long Island City—where Mayor Bloomberg, UFT President Michael Mulgrew, and principals union president Ernest Logan are also on hand—students "seem 'stunned and clearly irritated' by the gaggle of 20-odd reporters and photographers outside the door."

It's official—Schools Chancellor Joel Klein and Mayor Bloomberg have fixed the public schools! Why, how else could 84% of the city's 1,058 elementary and middle schools receive A's on the DOE's annual performance report card, with only 3% winding up with marks of C or below. In fact, all of the schools that received F’s last year and remained open received A’s or B’s this year. Sounding like a teacher who had "accidentally" left the answer key during the final exam and now had to justify the stark improvement from the 61% of schools that got A's and B's when the system began only two years ago, Klein said yesterday, “We want to make clear that that means that they met their progress targets. Not by any stretch of the imagination that those schools don’t have a lot of improvement ahead of them...You can be assured we will raise the bar next year.” The grades schools receive are determined on how much student test results improve in a given year and have been criticized for their heavy reliance on standardized test scores.

Oh, it's on: After Mayor Bloomberg complained about the State Senators stalling on the bill that would give him control of the public school system, the Senators sounded off right back. On Friday, Bloomberg said, "The only thing I can think of is they want to ruin the schools," suggested the state troopers "drag them back" to Albany and saying the Senators' summer off was "Meshughena." This prompted State Senator Hiram Monserrate to say, "We believe it would be meshuganah not to include parents in the education of our children. As opposed to loosely using the word meshuganah, we would also say we don't need a yenta on the other side of this argument and this debate. Raising the issues that he has raised in the manner he has raised them is unfortunate."

Mayor Bloomberg is unhappy that the State Senate Democrats are stalling a vote on whether to continue mayoral control of the NYC public school system and he's ratcheting up the rhetoric. His spokesman tells the Post that the Senators are essentially breaking their promise to the public: "The pledge by the Senate leadership to allow a floor vote on the bill should be honored." The Senate Democrats claim that they would be fine with voting on the bill—as long as it has some amendments, like involving parents more. Sen. Eric Schneiderman (D-Manhattan/Bronx) tells the NY Times, "If the mayor’s people would just sit down at a table for an hour with a pencil and our amendments, this would all be over." The Daily News' editorial from Tuesday said there doesn't need to be amendments: "The Assembly...held public hearings in every borough and took voluminous testimony before fashioning a school governance bill. In contrast, the Senate held not a single official hearing on how the schools should be run..."

Legendary former principal Frank Mickens died in his sleep yesterday. The 63-year-old Mickens was famous for turning around Bed-Stuy's Boys and Girls High School, described in the News as "a national symbol of an oversized, out-of-control inner-city high school" when Mickens began his twenty year reign in 1984. Mickens was often controversial for policies like instituting school uniforms and issuing long suspensions. A Brooklyn blog calls him "a no-nonsense disciplinarian..he patrolled the halls with a walkie talkie, often with a bullhorn." NY1 talks to a former student who said, "I honestly haven't met anyone who can hold a candle to him...4,000 students in there, and he knew each and every one of us." A Facebook memorial group already has over 250 members and includes the comment from his granddaughter: "If tears could build a stairway and memories a lane, I would walk right up to heaven and bring (you) back." Memorial services will be held for Mickens next Friday and Saturday in Bed-Stuy.

The Department of Education announced that it would be discontinuing the gifted program at the Clinton Hill public school where the principal was arrested for beating a teacher during a meeting last month. The removal of the program is the result of tensions that had been boiling over for some time before the incident between Principal Sean Keaton and many parents at the school. The Times has an in-depth look at the history of the conflict where they note: "Mr. Keaton is black, as are three-quarters of the students, while many of the families who said they found him hard to work with are white." The paper says that despite the cancellation of the program and the fight allegations (including the teacher having a stomp mark on his face), many of the parents at PS 20 stand by him. At the 5th grade graduation ceremonies this week, one parent said, “He’s straightforward and he pulls no punches. He gives it to you in the raw, and I respect that.” Keaton has been transferred to administrative duties elsewhere while an investigation is underway.

As if raising your kid in Williamsburg wasn't close enough to leaving them on the set of , historic for being one of the first times the tween pop group has appeared on the festival circuit. But when the movie played on the jumbo screen, it seemed like an even more momentous moment—the Jonas Brothers turning in their promise rings! Children were shown 45 seconds of "a topless woman and sex acts" until a teacher ripped the plug out of the wall. One parent told the Post, "My daughter is 6 years old; she doesn't need to see that. I don't even like to kiss in front of her because I think she's too young. So I'm very angry." The school is investigating just who was behind the video switch.

