Leonie Haimson remembers that Bill DeBlasio promised to reduce class sizes when he first ran for mayor of New York City in 2013. She is executive director of Class Size Matters. He even signed his promise. But when he got extra money, he spent it on universal pre-K.
Now more new money is arriving for the schools, and he is resisting using it to reduce class size, despite the obvious benefits to the neediest children, those who would be helped by extra attention.
She writes:
After he was elected, de Blasio never followed through and focused on expanding preK and 3K instead.
Still, when parents pressed him about the need for smaller classes, he repeatedly said that he would do this when he finally received the full funding from the state from the CFE lawsuit.
Now that our schools are receiving that additional CFE funding of $530M next year, rising to $1.3B annually over the next three years, not to mention $7B in additional federal aid to our schools, he no longer has this or any excuse to deny NYC children their right to smaller classes.
We have heard that instead, de Blasio is arguing for spending a very small amount towards putting two teachers in a classroom. Yet doubling up on teachers has not been shown through research to have the same positive impact as lowering class size, nor does it have the same effect in terms of creating a focused, engaged learning environment.
In fact, the number of inclusion classes with two teachers has grown steadily over the last decade, and now fully one third of all elementary school children in NYC public schools are in classes with two teachers. Yet there has been NO significant improvement in achievement as gauged by the NAEP results over this period for either general ed or special ed students, or in any other way that can be measured.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
For the same reason he wants to move retirees from traditional Medicare to Medicare Advantage.
Sitting here shaking my head once again over the completely false notion that one can “measure” student “achievement”-whatever the hell that means. “Yet there has been significant improvement in achievement as gauged by the NAEP results over this period for either general ed or special ed students, or in any other way that can be measured.”
The most misleading concept/term in education is “measuring student achievement” or “measuring student learning”. The concept has been misleading educators into deluding themselves that the teaching and learning process can be analyzed/assessed using “scientific” methods which are actually pseudo-scientific at best and at worst a complete bastardization of rationo-logical thinking and language usage.
There never has been and never will be any “measuring” of the teaching and learning process and what each individual student learns in their schooling. There is and always has been assessing, evaluating, judging of what students learn but never a true “measuring” of it.
But, but, but, you’re trying to tell me that the supposedly august and venerable APA, AERA and/or the NCME have been wrong for more than the last 50 years, disseminating falsehoods and chimeras??
Who are you to question the authorities in testing???
Yes, they have been wrong and I (and many others, Wilson, Hoffman etc. . . ) question those authorities and challenge them (or any of you other advocates of the malpractices that are standards and testing) to answer to the following onto-epistemological analysis:
The TESTS MEASURE NOTHING, quite literally when you realize what is actually happening with them. Richard Phelps, a staunch standardized test proponent (he has written at least two books defending the standardized testing malpractices) in the introduction to “Correcting Fallacies About Educational and Psychological Testing” unwittingly lets the cat out of the bag with this statement:
“Physical tests, such as those conducted by engineers, can be standardized, of course [why of course of course], but in this volume , we focus on the measurement of latent (i.e., nonobservable) mental, and not physical, traits.” [my addition]
Notice how he is trying to assert by proximity that educational standardized testing and the testing done by engineers are basically the same, in other words a “truly scientific endeavor”. The same by proximity is not a good rhetorical/debating technique.
Since there is no agreement on a standard unit of learning, there is no exemplar of that standard unit and there is no measuring device calibrated against said non-existent standard unit, how is it possible to “measure the nonobservable”?
THE TESTS MEASURE NOTHING for how is it possible to “measure” the nonobservable with a non-existing measuring device that is not calibrated against a non-existing standard unit of learning?????
PURE LOGICAL INSANITY!
The basic fallacy of this is the confusing and conflating metrological (metrology is the scientific study of measurement) measuring and measuring that connotes assessing, evaluating and judging. The two meanings are not the same and confusing and conflating them is a very easy way to make it appear that standards and standardized testing are “scientific endeavors”-objective and not subjective like assessing, evaluating and judging.
Thase supposedly objective results are used to justify discrimination against many students for their life circumstances and inherent intellectual traits.
C’mon test supporters, have at the analysis, poke holes in it, tell me where I’m wrong!
I’m expecting that I’ll still be hearing the crickets and cicadas of tinnitus instead of reading any rebuttal or refutation. Because there is no rebuttal/refutation!
I left out the word “NO” by mistake, meaning that ” there has been NO significant improvement in achievement as gauged by the NAEP results over this period for either general ed or special ed students, or in any other way that can be measured.” I do rely on the NAEPS as one of the very few quantitative measures that exist for learning, that is stable over time and thus can show trends, and one of the few that has never been used for high stakes which make the results more reliable (ie Campbell’s Law). Smaller classes have led to higher test scores and a narrowing of the test score gap for economically disadvantaged kids and students of color.
I thought that was the case, Ms. Haimson. Thank you for the work you do!
No doubt that smaller class sizes (where appropriate as some classes by definition should be large-choir, band, etc. . . ) will result in a better learning environment. But at the same time that does not mean that a one to one student to teacher ratio is the best.
Focusing on narrowing test score gaps focuses on the wrong thing. Focusing on the causes of the “economically disadvantaged students” and eliminating them are what should be being done. Those causes are the political-economic system which serves to perpetuate those inequalities. Test scores do not perpetuate those inequalities except in a minor peripheral fashion.
If you truly care about those “disadvantaged kids and students of color” you would be focusing on those political economic conditions that negatively effect the lives of said children not some goddamned invalid test scores. But hey, that may entail that you give up some of your own privileges. Cain’t be having that now can we?
NAEP scores are just a sweeter smelling load of crap than the others by not having high stakes attached. Those scores are invalid and any usage of them results in bogus analysis.
Thank you, Bob and Duane, for really interesting and important discussion.
No one who does “educational measurement” for a living thinks that he or she is measuring directly observable variables, so this argument is a little like dismissing ocarinas because they can’t play notes in the bass clef or complaining about the swimming abilities of airplanes. It comes down to a purely semantic argument about what “to measure” properly refers to, which is pretty much a waste of time. As Saussure pointed out a long, long time ago, words for the most part bear arbitrary relations to their meanings, and people extend the concrete meanings of words ALL THE TIME. Emerson, in his essay “Language” points out that the word right is an extension of the concrete meaning of “staying on the right path,” that inspiration is an extension of the concrete meaning “the act of breathing in,” and so on.
Measurement, as the term is used in education, refers to the process by which a variable is operationalized for the purpose of describing that variable in a quantitative manner. So, the real issue is not whether measurement in education in any sense exists but whether the extended sense of the term measurement (extended beyond the physical measurement of observable properties according to exemplars of the units used for the measurement, aka standard units) is legitimate, and certainly, there are situations in which it clearly is. I can easily make up a test that can accurately, validly, reliably gauge how many common Japanese kanji you can recognize or whether you know your times table from 1 x 1 to 12 x 12. And I can report the results in numbers that can be trusted. In such a case, the answers to the questions on the test act as an operationalization of the abstract, internal, not directly observable characteristic of the learner (his or her knowledge of kanji or of the times table).
So, I have little patience for arguments like this because they are terrible distractions from the real issues with standardized testing. Here’s an example of a real issue: The “standards” on the CC$$ for ELA are often so vague and so broad that it is impossible to “measure them,” in that OTHER SENSE of measure that I’ve just described, with a couple of questions, and these state standardized tests only have one or two questions per “standard.” So, for example, one cannot come up with one or two questions that can tell whether a person can “make inferences from text.” The standard is far too broad, so the operationalization in the test falls short, and for that reason, the “measurement” (sense 2) of that standard is invalid.
To clarify, Wilson’s crackpot argument is rather like saying, “You can’t say that Mary Shelley was inspired by experiments in Galvanism” because inspire means “to breathe in.” Well, that’s the concrete, literal meaning, yes. But there are others.
I have wasted time responding to this because I care deeply about people learning the real reasons why the standardized testing in the U,S. is a sham, a multi-billion-dollar, curriculum-and-pedagogy-devolving boondoggle. I survey some of the major reasons here:
But that you can’t measure educational attainment or aptitude directly but do so by means of stand-ins–these operationalizations, these objective correlatives–that’s not great revelation, a small part of which was brought down from he mountaintop by Wilson. It’s Day 1, Lesson one in a standard Educational Measurement course.
So, the real issues turn out to be the validity and reliability of the operationalizations, and this other stuff just muddies the waters and distracts from people’s gaining an understanding that, and that’s why I blow a gasket every time this Wilson stuff is posted.
I can agree that you, indeed, do blow a gasket. Have never understood why. What about Wilson’s focus on the invalidities involved (reliability means nothing without validity and the standards and testing malpractices have no validity). Please be specific in quoting Wilson to show where you believe he is wrong in his thinking.
Brother Dwayne, I know that your heart is in the right place about this stuff, and your nose tells you that these standardized tests smell to high heaven, but you need to move beyond wasting your time with this purely semantic argument, from Wilson, that measurement has to be of physically observable characteristics using standardized physical units. As used in education, measurement typically means the substitution of a concrete and observable set of behaviors for an abstract, internal, not directly observable phenomenon. THAT’S WHAT IT MEANS. And the question becomes not whether such measurement is possible but, rather, whether particular instantiations of this operationalizing are defensible. Are these questions a reasonable stand-in for this abstract ability? Often, of course, as with the state ELA tests, the answer is, emphatically, no, but it’s not simple for people to understand why, evidently, so they need to have THAT explained to them.
Sometimes the test, the “measurement” (sense 2, the one used in education), can be EXTREMELY VALID AND RELIABLE. For example, I can substitute for the not directly observable “knows her circle of fifths” the following tasks: draw the circle of fifths or play the chords, clockwise, in the circle of fifths. There’s a one-on-one mapping between the nonobservable, internal phenomenon, and the operational substitute, or objective correlative. Is this perfect? No,. Perhaps on the day when I set this task, the learner’s parents have just announced their divorce. Perhaps the llearner thinks that I mean, by “fifths,” bottles of alcohol. LOL.
Ha ha. . .
If [a person] truly care[s] about those “disadvantaged kids and students of color” [he or she] would be focusing on those political economic conditions that negatively effect the lives of said children not [on] some ____ invalid test scores.
Yes. Emphatically, yes.
Because he does what his bosses tell him to do.
Smaller class sizes yield positive results for students. They even serve to promote a more positive school climate throughout schools. When students’ needs are met, they are more likely to exhibit more pro-social behavior, and they learn more.
While I know nothing about what De Blasio might be thinking, the fact he is suggesting “two teachers” in a room suggests NYC may have a space problem. After years of disinvestment, the physical plants of aging buildings may be compromised. It is expensive to get derelict buildings ready for students. Safety is also a big consideration. Old buildings often have electrical, plumbing, foundation, roof, mold, asbestos, lead and heating-ventilation problems. These are all very expensive issues to address.
If NYC had, instead of the mayor, an elected school board in place, the public would be able to hear discussion of how and why budgets are created. But I suppose that sort of democratic and transparent government is not for some people.
Just so you know, there were problems with those elected school boards in the past. People don’t realize how vast NYC is. Do you have one school board in each borough? I have no doubt that the school board in Manhattan might be happy not to have to have any responsibility for students outside of Manhattan.
Do you have one school board for the city? Is that how LA works? Those school board elections have been rife with big money swaying the results.
I am just pointing out that the issue isn’t just elected school boards. That is likely to just create different issues. It could be better, but also could be worse.
“some” people — yes
Thank you, ciedie.
Nycpsp, I agree an elected school board for nyc could be problematic, riddled with politics, perhaps corruption, definitely out-of-state big$ for campaigns (if that were legal). We can look to LA’s elected school board & observe that; their schsys is about 30% smaller but still huge [#2 in size to NYC]. Nevertheless, we’ve seen right in the pages of this blog over the years how LA’s school issues get major public airing & debate, & have to answer to the public one way or another. That would be the upside.
There are long precedents in NYC for various types of public school management that should probably be revisited and compared. Mayoral control is only 19 yrs old (& I think also for a while under Lindsay).
Interestingly, NYC has something that looks to this outsider like locally-elected school boards in small cities/ towns: the Community Education Councils. So there are sub-districts (not just one giant district) with elected officials. Presumably they have only an advisory capacity: if they answer up the line, it is to folks who are appointed by the mayor, which may be a dead end.
Perhaps a system could be built from these grass-roots up? There might have to be a ‘middle-mgt’ level for the 267 CEC’s, reporting to a NYC school board borough rep. But if all these folks held elected positions, they would find themselves having to work together in response to voter druthers. [The key on which it falls or succeeds might be whether grass-roots level has its own budget, & primary control over it.]
Of course it is a space problem!
I have no patience for people who scream “reduce class size” without offering any good plan on how to do it.
In District 15, parents were calling for more integrated middle schools. They spent a lot of time offering a comprehensive plan for it, and de Blasio enacted it.
But they did it by talking to parents and teachers. And figuring out a way to do it.
There are lots of ways to make space and I have proposed several on my blog and website,. De Blasio created thousands of seats for preK and 3K students when he made this a priority; unfortunately he has never cared about significantly improving the learning conditions of students once they turned 5, and actually said recently that if enough kids get preK, nothing else matters, which is one of the dumbest things I’ve ever heard.
This is a fair argument about pre-K and 3-K that I’ve made many times in the past.
Agree, Leonie Haimson. This is reminding me of those studies ‘concluding’ that any benefits of the Head Start program were lost by 4th or 8th grade (therefore worthless, so dump it). Without any consideration for the ed conditions in the schools those kids graduate into, which any reasonable analysis would closely examine as the cause of the lost potential. Which means we can blink at those, as they’re not considered part of the equation. Pumping all new funds into universal PreK [/ 3K] without touching what lies upstream qualifies as just another ‘silver bullet’ based on isolating & applying certain study results—no systemic vision.
leonie,
You make a good point about de Blasio prioritizing preK seats (although are there 3K seats in public school buildings?) I assumed the pre-k seats were in the underused buildings (better that than charters!) and that a good percentage were in other places.
Thank you for all your good work.
I agree with you about the idiocy of anyone who believes “if enough kids get preK, nothing else matters”, but I strongly disagree with your comment that “he has never cared about significantly improving the learning conditions of students once they turned 5”. de Blasio took office trying to do many things that would help students of all ages — one of the first things he did was to put a halt on the Mayor Bloomberg policy of giving free space to charters. We all know how badly that ended.
But aside from charters, I do not understand how anyone could say with a straight face that de Blasio never cared about significantly improving the learning conditions of students once they turned 5. That was exactly what his signature $773 million Renewal program was all about, which he wasted little time doing. The state wanted to close up some so-called “failing” public schools and send those kids elsewhere (the ed reformers likely wanted the top performing students to be directed to charters, with the rest warehoused in new underfunded public schools that would provide a dumping ground for the students the ed reformers did not want to teach but loved to compare their own students to in order to justify why they should get even more resources from the public school budget to reward them for their success.)
Sure, there were problems with the execution of the Renewal program, but there are ALWAYS problems when something new and big is tried and the entire focus was on the failures (kids didn’t have huge test score gains!) instead of their successes (students and their families had access to all kinds of wraparound services, a school didn’t close).
And once again, de Blasio got excoriated for it and no one really had his back, just jumped on the bandwagon about how the execution was just so bad and that’s why the idea “failed”. I just went back and saw a huge NYT article that attacked the Mayor because he was supposedly told right away that the students weren’t getting higher test scores and he – apparently with evil intent by NYT standards — refused to immediately shut down their school and stop giving those students all those extra wraparound services even though he “knew” that those kids wouldn’t get higher test scores! The shame! How dare de Blasio keep a program that didn’t raise kids’ test scores when all it was doing was giving them better health, medical care, food, etc!
I couldn’t believe the drumbeat of “it’s all a waste of money if students don’t get better test scores!” Look at Duane’s reply to you. Test scores aren’t the measure of whether a program is working. I know there were issues with class sizes in some renewal schools not being as small as they should have been, but everyone was so busy assigned evill motives to de Blasio that they didn’t even have any interest in figuring out how to fix it, which involved questions of forcing teachers into those schools against their will, or teachers quitting or finding teachers properly licensed to teach there. Instead we heard the drumbeat implying that this happened because de Blasio didn’t care.
To de Blasio’s credit, instead of making his critics happy and closing down those schools so the best students could go to lavishly funded charters and the rest could be warehoused, he ended the “Renewal Program” while continuing the Renewal program effort to provide schools with the most at-risk population those extra wraparound services that were part of the Renewal programs.
I think if Kathryn Garcia wins, the public school system will see a wholesale takeover by the ed reformers. Likely with Eric Adams also, but Adams has some concern with at risk kids. I suspect Garcia will make the parents who count happy — her base is affluent Manhattan — and maybe she’ll even give smaller class sizes to the verbal group of parents who are demanding it although I still don’t know where the space will come from — and it won’t matter that the ones whose voices never get heard are ignored. After all, spending money on them if test scores aren’t raised is a waste of money anyway, right?
de Blasio may not have been able to successfully execute his vision, but he tried and took the heat for it. In a better world, it would have been okay for programs to take time to work, with changes being made to adjust to unforeseen problems. The people who executed the Renewal program made mistakes, but that happens with all programs. When it was de Blasio, the ed reform PR arm turned it into a reason that parents should assume he lies about caring about schools. I never bought it, but some people did.
NYC public schools are going to be in for a bad time with the new Mayor (unless Wiley somehow wins). I know that parents like me won’t feel it — we may even get more. But the kids who need it most won’t. But the media only cares about them when they can be used as tools to point to the failures of a Mayor they don’t like daring to shower their public schools with resources instead of closing them down.
Privatizers want the space. It’s a privatization problem. Investing in infrastructure and hiring/keeping teachers is what the corporate “reformers” want to avoid. They want to run deficits, and line their pockets whenever there is a surplus. Large class sizes are what they want. Bloomberg wanted to “fire half the teachers” and double class sizes. That thoughtless idea needed to be stopped and frisked.
de Blasio fought those privatizers and no one had his back. Seriously, I have never seen more complicit silence than when de Blasio’s attempt to prevent privatizers from taking space from public schools resulted in him being ordered by Albany to give them all the space they wanted.
I was appalled that the overriding message that even progressives were saying was that by standing up strongly against the privatizers, de Blasio didn’t do it “the right way” so it backfired (as if there is some different way that one can oppose those in power that will make them give up that power). All that did was empower the privatizers even more, knowing that they could always scapegoat de Blasio and even progressives would repeat that he wasn’t doing it “the right way”.
Mayor de Blasio doesn’t want to “fire half the teachers” and “double class sizes”. He has tried to make policy that takes into account what unions want, what parents want, and what is best for the community. Those things are often in conflict, and the privatizers win when anyone whose preferences aren’t met joins with them to undermine those who support making public education better.
I would love to have a conversation on this blog about the best way to go about reducing class sizes with some real ideas based on the current situation. What is forced on parents? What is forced on teachers? What is forced on those who build schools?
Progressives are not your enemies. We are your friends.
de Blasio is not the progressives’ enemy. Neither are most Democrats. AOC gets it.
I mentioned Bloomberg, not de Blasio.
I spent quite a bit of time working in inclusion classes in New York City. I can unhappily and unequivocally endorse this statement: “Yet doubling up on teachers has not been shown through research to have the same positive impact as lowering class size, nor does it have the same effect in terms of creating a focused, engaged learning environment.” I always–always–got better results with the special needs students I served when I worked with them in small-group instruction.
I could tell you some stories about this, you know?
Some co-teaching situations work well, others not as much. It all depends on the students and whether or not the team was assembled thoughtfully and how compatible the teachers are. And in the case of an aid, training matters a great deal. Whether it’s an aid or a co-teaching teaching situation …. it all depends on the variables.
Simply throwing staff in a room together to have a better teacher to student ratio is not a good alternative to lowering class sizes.
Agreed. Co-teaching is like a marriage. Some will thrive, but many will fail.
From a parent’s perspective — it is really interesting to read the thoughtful replies from educators. Thank you.
As a parent, I was fortunate to have a kid who was in an ICT classroom (in NYC that meant that some percentage of the students had IEPs) with two superb teachers who worked amazingly well together.
I have also seen teachers who have classes of 20 or even fewer who aren’t particularly good. And I have seen amazing teachers who seem to know each student’s strengths and weaknesses who teach in class of 35+ students. I have no idea how they do it, honestly.
Education has never been a one size fits all,but it’s nearly impossible to address some of the complexities – too many people seem to think there are quick simple fixes and blame politicians for not just fixing things, and those politicians get replaced and replaced and nothing changes, because there are no simple answers.
I have no context for the teachers you evaluated (20 students vs. 35) and why you thought one was better than the other. I am sure you have keen observation skills. However, observing teachers casually without the big picture of how the class is progressing doesn’t always tell the full picture.
A classroom that looks a little louder and slightly more active – the children may be growing and learning and thriving a great deal.
A teacher who looks masterful controlling a room of 35 may just be good at crowd control and entertaining a group. Whether or not the environment they have created fosters true engagement and growth of children is complex to measure.
Occasional observations don’t always tell the full story.
When I first started teaching I worked with 2 teachers with 2 very different styles – both good – just different. At first I strove to be like teacher A. Her class was always in control and children were always doing the tasks presented. It looked like engagement and it was – to a degree. In teacher B’s class, there was a lot more interaction during transitions and talking during lessons. Occasionally it looked a little hectic – but not the majority of the time. Over time, while I still respected teacher A, I grew to value teacher B’s classroom style. I saw that the environment fostered ownership, confidence and risk taking and children’s skills grew as much, if not more than teacher A.
Had I not spent hundreds of hours in each classroom and seen the difference at the end of the school year in growth… I may have had the same opinion as the first few months I spent in their classrooms.
beachteach,
I don’t have keen observation skills! I’m just a parent giving my perspective, which definitely isn’t based on classroom control! From a parent’s perspective, teaching isn’t a straightforward thing. I have seen teachers that some parents love and under whose tutelage a kid thrived tremendously, and other parents bemoaned because under that teacher’s tutelage, their kid faltered and started hating school. So I really try to reserve judgement in general, because teachers (like all of us) have amazing talents and yes, some weaknesses, and it really tends to be more about how those affect a particular student.
But sometimes it is possible for parents to tell that a teacher has checked out of teaching, or isn’t particularly engaged in the classroom. And sometimes new young teachers don’t understand how to handle students who don’t fit into the box, while experienced teachers do.
But I agree with your point about a parent not really knowing all of what goes into teaching. I certainly don’t. And I have also seen teachers who didn’t seem particularly gifted who, after a few years, turned into beloved teachers who had a huge positive impact on their students.
@ NYC…. I was talking about observations in general…. not a parent who is regularly in a classroom. Most parent volunteers, who are in the classroom regularly – are often able to pick up on a teaching style that works for their child (and a group) better than someone who comes in once or twice a year.
…. And yet he found room for universal PreK and 3K. Seems there is a way but no will.
I’m sure they’re finding a way to make plenty of space for charter schools. Oh yeah, put two teachers in a classroom and you’ll have an extra classroom for collocation. My great teachers union fights for lower class size because it’s better for students, and also because uncrowded classrooms means fewer open rooms for hostile, corporate takeovers. Parent Revolution hasn’t gone away.
I should note for anyone who doesn’t read this blog regularly that Parent Revolution is NOT a group of parents. They are lawyers hired to attack public schools and convert them to charters.
RL,
I agree that if you think small class sizes for older students should have been prioritized over universal pre-k, you have every right to be angry. In fact, had de Blasio just eliminated pre-k altogether, and made Kindergarten a 1/2 day (is it still a half day in Los Angeles?) there would have been space for smaller classes.
Or maybe not, since as soon as de Blasio suggested rezoning parents against their will to attend less crowded elementary schools, there was a huge outcry and lots of people saying that de Blasio should stop it.
I would love to read the NYC teachers’ union position on how to reduce class sizes and force students out of currently overcrowded public schools. Is the union taking a stance that teachers would be flexible and go to another school if that helped overcrowding?
For the record, much of universal pre-k was accomplished by NOT having students in the same building as their overcrowded neighborhood public elementary school. Are you saying that Kindergarten and first grade teachers who object to be moved to wherever there is space as the DOE orders to alleviate overcrowding should be blamed if they do not happily accept their new assignments? Do teachers get a say or should their desires not be considered for the good of the students? I could see an argument for both ways.
What is the “way” that you think de Blasio didn’t use? I really want to know since people seem certain there was an obvious way, that didn’t force either union teachers or parents to do something they didn’t want to do.
Universal pre-k involved being flexible about space and where pre-k teachers had to teach. Are union K-12 teachers now willing to be flexible?
I would like to hear this plan for overcrowded schools. And don’t forget to tell parents who would rather have their kids in a good school with 35 kids per class than a different one with 23 students per class that it doesn’t matter, that school will not have fewer students and 1/3 of the students will be sent elsewhere.
Progressives are not your enemies. We are your friends.
Progressives like AOC are my friends. Progressives like Bernie Sanders are my friends. They share a desire to discuss the issues in their complexities instead of a desire to bash various politicians – usually Democrats – for not achieving some unattainable progressive nirvana. I have never once heard AOC push the false narrative that de Blasio or other democratic politicians are in some conspiracy because deep down they are listening to their billionaire masters telling them “you must keep class sizes as high as possible.” It isn’t true.
I don’t use every misstep by Randi Weingarten — and Randy Weingarten makes a lot of missteps! — to bash the evil teachers union. How does pushing the false narrative that Randi Weingarten acts only in the way that her corporate masters tell her because the teachers’ union is a corrupt organization help anyone?
Is that really a discussion you want to have? Randi Weingarten is bad because the teachers union is corrupt and evil — yes or no? Will that make the union better by pushing the false narrative that their leaders are irredeemably corrupt and should not be trusted?
Pushing the false narrative that Mayor de Blasio has some secret desire to keep class sizes very, very high — likely because rich people who hate public schools are telling him to and he follows their marching orders — is ridiculous. It also ignores various issues that keep class sizes high — like rezoning being very unpopular with parents and like forcing teachers to work anywhere but where they want being very unpopular with unions. Not to mention how to go about hiring — for 1.1 million students — the tens of thousands of new teachers to teach these newly small classes.
Anyone? What is the plan? I suggested 6 trailers per elementary school as a start — who agrees?
To me, this discussion reminds me of talking to a parent who (correctly) notes that some union teachers are not very good and they want the only discussion to be “we must destroy the union” and they accuse anyone who wants to have a real discussion about solutions as saying “everything the union does is perfect” when that is NOT what they are saying.
We agree that class sizes should be smaller. So what should de Blasio be doing? What is a good plan? Do kids get moved out of crowded schools against their parents’ will, or do we buy trailers and park them in the playgrounds?
When you wrote that only Senator Sanders and Representative Ocasio-Cortez were your friends, NYPSP, it let me know you were getting a little too personal. Not the first time. I am not your enemy, and I expect to be able to be comfortable commenting on this blog without knowing you will jump on me no matter what I write. I respect you, whoever you may be. I would like the same in return. If not, I can always change my username and avoid the problem, but that shouldn’t be necessary. Thank you for reading.
NYCPSP has an unfortunate habit of invoking the names of AOC and Sanders to prove his or her bona fides.
leftcoastteacher,
Because I respect you, I went back and re-read all of my replies to you. I even re-read the replies I made to other people’s comments that you seemed to take offense to. I still do not understand why you felt so offended with my genuine desire to have a discussion about the complexities of smaller class size instead of just assuming de Blasio was part of a conspiracy to keep class sizes high.
I don’t know what caused you to reply to me and post: “progressives are not your enemies”.
I never said that progressives were my enemy. I don’t think progressives are the enemy and I never have. So I apologize because I reacted badly to what I saw as an attempt to distract from the subject.
I should have just posted “I never said progressives were my enemy.” Hopefully that would have allowed us to continue with a discussion of what is involved in lowering class sizes.
“NYCPSP has an unfortunate habit of invoking the names of AOC and Sanders to prove his or her bona fides.”
It is true that when I am accused out of the blue of being a person who views progressives as “enemies”, I do have the habit of citing that I happen to admire many progressives and agree with them on most things.
Maybe if everyone can stipulate that I don’t think progressives are my enemies and have never in my life thought progressives were my enemies, I would never have to invoke the names of AOC and Sanders and explain how much I admire them to defend myself against the spurious charge that I view progressives as my enemies. I don’t.
Frankly, I’m offended that people are allowed to accuse me of something ridiculous and I’m not allowed to respond.
Hey, y’all, public school parents are not your enemies.
Leftcoastteacher, public school parents are not your enemies.
Anecdotal parent experience here. (Some of you have heard it before, but it bears repeating). Two out of three sons [eldest & youngest] had IEP’s: eldest at 6th-gr, youngest at K. They were 4yrs apart. Eldest was subjected to the usual late-‘90’s/ early-‘00’s IEP fare: resource room [which meant sacrificing or postponing electives in which he would have excelled], plus “co-taught” general courses [ELA, Soc Stud].
Co-teaching was a complete waste as far as I could determine. A too-big class for a SpEd kid to thrive in, which was worsened by the constant sotto voce hubbub of the ‘extra help,’ complicated by the bizarre denial of co-teacher being there for [unidentified] Spec Ed cluster, exacerbating a sort of shame element.
In 10th gr my eldest’s lifelong disconnect between hi IQ & processing speed was suddenly made clear. At 16 he went into that rare bipolar mania–a psychotic break– was hospitalized for weeks, suffered thro med trials w/adverse effects. Thank god we live in a high-priced county/ schdistr & everything was brought to bear: post-hosp, a county facility delivered not only med admin & group therapy, but ½-day tutoring by a veteran teacher who coordinated w/schdist SpEd & Guidance supvs. Once out of there, schdistr provided another rare veteran teacher who came to our house 2x weekly through summer, to get him thro ELA & Soc Stud. He rejoined 11thgr on sched, buttressed by several ‘self-contained’ [6-student max] classes that allowed him to proceed at own speed to successful hisch grad & college.
But meanwhile—while eldest was in hospital– 6th-gr youngest’s Child Study Team called me on carpet. (Fortunately I had a SpEd teacher sis in another state advising me). They danced around the [illegal] words, but were clearly calling for ADHD meds. I explained to them what was going on w/eldest– & that his psychotic break was no doubt advanced by yrs due to ADHD meds delivered thanks to their CST-recommended shrink a few yrs prior, which brought on major depression, combated by shrink with AD’S, which brought on a 1st severe mania that shouldn’t have happened until 19yo at earliest. Told them same blood ran thro youngest veins, & they’d better find a way to teach him without meds.
And they did. Youngest’s hisch ed was buttressed by several ‘self-contained’ [6-stud max] classes, plus back-to-back math classes sr yr when it looked like he needed it. He’d had some scarily similar mental issues in childhood, but was never put on meds, graduated with his class, went on to college.
The bottom line here: small classes work—for all sorts of problems. (And of course: only in a high-RE-tax schdistr will you gt the kind of SpEd support that is needed– for all kids so afflicted.)
Thank you for sharing your own experiences. Your kids were so lucky to have an amazing parent like you who was advocating for them all the time – and you were so wise to trust your own instincts about what was best for them.
I think every kid deserves a small class size, but I also know some kids can more easily deal with quite large class sizes and I would much rather make sure that the resources are prioritized for the kids who need it the small class sizes the most.
But wow, you are an incredible parent to keep fighting for what was best for your kids. It must have been exhausting and in a better world you wouldn’t have to, but it would so great if school systems could hire an individual advocate like you for all their kids with special needs.
Thanks nycpsp. Yes I saved youngest, but wish I’d had more wisdom earlier to help eldest. Was overwhelmed by seemingly unanimous input from ‘the system’ [psych/ med/ pharma establishment, shamelessly bought into & pushed by pubsch establishment of that era]. My deep cynicism re: pubsch establishment’s whimsical adoption of ‘silver bullets’ stems from this experience. Facts are, it’s far cheaper to drug kids into behavioral compliance—and run big classes– than to simply run smaller classes where it’s feasible to work successfully with the full spectrum of whoever walks in the door. Just like all silver bullets, it’s always and ever about spending less $$ on pubsch ed.
@bethree5 ~ Thank you for sharing this difficult story. I am sorry for the heartbreak this must have caused you – to watch your sons struggle. Your story is an important one to be told.
“Co-teaching was a complete waste as far as I could determine. A too-big class for a SpEd kid to thrive in, which was worsened by the constant sotto voce hubbub of the ‘extra help,’ complicated by the bizarre denial of co-teacher being there for [unidentified] Spec Ed cluster, exacerbating a sort of shame element.”
Yeah, pretty much Bethree. This was my experience as the special education teacher in the mix. It was a stunning, indeed tragic, waste of time.
Guess why it’s the fave go-to these days (sigh). Cheap enough, sounds good, doesn’t work. oh no I’m already getting cynical & resigned & it’s not even noon yet ;- )
Cynical, maybe, but resigned? I don’t see it. As long as you’re in these fora speaking up on these issues, you are anything but resigned. I appreciate your comments, but I particularly valorize your comments–the most succinct and effective–on co-teaching. To use the cliche, you hit the nail right on the head; believe me, I’ve been there and done it. In fact, one of the reasons I left my job in New York was exhaustion at the educational travesty, in fact, malpractice, of integrated co-teaching.
Doesn’t Integrated co-teaching work for some students, with very mild issues? It seems as if we are throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I can see how wrong it is if the school system threw a kid who needed a 6 person class into an integrated co-teaching classroom. That is outrageous if schools are using it to save money. But I wonder if it could be good for other students with different issues who can handle being in a larger classroom?
My kid had a remarkable experience in an ICT elementary school classroom. All the kids were friends and it wasn’t obvious to me as a parent which students were part of the special ed group and which not, and in many cases, I don’t think the kids even knew. The entire class had a vibe of teachers understanding that all the students – regardless of whether they had a special ed classification or not – were unique and didn’t fit into one “out of the box” way of teaching. I know that many teachers teach that way regardless, but I did wonder if the fact that teachers are trained in special ed or had significant experience in classrooms with kids who weren’t typical made those teachers better teachers for all students.
There is a school in Brooklyn, “The Children’s School”, that seemed to approach learning that way — having 2 teachers and an aide in each class. Class sizes weren’t huge, but probably average size for NYC.
But I agree that it is wrong if those co-teaching classes are used as a substitute to save money by not offering students who need it classes of 6 or fewer. It’s sad that what probably started as a good idea was misused so badly.
Nycpsp: “Doesn’t Integrated co-teaching work for some students, with very mild issues? It seems as if we are throwing the baby out with the bathwater.”
You’ve observed an ICT class which seemed to work fine, plus you note a special school where they have 2 teachers + aide in every class. I think beachteach’s post earlier says it best: this can work if it is the result of a careful plan. You’ve got specific goals & staff it with well-trained people who find a successful way to work together. The 2 teachers & aide would need to meet weekly to compare notes/ reassess/ move forward. Backed by seamless leadership in the bldg [principal, dept heads (incl SpEd)] – add monthly meetings. And there’s a piece behind the scenes: a small resource-room class run by a [usually different] teacher providing add’l 1-on-1 to the SpEd cohort from the big class – yet another person who needs to be tied into planning/ running interference.
To me what that looks like is a complex project set up to deal with a challenge. The challenge is a class size which only works where little 1-on-1 attention is required. Systems-wise, the ‘solution’ is grossly inefficient and presents additional challenges which can only be met by top-notch people spending a lot of time conferencing off-hours. May succeed in a well-resourced bldg; the no-fault is going to be as beachteach says, “simply throwing staff in a room together to have a better teacher to student ratio.”
IMHO we can add this to baby-boom era tracking and non-solution solutions like a mandate for one teacher to ‘differentiate instruction’ for 25-30 kids. Sometimes works depending on a roll of the dice.
Whether it might work for ‘those with very mild issues’ you mean those whose learning problems are not compounded by disruptive behavior. What’s working there is simply that the majority are able to learn, and their teacher teach them, without distraction by the minority. I believe we also have studies showing that disruptive behavior from any quarter is far less of a factor in small classes.
Thank you, bethree5, those are all good points. I definitely support smaller class sizes for all. Was just thinking more about prioritizing it.
Also, on a personal note, there can be some downsides with smaller schools with smaller class sizes because some kids don’t find friends among that small group or are outcasts. I’m not talking active bullying, but kids are kids and having friendly or more likely indifferent “acquaintances” in a small class is not like finding kindred spirits. Not that it’s easy to find kindred spirits in a large classroom, either, but while it seems counterintuitive, some atypical students do better in that setting because they find one another. Obviously, I’m not talking about kids with special needs who are harmed by being in a large class.
Mostly I was just thinking that being able to provide enough separate classrooms for small classes for all seems like a complex and time-consuming project, but right now smaller classes for the students who need it most should happen.
I spent quite a bit of time as a parent at overcrowded but popular public schools, and while most parents wanted smaller class sizes, I never heard any of them volunteering to move a group of their kids to a different, less crowded school.
How does one immediately lower class size since using 2 teachers is not sufficient?
Where are the thoughtful plans by people advocating smaller class sizes that explain how you immediately move 1/4 or 1/3 of the students out of their beloved neighborhood public school and send them somewhere else?
This takes thinking and planning. Just like the people who advocated for Middle School Equity talked to parents and offered some reasonable ideas. I really admired them because they did more than attack the administration for not doing something. They worked hard to develop some thoughtful ideas.
Maybe there are thoughtful ideas about how to reduce class size by only having one teacher in a single classroom with fewer students, but I haven’t seen it.
I really don’t get this “decrease class sizes but not with 2 teachers”.
Is there a list of every overcrowded public elementary schools and a potential nearby uncrowded school with empty classroom space that the small class size advocates demand that students from the current school be sent?
What are some realistic plans for reducing class size with only one teacher per smaller group of kids in a classroom?
Should de Blasio be buying more trailers and hiring more teachers? I don’t object to that, but please offer a realistic plan?
How about 6 trailers per crowded elementary school, one for each grade, and perhaps the tradeoff is having a smaller playground.
Those advocating smaller class sizes have to accept that some parents are not going to be happy.
And I am all for new schools, but it would be helpful to identify spaces and think about how they can be reconfigured, how long it will take,and whether the real issue is the School Construction Authority that wields total power and apparently nobody wants to criticize.
The plan depends on each school and the system it’s in. I bet the staff in each school, if invited to be part of the planning of a solution and given a seat at the table, would have good ideas. But the ideas I would have for my school may not fit a school in another area. There are too many diverse variables.
If there is criticism of a plan by staff…. it’s most likely more layered and complex than just “teachers attacking admin.”
Those are good points. And part of the problem is the definition of “the system it’s in” and “a school in another area”.
NYC public school system is a single vast system broken into districts, but keeping solutions within districts (some of which are significantly poor and some of which are far more affluent) has its own problems.
A bunch of parents and educators in District 15 Brooklyn did something like that for a middle school diversity plan. It was district wide. But even then, it meant some parents were very unhappy. That’s the elephant in the room.
But that group of parents approached the issue as “The DOE does want to do something” as opposed to starting with the idea that the reason things aren’t happening is because the DOE wants a segregated school system or the DOE wants students to be in very large class sizes. I don’t think that is true. But the devil is always in the details of how to get it done.
And offering up some plans starts a real conversation. Getting parents on board with ideas in those plans demonstrates that there will be some political support when a new plan that includes ideas that makes some parents unhappy is revealed.
^^^I should add that the efforts behind re-zoning also tried to address overcrowded schools.
It was extremely hard to convince parents that attended a much less crowded public school with smaller class sizes was just as good, or even better than not attending the good, but overcrowded public school that they assumed their child would attend because of where they lived.
Somehow it is very hard to get that message through, and I do know it was tried.
Having smaller class sizes for public schools serving the most disadvantaged students is absolutely imperative. If those schools are overcrowded now, or have large class sizes, that is the first thing that must be addressed. I hope those can be identified and prioritized.
Eons ago I had a superintendent of schools who would “joke” about having class sizes of 40 kids. He would admonish that teachers should not complain about class size because everything up to and including 40 pupils was totally acceptable and educationally sound. My first year in the school district I had 38 kids; needless to say by the end of the day I was a puddle of sweat on the floor. I really loathed and despised that superintendent, thinking that it was funny packing 38 kids into a small classroom with limited resources. There would have been no room for a 2nd teacher, not that the super was proposing any solution to the overcrowding, quite the opposite. Overcrowding was no problem for him, because he could brag about the big money savings to the general public, many of whom had no kids in the public schools. Overcrowding was his selling point for fiscal responsibility, educational responsibility was of tertiary importance. Not even tertiary.
We in Utah already have 40 or more students per core class (even more for electives). It’s not a joke (not that you thought it was).
Leonie has always underestimated the logistical problems and financial cost of meaningfully reducing class sizes in NYC.
Has Leonie done any polling as to whether parents in overcrowded schools who want smaller class sizes would be willing to move their kid to a different, less crowded school?
I have been in the NYC public school system for a long time and the same thing happens over and over again:
Neighborhood public school is underused and has small class sizes. School becomes better and parents want their kids to go there. School becomes overcrowded but parents still want their kids there even though there are large class sizes, but they say they want smaller class sizes! Parents don’t want their school re-zoned because it is overcrowded.
And I saw one elementary school that moved it’s 3rd, 4th and 5th grade to have space in a new middle school. Which just made the school even more popular and overcrowded.
However, there is no question that schools serving primarily highly at-risk students need small class sizes, resource room, and a lot more.
Nycpsp – no question that parents will find fault with changes to their anticipated routine that would actually give them smaller classes [or other better ed options for their kids]. ‘Fraid this is territory where the school admin must simply bite the bullet and move ahead.
I’ve seen this phenomenon in my own small city over 30 years. Rezone one avenue so as to equalize class-sizes between two adjacent elementary schools. Bus one segment of northside elementary grads to southside middle school because northside midsch is overcrowded & southside midsch has the room. Everyone screams bloody murder– then adapts & is fine with it.
Biggest hoo-ha in recent years: instead of building additions on several elemschs: re-takeover school bldg rented for decades to private schools & re-purpose it as a K school gathering all K kids from all 6 elementary schools! Wow did prospective K parents cry over that! And yet here we are a few years later & folks actually have found many reasons to like it.
In this town it takes a combination of trust that the pubschdistr has the best interest of kids in mind, plus the corrective influence of town taxpayers who are not about to spend millions when a good & cheaper compromise is in the offing. And of course the willingness of school board to take an unpopular stand which they are convinced is in the best interest of the public.
Hundreds of millions of new money is coming to NYC because of the settlement of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit. How will that money be spent?
That’s a really important question! I was doing more research on Leonie’s blog and it seems as if the NYC Council has a pretty good proposal for how to spend it.
I did see some specific ways to address class size reduction — like hiring 2,500 new teachers and talking about having space in some school district buildings (although I can’t tell if the classroom space available correlates to where the classroom space is most needed to address overcrowding).
In a previous post, there was a discussion about Gary Rubinstein’s view of specialized high schools. Those are some of the most overcrowded schools, with large class sizes. I’d put making those class sizes smaller down on the priority list, and focus on the schools where the students need small classes the most. It would be great to see some district level ideas for how that could be done, with parents and teachers — at some some core of them — having a strong buy-in for the changes.
The title of this post is “Why Does Mayor Bill DeBlasio Refuse to Reduce Class Size?” I was hoping we might discuss that. That is a discussion that might lead to real solutions.
Instead I read:
“Because he does what his bosses tell him to do.” (who are these “bosses”? Randi Weingarten?)
Or “For the same reason he wants to move retirees from traditional Medicare to Medicare Advantage.” (Is this because Randi Weingarten wants this? Another case of him “listening to his bosses”?)
Maybe this blog isn’t a place to discuss the issues anymore. It’s a shame because I think teachers and educators have very good perspectives to add, but I also assumed they would be interested in addressing the many complexities and perhaps come up with new or innovative ways that might address the many reasons why class sizes remain large.
Just my guess. At least I fingo my hypothesis under my real name instead of hiding under a disarming descriptor we’re all supposed to take on faith.
I totally respect anyone having skepticism about anyone who doesn’t use their real name when posting. I use that just to point out that I don’t have any particularly expertise or knowledge beyond just being a parent. I’m here because I’m interested in what teachers think and I think Diane Ravitch is brilliant and discusses the complexities of education issues in a way that I relate to.
I feel as if identifying myself as a parent gives contexts to what I post, but if it isn’t helpful, I respect anyone who thinks I care about this issue for some other reason (although I can’t imagine what that would be).
Is it disarming being a NYC public school parent? There are something like 2 million of us! Doesn’t seem to make me very unique, except I’m definitely more opinionated than most.
Hey, John Awbrey, I call foul. I could never post stories such as the one I posted in this thread if I thought the content might reach members of my family or god forbid wider circles. I post them because I think the odd & personal twists of my family’s story contribute something valuable to the issue discussed. I hope they cause people to stop & think more about the position they’ve taken– perhaps even use their influence as teachers or admins or writers or bloggers to support a policy because of my story. If they actually need my personal data to do so, they can invite me to an offline discussion.
haha sorry Jon your remark to nycpsp sailed right over my head. should have gone to bed at midnight…
Just to be clear to whom it may concern, I don’t find anything especially disarming about the name “bethree5”, at least, not intentionally, but “NYC public school parent” does get a blip on my astroturf meter, along the lines of National Parents Union and Democrats For Education Reform.
Jon, some are forced to use pseudonyms because their administrators might well fire them for expressing views that you and I would consider reasonable. But why am I saying this? You know this, I’m sure. And thanks, btw, for your wit and insight on this blog!
Sure, Everybody Knows, (I use a nom de facebook myself … but that was from back in the day when you could put your irl-dox up in lights on your About page).
But I would not have bothered saying anything at all if NYC etc. had not singled out my comment for special mention and if the general tenor of his/her remarks had not been tingling my spidey sense with that astroturfer concern-troll feeling.
Time Will Tell …
Yeah. Hate having my spidey sense tingled. LOL. When I see a picture or vid of Ted Cruz, btw, my spidey sense is more like St. Vitus’s Dance or full-on Delirium tremens.
I have been contacted by educators who asked me to remove their comments from years ago because they were applying for a new job and didn’t want their personal views to hurt their chances. Or they feared that might be stigmatized for reading here.
By the way, the principal of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtwin, CT (Dawn Hochsprung) was a reader of this blog.
Your blog means so much to so many, Diane! Bless you.
Jon says “NYC public school parent” does get a blip on my astroturf meter, along the lines of National Parents Union and Democrats For Education Reform…”
Jon, in truth I had never thought about that point. I agree with you that the name of those organizations are outrageously misleading. They stand for everything I hate — misleading the public, disingenuously changing the subject or sowing outrage to prevent real discussions about education. I respect people with other opinions who disagree with me and explain why – it helps me think about whether my view is incorrect or too simple. And I probably overreact to snark or disingenuous replies.
Anyway, as I said, I can’t argue with your view that I might be misrepresenting myself. I started using that name the first time I posted here years ago, and then it seemed wrong to use a different name. Although at some point I am going to be a former NYC public school parent, so using that name would be wrong.
But don’t get me started on those astoturf groups with names that imply they are made up of thousands of parents. You are right to be skeptical. I criticize ed reform a lot (admittedly too much!) so while other posters might be skeptical of me, too, I don’t think any of them think I would be part of the ed reform movement.
I did some more research on Leonie’s website and I see that there are more concrete proposals about how to find the space to lower class sizes, so thank you to Leonie for addressing this.
I would be very interested in how strong the correlation is between public schools being overcrowded and having above average test scores or other (not scientific) measurements? Is the worst overcrowding happening in schools that are popular because parents perceive them as more appealing?
I remember 5 years ago when Nikole Hannah Jones wrote a fascinating account of choosing a school for her daughter, and the tensions that arose when a re-zoning approach to making an overcrowded but popular school less crowded was rejected even though the new school would have significantly smaller class sizes.
I see that there is a proposal to hire 2,500 new teachers. That sounds great, as long as they are good teachers, and the schools with the most vulnerable populations don’t end up getting a disproportionate number of inexperienced teachers.
The teachers will be good…. if the parents and students are.
Deal 😉
I suspect, having been a school trustee, that everybody would like to reduce class size in theory especially before their first election, but when the first budget discussion appears, trustees will learn that 70% minimum of a board budget is teacher remuneration. The superintendents will point out that reduction of class sizes across the board by 1 student, would use up all of the boards disposable income. They can raise taxes if allowed, cut other services, but it is much harder to cut sizes than you might imagine . It really takes senior govt (state and fed) willingness to raise taxes on somebody.
I have know knowledge of NYC schools except a friend who had children in a public school near Columbia and absolutely loved the school. So this is uninformed . . .
I wonder…. looking at the whole budget…. if it would be that difficult to reduce class sizes. Not knowing each schools budget…. I’m just speaking off the cuff. What is the budget for technology and equipment? Testing? Administration? Non classroom positions that could be cut?
As far as a “board” – how about each school has a “parent advisory” – which has a seat at the decision making table. Does each school have it’s own budget that a principal and advisory could have some decision making ownership. Or is there a mega central admin operation?
no knowledge
beachteach,
I think one of the reasons this becomes so complicated is it isn’t a question of the desire to reduce class size, but the question of how it is done.
I don’t think it is possible to do widespread class size reduction without widespread zoning reform. Some popular schools are overcrowded and some nearby less popular ones are not, but as soon as there is any talk of moving some students from one school to another, there is an uproar. And there is no space to make new classrooms in the crowded school (which often already has turned other rooms into classrooms just to accommodate a growing population of zoned students).
And the parents at less popular schools are often offended when the parents of students who end up there act as if the school is “bad”. It can make for some very difficult transition years if the school district even has the political will to rezone.
I have my own ideas of things I would like to see tried, but I am sure there would be parents from all sides who would find my ideas offensive or problematic. And teachers. I know there are no easy answers and reducing class sizes (without somehow being able to magically build new floors or annexes on the most popular schools) is going to make some parents very upset – including the ones who now say “I want smaller class sizes” but don’t realize that means their kid may not be attending the school they assumed he would and bought a home specifically because they wanted him in that school.
I think it would be great if there was a teacher/parent driven effort – much like the middle school integration efforts in District 15 – to think about good ways to achieve small class size.
On the other hand – if there are underused schools with mostly at-risk students, this is a no brainer, and if de Blasio isn’t pouring huge amounts of resources into those schools to have small class sizes and whatever additional resources they need, he deserves much criticism.
NYC will be getting a lot of new money as a result of settlement of an old court case called Campaign for Fiscal Equity
The pandemic caused the federal government and many states to prioritize reopening public schools, hopefully without some of the inequities the pandemic exposed. There is money coming. The question is do we use the money to build the floor or the ceiling. Do we use the money to fund transformation or do we use it to try more cheap education experiments? It is time to build the floor after the bottom dropped out from under us with decades of cost cutting and experimentation by business interests. The best use of the money is lower class sizes. We hire more teachers, better compensate all teachers, make it easier for more teachers to join teachers unions, and stop throwing money at venture capitalists. It is the one thing that makes the biggest difference. Class size matters.
Yes! Totally agree. Let’s do this right.
I absolutely agree.
But do we also force students and teachers out of the overcrowded schools they are currently in and send them to a less crowded school that may be underused?
I heard a good suggestion of using some shuttered Catholic schools. And something I noticed is that parents seem more willing to be moved to a brand new school with no reputation than a practically empty old school that is still thought of as “bad”.
It would be a waste of resources to buy and refurbish old Catholic schools so families who don’t want their kids in a supposedly “bad” public school with lots of room were more willing to move out of overcrowded and popular public schools.
But maybe there is a way to rebrand schools that are underused. Class size matters, but not always to parents who start kicking and screaming if you tell them their kid can’t attend the popular and overcrowded zoned school in their neighborhood.
The intricacies of the NYC school system is beyond me…. to speculate and imagine what the strategy would be to reduce class size.
But it is important to do.
I am sure there are great minds who could solve the problem if there was the inclination to do so.
@ NYC parent – it sounds like you have lots of suggestions that would be worth putting in a letter to the powers that be. Good luck 🙂
The money is there. The political will is not.
This is pragmatic. Sounds like our local Bd of Ed in my 30k pop central NJ city. But… we’re talking NYC. Let’s do a big-picture fantasy. What if [just for a wild example] annual stds-aligned state stdzd testing in grades 3-8 plus one hisch year were replaced with one stdzd test in primary grades, one in middle school, & one in highschool [i.e., 3 tests instead of 7]? Pile on: what if charter schools in NYC were required to fund their own locations like every other charter school in the country? Now let’s go really wild: what if the stock exchange, and every NYC RE developer & multiple-millionaire owner/ renter et al corporations feeding off NYC govt largesse were required to chip in a big chunk of $$$ to NYC public schools?
Are we there yet? Enough $$ for smaller classes for NYC pubsch students?
Yes.