Archives for category: NYC
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Putting Children First in NYC?

By dianeravitch
August 30, 2012 //
6

A reader in New York City has been studying the New York City Department of Education website. She keeps coming up with intriguing findings. Here are some of them:

A recent post on Diane Ravitch’s blog and a recent article in the New York Times Magazine got me curious. I wondered: Do New York City’s education policy makers really put children first? Are they doing all they can to make sure every single student succeeds, no matter their social or economic environment? Do they follow their own rhetoric?

We know that they blame teachers when students living in deep poverty do not graduate high school. But what are they doing to support public schools that serve the neediest students? Are they providing “fair student funding” as they claim?

I pulled school budget numbers from the New York City Department of Education’s own web site. I also pulled a list of the 10 high schools serving the most academically privileged students on entry and the 10 schools serving the most academically under-privileged students on entry using numbers (they call it a “peer-index”) from their own web site.  I want to make clear that these students are identified based on their performance prior to entering these high schools. The high schools themselves are not “responsible” for this particular measure.

What did I find?

The schools serving the most academically privileged students received over 99.5% of the funds the city’s own formula entitles them to. The schools serving the most academically under-privileged receive 82.3% of the funds they are entitled to. 

Let’s repeat that: The high schools that admit the most struggling students receive 17% less funding than they are entitled to BY THE CITY’S OWN FORMULA than high schools that admit the most academically privileged students.  How is this fair? And how will this help schools that take on the most challenging work in education help these kids? Whose needs are being put first?

Categories Accountability, Education Reform, NYC

Who Teaches in NYC Charters?

By dianeravitch
August 28, 2012 //
1

Bruce Baker just released a fascinating summary of research on NYC charter schools.

The teachers are younger than district teachers, but not right out of college.

They typically have six years of experience, less than district teachers.

Their salaries are comparable to those of public school teachers.

They mostly have smaller classes than those in the district schools.

The students are less likely to include ELLs and special-ed than the district schools.

The charters do not have the same kids as the district schools.

The test scores vary.

Bottom line: These schools do NOT prove that money and poverty don’t matter.

Categories Charter Schools, NYC, Teachers and Teaching

NYC’s Schools for the Poorest Faring Poorly

By dianeravitch
August 25, 2012 //
6

A reader from New York City looked at New York City’s website to examine disparities between schools with high poverty rates and schools with low poverty. She asks these questions:

The leadership at the New York City Department of Education has refused to acknowledge the impact of the concentration of poor students in schools on student outcomes. In a letter to the NY Times the city’s #2 education official, Mr. Shael Suransky wrote “I contest [the] calculation that “schools with wealthier students are three times more likely to get an A than schools serving the poor.”” The truth is that the city’s own data shows that among the 5% of elementary schools with the lowest poverty rates there were 14 A’s while among the 5% with the highest there were 4 A’s. Perhaps Mr. Suransky meant that he contests that calculation because the facts are much worse. In fact, wealthier schools are three and a half times more likely to get an A.

Even as we look at a broader swath of elementary schools the gap continues to exist. The richest 10% of schools received 23 A’s and the poorest 10% received 11 A’s (a 2.1:1 ratio). The richest 20% of schools received 38 A’s and the poorest 20% received 19A’s (a 2:1 ratio).

Why the refusal to acknowledge facts?

Categories Accountability, Education Reform, NYC

Media Spin About Vouchers

By dianeravitch
August 23, 2012 //
10

The Wall Street Journal has an odd article today trumpeting “A Generation of School Voucher Success” by voucher advocate Paul Peterson of Harvard and Matthew Chingos of the Brookings Institution.

The article is based on a study of a privately funded voucher program in New York City and its effects on college enrollments of those who received vouchers.

The study concluded that “Overall, no significant impacts are observed.”

However, there were statistically significant gains in the college enrollment rates of black students, and statistically insignificant gains for Hispanics.

Why the difference? It’s not clear, but consider what the study says about the two groups compared:

African American and Hispanic students differed from one another in a number of respects. Although students in the two ethnic groups had fairly similar baseline scores, African American students were more likely to be male, have a parent with a college education, come from one-child families (but are also more likely to come from families with four or more children), and, not surprisingly, come from a family in which English is spoken in the home. 

But overall, the study produced “no significant impacts.”

If you read the study, check out p. 12, “Results,” which begins:

“The offer of a voucher is estimated to have increased college enrollment within three years of the student’s expected graduation from high school by 0.6 percentage points—a tiny, insignificant impact”

This somehow got spun in the WSJ article into “A generation of school voucher success!”

This study does not delve into test scores. One can only guess what the study would say if there were big test score gains.

The D.C. voucher program, the Cleveland voucher program and the Milwaukee voucher program have not produced any evidence of gains in test scores.

This is from the final evaluation of the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program:

There is no conclusive evidence that the OSP affected student achievement. On average, after at least four years students who were offered (or used) scholarships had reading and math test scores that were statistically similar to those who were not offered scholarships (figure ES-2). The same pattern of results holds for students who applied from schools in need of improvement (SINI), the group Congress designated as the highest priority for the Program. Although some other subgroups of students appeared to have higher levels of reading achievement if they were offered or used a scholarship, those findings could be due to chance. They should be interpreted with caution since the results were no longer significant after applying a statistical test to account for multiple comparisons of treatment and control group members across the subgroups.

Voucher students in DC saw no test score gains, but were more likely to graduate from high school:

The graduation rate based on parent-provided information was 82 percent for the treatment group compared to 70 percent for the control group. 

Studies comparing voucher schools and public schools in Milwaukee and Cleveland have not detected any differences in test scores.

Earlier studies of the NYC private school voucher program showed no gains in test scores, which the study notes:

The original study of the New York City voucher experiment identified heterogeneous impacts. Although no overall impacts in reading and math achievement were detected, positive private-sector impacts were observed on the performance of African Americans, but not of Hispanic students (Howell and Peterson 2006, 146-52; Mayer et al. 2002, Table 20). 

When vouchers are celebrated, the subject of test scores is irrelevant. When public schools are condemned, the subject is always test scores. Truly, a double standard.

Wonder why.

Categories Education Reform, NYC, Vouchers

A Brief History of Seniority, Or, “You’re Fired, Mr. Chips!”

By dianeravitch
August 23, 2012 //
1

This article was published last year. It was written by Marc Epstein, a social studies teacher and dean at Jamaica High School. Marc has a Ph.D. in Japanese naval history. Since he wrote this article, the New York City Department of Education closed Jamaica High School but a court stayed the closing. The city has already placed small schools in the historic building.

Categories Bloomberg, Michael, Cuomo, Andrew, Education Reform, NYC, Teacher Tenure, Unions

A Trifecta of Reform Rhetoric

By dianeravitch
August 23, 2012 //
1

Here you can see a rare event: a trifecta of school reform rhetoric.

A spokesman for Jeb Bush’s organization writing an article praising the “parent trigger” in Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post, espousing the principles of the rightwing ALEC.

This is a splendid demonstration of how the rightwing carefully uses progressive terminology to promote its agenda.

And by the way, the 1925 Supreme Court decision that this guy writes about had nothing to do with publicly funded school choice or a parent trigger. It came about because far-right groups in Oregon pushed through a law and a referendum that threatened to close down private and parochial schools. The rhetoric from the far-right then was that all American children should attend public schools, not any others. The law was challenged by the Society of Sisters of the Holy Names of Jesus and Mary, whose school was at risk of closure. The Supreme Court upheld the right of parents to send their children to a nonpublic school. Nothing was said or implied about public funding for nonpublic schools or about the current rightwing assertion that parents should have the right to seize control of their public school and hand it to a private corporation. Connecting this court decision with the parent trigger is a wild stretch.

Categories ALEC, Education Reform, NYC, Parent trigger

How NYC Abandoned Integration

By dianeravitch
August 23, 2012 //
2

A good article in today’s New York Daily News by Michael Brick, who recalls going to an integrated public school in Austin, Texas.

Brick compares his own experience in Austin with New York City’s complete abandonment of integration today.

An interesting reflection on where we are heading as a society.

Categories Bloomberg, Michael, Charter Schools, NYC, Segregation , Racial Isolation and Integration

What Happens When Performance Assessments Work Better than Tests?

By dianeravitch
August 22, 2012 //
13

A small group of public high schools in New York City managed to get exempted from the testing regime of the New York Regents many years ago.

And they have proven themselves.

These schools use performance assessments rather than the standardized tests of the Regents (although they do take the Regents exam in English language arts). The performance assessments are demanding. They are judged by teachers, parents, and others.

The students in these schools are succeeding at far higher levels than the students in other public high schools in the city. They have a higher graduation rate, a lower dropout rate, and a higher rate of persistence in college than students from other public high schools in the city. They have higher graduation rates for black students, Hispanic students, Asian students, white students, and students with disabilities than the New York City public schools in general.

Now they want to increase their number from 28 (26 in the city) by adding another 19.

But city and state officials are reluctant. What if they let other schools escape the testing regime? Who knows how many would seek to be exempt next year and the year after. What if no one were left to be tested? What do results matter, as compared to the sense of control and power that high-level officials thrive on?

Categories Accountability, Education Reform, NYC, Testing

History Repeats Itself in the Classroom

By dianeravitch
August 18, 2012 //
13

A reader comments on an earlier post written by a teacher who taught in Hartford:

I have seen this teacher’s story played out in so many schools in NYC.
She asks who will subject themselves to teaching in the most challenging of communities?
I often had that same concern. I agree.  At a point in the not so distant future, teachers will be retiring and schools will need to staff the classes.
There will be teachers available to teach in high needs schools, but despite Mr. Duncan and others who claim the best and the brightest for every classroom, what I see happening is that many best and brightest will not enter education at all.  The ones that do will have their choice of schools in which to teach and most likely most, although not all, will choose schools which may or may not have adequate resources but more importantly, respect and autonomy for teachers.
Those in the 2nd and 3rd tiers who can’t get jobs in desirable school districts will be assigned to high needs schools.  Some will stay and improve their practice after a few years.  Some will stay and go through the motions because no other job opportunities are on the horizon.  Some will stay a short time and either find a way to go a “better” school district and/or change careers and leave teaching completely.
So in the end the children who need the best and brightest teachers (whatever that really means) will most likely have teachers who are there because there was no where else to go.
O. I forgot.  The states will recruit teachers from other countries with promises of housing and support.  When the teachers discover they’ve been hoodwinked, they will be on a return flight to their home country.
History repeating itself.

Categories Education Reform, NYC

Where Are the Miracle Schools?

By dianeravitch
August 16, 2012 //
4

Bruce Baker of Rutgers University has written a fascinating analysis of charter schools in New York City and Houston.

Do they enroll the same students as the nearby district schools?

Do they have higher test scores?

Do they spend the same amount of money?

These are very important questions, given the reformers’ belief that charter schools will close the achievement gap and solve the problem of poverty.

Spoiler alert: The charters do not enroll the same students; do not on average have higher scores than nearby district schools; and typically spend more money than district schools.

Please read this article. It has fascinating data.

 

Categories Charter Schools, New Jersey, NYC
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