Ed Notes Online: Success Charter Attempt to eliminate its at-risk admissions priority for applicants attending failing schools.

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Success Charter Attempt to eliminate its at-risk admissions priority for applicants attending failing schools.

Success wants to change its charter after the PEP vote:
"Eliminate its at-risk admissions priority for applicants attending failing schools."

And weak-kneed SUNY authorizers will go along. Note the hearing will be in a place hard to get at the old IS 33. Why doesn't the NY Times do some FOILing of Success?

Apparently now that Success has been rubber-stamped by the PEP the network is now pursuing small changes to it's charter to market its schools more effectively.

The first two Success schools will go from being named Brooklyn Success 1 and 2 to Success Academy BEDSTUY 1 and Success Academy BEDSTUY 2.

Meanwhile the Success school at MS 50 will be named Success Academy WILLIAMSBURG.

While this change seems inconsequential it really isn't because at this hearing Success is also looking to do the following:

"Eliminate its at-risk admissions priority for applicants attending failing schools."

If that's not disturbing enough, the hearing for making these changes is going to be held FAR AWAY from MS 50 at the first Success school in Bedstuy located at 70 Tompkins Avenue on March 19 at 5pm.

This should be brought up at tomorrow's meeting and brainstorm how we are going to respond to the continued blatant disrespect of our community's right to have control of our educational system.

Regards,

From: Office of Public Affairs [mailto:OPA@schools.nyc.gov]
Sent: Wed 3/7/2012 1:20 PM
To: Office of Public Affairs
Subject: NYC DOE: Public Hearing re: Success Academies in CSD 14


Notice of Public Hearing

	Date:	Monday, March 19, 2012
	Time:	Speaker Registration: 5:30 PM – 6:00 PM Presentation, Comments, and Questions: 6:00 PM
	Location:	Brooklyn Success Academy 1 70 Tompkins Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11206

Event :

This public hearing is open to anyone interested in learning about the following charter revisions for schools located in Community School District 14.

Brooklyn Success Academy Charter School 1

Name of Charter School	Brooklyn Success Academy Charter School 1
Terms and Dates of Charter	First Charter: 11/16/2010 – 11/15/2015
Current Grade(s) and Approved Enrollment	Fiscal Year 2011-2012: Grades: K-1: 188 students
Current Year of Operation	2011-2012: 1^st Year of Operation
District of Location	NYC CSD 14
Proposed Charter Revision	The charter school education corporation proposes to change its corporate name to "Success Academy Charter School - Bed-Stuy 1" and to modify its at-risk design admissions factors to include a variable set-aside for English language learners ("ELLs"), which would be set at 20 percent of the incoming class for the 2012-13 school year, and thereafter be based on several factors including, but not limited to, an evaluation of the New York City School District's and the surrounding CSDs' ELL percentages, either current or from the previous school year, and/or an analysis of the ELL percentages of students enrolled at the school, with a view toward achieving ELL enrollment comparable to the enrollment figures for ELLs in the School District. The school would also eliminate its at-risk admissions priority for applicants attending failing schools.

This school is authorized by the SUNY Charter Schools Institute. More information can be accessed at: http://www.newyorkcharters.org/ .

Brooklyn Success Academy Charter School 2

Name of Charter School	Brooklyn Success Academy Charter School 2
Terms and Dates of Charter	First Charter: 9/13/2011 – 9/12/2016
Current Grade(s) and Approved Enrollment	Fiscal Year 2011-2012: Grades: School opens in 2012-2013 school year
Current Year of Operation	2011-2012: School opens in 2012-2013 school year
District of Location	NYC CSD 14
Proposed Charter Revision	The charter school education corporation proposes to change its corporate name to "Success Academy Charter School - Bed-Stuy 2" and to modify its at-risk design admissions factors to include a variable set-aside for English language learners ("ELLs"), which would be set at 20 percent of the incoming class for the 2012-13 school year, and thereafter be based on several factors including, but not limited to, an evaluation of the New York City School District's and the surrounding CSDs' ELL percentages, either current or from the previous school year, and/or an analysis of the ELL percentages of students enrolled at the school, with a view toward achieving ELL enrollment comparable to the enrollment figures for ELLs in the School District. The school would also eliminate its at-risk admissions priority for applicants attending failing schools.