Yesterday, the city announced that reading scores of public schools students improved. According to the Post, "The percentage of third-through eighth-graders in the city's public schools who scored proficiently on state reading tests spiked from 57.6 to 68.8 percent in the last year," giving Mayor Bloomberg a reason to crow, it's "nothing short of amazing and exactly what this country needs." However, the NY Times reports there are skeptics, "The actual test scores and the percentage of students meeting standards can tell very different stories because it takes only a few correct answers to cross the line between Level 2, which is considered failing, and Level 3. For example, in the eighth grade, 57 percent of students met standards in New York City, compared with 43 percent last year. The actual scores show a different picture, with the average rising to 653 out of 790, up just 6 points from 647 last year." A secondary school principal was a doubter when she spoke to the Daily News, "After seven years of these improved test scores, how come the children we're getting in high school aren't reading any better and don't show any greater love of literature?"

In one corner, there's Mayor Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Klein. In the other, middle-class parents who have been told their children have been placed on wait lists for kindergarten placement. The NY Times describes it as a "mounting...middle-class vitriol against the school system." One parent shared a letter to the Dept. of Education—"You have unleashed the fury of parents throughout this city with your complete lack of preparedness"—while another recounted, "I got a call from Mayor Bloomberg’s campaign about yadda yadda yadda was I going to vote for him. As a parent who has a child with no place to go next year, no indication of where he’s going to go next year as a result of the mayor taking control of education, I said absolutely not... You would think that Bloomberg, who is a businessman, knows how to manage inventory like this. My kid isn’t just a bottle of vodka, but this is about inventory.” The Dept. of Education believes their approach to wait lists is fair and "will ensure that children have a placement offer by the end of June."

Researchers from Columbia University and Berkeley say they've proven that children attending schools near fast-food restaurants have higher-than-average obesity rates. Using data gathered from 1,047 California high schools over the course of eight years, the report [PDF] concludes that among 9th grade children, a fast food restaurant within a tenth of a mile of a school is associated with at least a 5.2 percent increase in obesity rates.

Students at five city middle schools are serving a guinea pigs for a Nintendo Wii-based fitness program, which may be expanded city-wide if private funding can be found. At one school in The Bronx, 25 children have been testing the program after school for four hours a week, doing yoga and jogging in a room with five big TV screens and Wii consoles, which were donated by Nintendo. The concept really isn't so radical; last year a Manhattan gym started charging $110 for Wii personal training sessions. Lori Rose Benson, head of the Department of Education's Office of Fitness and Health Education, admits she isn't a "huge supporter" of the program, because of the cost and the limited number of children who can participate at one time. But naturally the kids love it; eighth-grader Emmanuel Goua tells the Post, "It's exciting, because you actually lose weight without even knowing it. It's a fun way to exercise." And eighth-grader Thalia Gutierrez explains, "It helps your arms and your biceps and everything. I have muscles. I even got abs, too." Now Nintendo just needs to come up with a Wii grammar game!

With the economy changing people's financial situations, many parents who would have enrolled their children in private schools are looking to put their kids in highly regarded public schools, like P.S. 41 in Greenwich Village, P.S. 199 and P.S. 87 on the Upper West Side and P.S.'s 6, 59 and 290 on the Upper East Side. So now parents trying to find their ways into the neighborhoods where these schools are—the NY Times speaks to a few of these desperate parents; one said she and her husband were considering subletting their apartment and then rent an apartment in a more attractive zone while one father said, "I will certainly consider some alternative way to game the system by gaining a different address. This is my child, who is a really smart kid, and he’s not going to my crummy zoned school. That’s just not going to happen." The Times also has some tips for parents, one being to research schools on Insideschools.org and another to make sure a potential home is actually in the school's zone.

City Council will begin hearing the case today to allow nativity scenes to be displayed in New York City public schools. While menorahs, Christmas trees, stars and crescents are allowed along hallways and in front offices during the holiday season, the Department of Education views nativity scenes, or crèches, as purely religious. Council member Simcha Felder believes so strongly in the Department's policy that he not only opposes the resolution, but would rather all religious symbols be taken out of the schools. He told the Times, “If it’s offending anybody, let there be nothing." But Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights President William Donohue is pushing the Council to include room for créches, the same way he says he would if Jewish or Islamic symbols were banned, arguing, “I can’t imagine any Jews and Muslims being offended by this. What are we left with? A few angry atheists?”

Just as the city announced it would close three failing schools, it turns out nine city high schools made a list of top public schools in the country. U.S. News & World Report ranked Stuyvesant as #23 on its Top 100 high schools list; other NYC mentions were H.S. of American Studies (29), Dual Languages & Asian Studies (31), Staten Island Tech (32), Bronx Science (33), Baccalaureate School of Global Education in LIC (38), Queens H.S. of Science (48), Brooklyn Tech (67) and Townsend Haris H.S. (71). As for the failing schools, NY1 reports that JHS 40 in Manhattan will be phased over over two years, PS 90 in the Bronx will be replaced by two new schools, and PS 225 will be split into elementary and middle schools. Other schools may be up for closing or phasing out in future weeks.

A reader sent us a scan of a flier she found at NYU's student center, "It’s a flier for a NYU financial aid plan that basically tells students that can’t afford NYU to go to CUNY," and points out it's crazy that "NYU can’t give its students decent financial aid even though John Sexton flies to Abu Dhabi every other week and we keep buying new buildings all over the city." The school's tuition is around $50,000.

There's not one, not two, but FOUR relatively negative stories about the Department of Education today. The Daily News reports that more than a third of public school students are in overcrowded classrooms; a report says 167,000 new seats are needed, but the city is only planning on 63,000 more. The News' Juan Gonzalez also finds that the DOE spends $5 million on couriers--double what was spent in 2002--mostly due to the couriering of tests. The NY Times finds that even the DOE tried to make gifted programs more accessible, a new policy resulted in half as many gifted students--"with 28 schools lacking enough students to open planned gifted classes, and 13 others proceeding with fewer than a dozen children." Finally, the Columbia Spectator wonders where promised arts programs for schools are. Remember--reforming the public school system is a major part of Mayor Bloomberg's platform.

The New School's Center for New York City Affairs issued a troubling report finding that "more than 90,000 children in grades K through 5 (more than 20 percent of enrollment) missed at least one month of school." And, "In high poverty neighborhoods, the number was far higher, approaching one-third of primary grade students." You can read the whole report here--PDF--but here's an excerpt from the executive summary:

There are many reasons for high rates of chronic early-grade absenteeism: health issues such as asthma, transportation problems (particularly for children with disabilities), and dislocations caused by eviction or traveling between homeless shelters. There are issues of family instability, such as a mother’s depression or illness. Absences are also associated with cultural issues such as language barriers, and with problematic family priorities, including extended family vacations during the school year. The schools themselves bear a responsibility for attendance, both in their attention to the issue and in their efforts to create welcoming places where children want to be and that parents respect and value.

Continue reading "Map of the Day: Chronic Absenteeism in City Schools"

• Today on the Gothamist Newsmap: A serious MVA on the upper level of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, a suspicious package in Manhattan, and an overturned auto in Queens
• The things we learn as the Daily Intelligencer questions disclosure on Gawker... then FishbowlNY discloses some stuff about itself and Daily Intel
• Newly elected City Council members Mathieu Eugene and Vincent Ignizio are still not sworn in
• The stock market gained 0.4% today
• Do students really want their professors on Facebook? And will universities have to write some new rules about approaching students online? Hmm.
• On NY Turf looks at the City Council's pedicab vote today: "amendments entered by Quinn and the Mayor's administration the bill will effectively crush the nascent industry."
• There's a Working Families Party rally for NYC Public Schools tonight, as the Mayor announced a new "chief family engagement officer" would join the Department of Ed
• Gridskipper looks at the ugliest buildings in NYC; we'll have our thoughts tomorrow
Continue reading "Extra, Extra"

Police are looking for a man who is lurking around Queens neighborhoods, assaulting children. First, around 2:30PM on Friday, a man approached three children at a playground near PS 118 in Hollis. He exposed himself to an 11-year-old boy and two 9-year-old girls. The children got away.

One of the 40 new schools the city is opening in the fall will be the first public school dedicated teaching the Arabic language and culture. The NY Times reports that half of the classes at the Khalil Gibran International Academy will eventually be taught in Arabic. It will be located in Brooklyn, though it's unclear where yet. Principal Debbie Almontaser says the school will start out with just sixth graders, but will eventually have 500-600 students. She said, "We are wholeheartedly looking to attract as many diverse students as possible, because we really want to give them the opportunity to expand their horizons and be global citizens."

Hello, everybody. We've had a couple of exciting months, launching SFist and DCist as well as growing our staff, and have a busy fall/winter planned as well: