Historian-teacher John Thompson analyzes a recent review of the Bloomberg administration’s education initiatives and explains how the private education funders wasted $2 billion.

The great mistake of the Bloomberg administration was its unalloyed faith in accountability, the threats of punishment and sanctions.

As the budget expanded, the number of reading specialists for the early grades plummeted–“from 1,158 in 2002 to 637 in 2013.”

By contrast, “de Blasio respects experts who estimate that ’75 percent of the city’s four year olds — that is, about 73,000 children — would attend full-day pre-kindergarten if it were available and readily accessible.’ Wouldn’t it be nice if Bloomberg had invested billions of dollars filling that real-world need and not his personal need to sort and punish?”

Thompson is very hopeful that de Blasio sees a better path for school improvement–through support, early childhood education, and coordinated social services–not A-F grades for schools.

He writes:

“Now, New York City has a mayor who respects social science and understands the need to strengthen the social and institutional infrastructure of poor communities. Now, NYC “can counter the social isolation common in these poor neighborhoods and temper the impact of poverty and low social capital on educational failure and lifelong poverty.” Soon, researchers may not need to be so circumspect in choosing their words about the need for:

A targeted, neighborhood-centered approach to poverty would weave together school improvement with coordinated human services, youth development, high-quality early education and child care, homelessness prevention, family supports and crisis interventions.”