This school is authorized by the SUNY Charter Schools Institute. More information can be accessed at: http://www.newyorkcharters.org/ .

Brooklyn Success Academy Charter School 4

Name of Charter School	Brooklyn Success Academy Charter School 4
Terms and Dates of Charter	First Charter: 9/13/2011 – 9/12/2016
Current Grade(s) and Approved Enrollment	Fiscal Year 2011-2012: Grades: School opens in 2012-2013 school year
Current Year of Operation	2011-2012: School opens in 2012-2013 school year
District of Location	NYC CSD 14
Proposed Charter Revision	The charter school education corporation proposes to change its corporate name to "Success Academy Charter School - Williamsburg" and to modify its at-risk design admissions factors to include a variable set-aside for English language learners ("ELLs"), which would be set at 20 percent of the incoming class for the 2012-13 school year, and thereafter be based on several factors including, but not limited to, an evaluation of the New York City School District's and the surrounding CSDs' ELL percentages, either current or from the previous school year, and/or an analysis of the ELL percentages of students enrolled at the school, with a view toward achieving ELL enrollment comparable to the enrollment figures for ELLs in the School District. The school would also eliminate its at-risk admissions priority for applicants attending failing schools.

This school is authorized by the SUNY Charter Schools Institute. More information can be accessed at: http://www.newyorkcharters.org/ .

Comments are welcome; speakers must register within 30 minutes of the hearing’s start time. Written comments will also be collected on at the hearing or be submitted via email to: charterschools@schools.nyc.gov.

Pursuant to Education Law 2857(1), the New York City Department of Education is required to hold a public hearing to solicit comment from the community in connection with any revision proposal for a charter school.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...: Eva has all of a sudden put up an advertisement on a bus shelter near PS 132 partially in Spanish. However, she is still not sending mailings to parents in Spanish over in Bed Stuy/Fort Green.; Sunday, March 11, 2012 at 12:55:00 PM EDT
in a quandary said...: It is outrageous that Eva can get away with this!; Monday, March 12, 2012 at 8:49:00 AM EDT
Anonymous said...: Taking in ELL's can be subjective. On what basis is Eva going to test applicants to determine their ELL status? ELL's can be children who need some help transitioning into English or they could need more. Many of our students in public schools who are not in bilingual classes receive no ELL services outside of their self-contained classroom. Is Eva going to have bilingual classes? Dual language classes? Or is she going to hire a teacher with an ESL license (or not) to instruct the ELL's? Also how disgusting that SA would be an option for "failing schools." is she going to take applicants outside of the lottery which is supposed to be "fair" to all?; Monday, March 12, 2012 at 5:30:00 PM EDT
Jim D said...: By all accounts less than thirty percent of the "applicants" for "Cobble Hill Success" reside in D15. That's WITHOUT letting its target Brownstone parents know that under its current admission standards, ELLs and those children otherwise zoned to attend "failing schools" (defined as those schools receiving a "performance rating" of "D" or worse on the most recent Progress Reports - of which their are NONE in Brownstone Brooklyn) - WHETHER OR NOT RESIDING IN D15 - MUST get priority over their children in admission preference. Furthermore, that "lottery preference" currently applies to admissions to ALL Success Academies.

Could that policy explain, in substantial part, the "under-enrollment" at Upper West Success despite its ostensibly large "waiting list?" Could that failure to ultimately attract large numbers of affluent parents explain why Success Academy is now applying to eliminate the "at risk" preference in ALL of its Charter Schools and replace it with a TEMPORARY 20% ELL quota (thereby under-representing and REDUCING even that constituency in D15 which has a 24% K-5 ELL population) ?

Does anyone besides CEC-15 care that Success Academy has deliberately engaged in a cynical and shameless policy of exploiting "at risk" children as mere stepping stones for obtaining Charters from SUNY and then cruelly abandoning them, at the first opportunity, when they get in the way of the recruitment of their 'real customers'?; Wednesday, March 14, 2012 at 12:18:00 PM EDT
Anonymous said...: Yes those success academy school are shameless using the children to get what they want and they don't even care. The have a so called strict policy on behavior, not taking into consideration that mostly all of the children come from public schools that they so much despise. Their suspension rate is also higher,they kick kids out that they cant deal with or don't want to deal with throwing them back into the same situation the claim the want to help correct. These charter schools should have to pay rent for using space in public schools for that matter they get enough private funding Why don't they just build their own schools. They are taking space away from children that don't get accepted or the ones they throw out anyway. Ms Moskowitz doesn't care about these children if so the would help the ones that really need help. I shouldn't really be surprised because the majority of the staff, teachers aren't really teachers meaning they have no background in education which makes a huge difference. Its all about the money with these people at the expense of the children. Charter schools like this need and should be stopped....; Sunday, August 31, 2014 at 10:00:00 AM EDT

"A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

What media call "philanthropy" for the public schools are actually seed monies to establish a private "market" in publicly-financed education - an enterprise worth trillions if successfully penetrated by corporate America. Cory Booker, one of the "New Black Leaders" financed by the filthy rich, is key to creating a "nationwide corporate-managed schools network paid for by public funds but run by private managers.

"Ed Reformers" want to cash in on public education and to control its content and outcome, not improve it. Provide great education? Baby boomers had as close as this country has ever gotten to it when we were growing up. The Ed Reform Movement has no interest in seeing such a well-educated, democratically astute population ever again.

http://blackagendareport.com/content/cory-booker-clear-and-present-threat-public-education

History of the UFT Pre-Weingarten Years

This award-winning series of articles by Jack Schierenbeck originally appeared in the New York Teacher in 1996 and 1997.

Naturally, from a certain point of view. But, despite certain biases, Schierenbeck, a great guy, was one of the best NY Teacher reporters so this is worth reading. Jack suffered a debilitating stroke many years ago (I used to get secret donations to ed notes from him through a 3rd source.)

This chapter looks interesting:

Class struggles: The UFT story, part 3

“The schism in the union over radical politics [is] a major reason for stalling the growth of a teacher union for decades.” Revolutionary politics and ideology take center stage, as the original Teachers Union becomes a battlefield, pitting leftist against leftist and splitting the union.

Clarence Taylor's "Reds at the Blackboard" focused on the old Teachers Union which disbanded in 1964 after suffering from anti-left attacks.

Of course for another view, check out the review at New Politics of the Kahlenberg Bio on Shanker by Vera Pavone and me: Albert Shanker: Ruthless Neocon

Effective Union Organizing

A video series put together by Jason Mann from the British Columbia Federation of Teachers about social media and how to use it for effective union organizing.

The first series was called New Media For Union Activists Roadmap and it's still available on-line at:
http://www.newmediabootcamp.ca/welcome/
I watched some of them and need to rewatch as they are loaded with information.

The second series started last week and it's called "Online Campaigning for Union Activists"

You can sign up for this free series at :
http://act.bcfed.ca/online-campaigning-for-union-activists/

You Don't Have A Choice - Join the Revolt

Ex-Harlem Success Teacher Comments on Eva the Diva

Ex-HSA Teacher has left a new comment on your post "Fear and Loathing at Evil's Harlem Success Empire ...":

I am a former Harlem Success teacher. Not many people who work/worked for her like her very much. I once made the comment that she is very nice when I first was hired. Two of her closest colleague responded immediately almost in unison, "Eve is not nice!" Over time I realized that there was a lot of political games going on. Another colleague once said to me that he was tired of "being part of a political campaign." Sending out 15,000 applications for only 400 seats in a school is reprehensible. The money that paid for those mass mailings could have paid the yearly salary of another teacher not to mention the heartache of all those parents who applied but did not get a spot. She does good work trying to give disadvantaged students a quality public school education but at a great cost to staff AND the school's educational budget! school budget.

Davis Guggenheim Compared to Riefenstahl

“Waiting for Superman" is the second most intellectually dishonest piece of documentary work I have seen. It is surpassed only by Leni Riefenstahl's "Triumph of the Will," the pro-Hitler propaganda classic, in that regard. Uses personal narratives of adorable children to create narrative suspense that overrides public policy discussion with pure emotion in unscrupulous attack on teachers and their unions, among others

Timothy Tyson
Professor of African American Studies and History
Duke University

How Teaching Experience Makes a Difference

Even as New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Michelle Rhee and others around the nation are arguing for experienced teachers to be laid off regardless of seniority, every single study shows teaching experience matters. In fact, the only two observable factors that have been found consistently to lead to higher student achievement are class size and teacher experience, so that it’s ironic that these same individuals are trying to undermine both.
- Leonie Haimson on Parents Across America web site

Full article with charts here.

Weingarten/Gates Foundation announce drone-driven teacher evaluation

According to a press release issued by the Gates Foundation, the AFT and the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, these three have entered a ground-breaking partnership to evaluate teachers utilizing the drone technology that has revolutionized warfare in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. A bird-size device floats up to 400 feet above a classroom and instantly beams live video of teachers in action to agents at desks at Teacher Quality Inspection Stations established by the AFT and the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

When asked if the drones were authorized to drop bombs on teachers who exhibit inadequacy, Chester E. Finn, Jr., president of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, replied, "Don't be ridiculous. Gates money puts other methods at our disposal."

Randi Weingarten, president of the 1.5-million-member American Federation of Teachers said the powerful union has signed on to the drone project...

More at Substance

The Real Reason Behind Push for Standardized Tests: It's All About the Adults

On standardized testing in our schools

A must read article about the standardized test industry.
Written by an insider who has worked as a test scorer, the article outlines a multinational industry based on an army of temporary workers paid by the piece at $0.30 to $0.70 per test, translated in the need to grade 40 tests per hour to make a $12 salary. The article goes on to show how the companies gauge the grading "results" based on the need to ensure new contracts to continue profiting off of our youth. The original article is from Monthly Review. Here it is on Schools Matter blog.

http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2010/12/on-growing-use-of-corporate-test.html

Parallels between America today and Germany in the 1920's and early 30's

"Resentment and obstruction are all the right wing in America have to peddle. Their policies are utterly discredited. Their ideology - even by its own standards - is a sham. They are so bereft of leaders, their de facto leader is a former drug addicted, thrice-divorced radio talk show host. That is literally the best they can muster. But they have built a national franchise inciting the downwardly mobile to blame the government, not the right, for their problems, exactly as Hitler did in the 1920s."

The US Is Facing a Weimar Moment

Published on Sunday, March 15, 2009 by CommonDreams.org

Chicago View of Unity/UFT on Charters

After many meetings and debates, the Chicago delegation succeeded in working with the New York United Federation of Teachers, Local 2 (UFT) to push the AFT to take stronger stands on charter school accountability and school closings — though many delegates from Chicago would have liked the language to have been even stronger.

Generally speaking, the New York delegation represented organizing charters as the best model for handling their role in reshaping unions, despite the fact that according to many reports few charter schools in New York have been organized as is the case in Chicago. This logic is the same touted by the Progressive Caucus of the AFT. The few that have been organized are a part of the UFT local though they have separate contracts negotiated with the help of UFT. The Chicago delegation reflection the mindset that allowing new charters to continue to proliferate while attempting to organize existing charters is an end game in which public schools and the union lose.

Jen Johnson, CTU, Local 1 in Substance

Ed Notes Greatest Hits: HSA Rally and Founding of GEM

SEE MY VIDEO ON HARLEM SUCCESS RALLY 2009:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEp7rg_L5JI

Angel Gonzalez and I attended that rally and used the footage to promote our conference on Mar. 28, 2009, which is where the concept of a group like GEM emerged. Until then we had basically been a committee of ICE working with the NYCORE high stakes testing group. The actions of Eva and crew helped spawn GEM. Mommie Dearest!!

I have more video somewhere. I was hoping to get Leni Riefenstahl to edit it but she died. We would have called it "Triumph of the Hedge Fund Operators."

Ed Notes Extended

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Success Charter Attempt to eliminate its at-risk admissions priority for applicants attending failing schools.

5 comments: