Written and edited by Norm Scott:
EDUCATE! ORGANIZE!! MOBILIZE!!!
Three pillars of The Resistance – providing information on current ed issues, organizing activities around fighting for public education in NYC and beyond and exposing the motives behind the education deformers. We link up with bands of resisters. Nothing will change unless WE ALL GET INVOLVED IN THE STRUGGLE!
As stakeholders in the future of "public" education as long as the charter cap is listed and every school becomes a charter, the NYC Coalition of
Community Charter Schools is concerned over the climate around teacher
evaluations which we believe deters young people from pursuing careers
in education. As independent charter schools, our autonomy allows us to hire unqualified, inexpensive teachers so we can turn over our staff on a
regular basis. If one of our teachers manages to reach 30 they are
counseled out. We evaluate staff and leadership using our own metrics. The power to
develop our own criteria, free from any public scrutiny cannot be overstated as that power allows us to feed at the public trough without scrutiny.
It’s what drives us to
innovate new methods of test prep and creative ways of counseling students out by nudging their parents to death and to give teachers the support they need to excel at their
craft of getting high scores and making sure no child is allowed to move or speak without being given permission. This autonomy is at the heart of who we are - and if you happen to have extra underwear for our kids who are forced to sit still without bathroom breaks, please send them over.
Charter schools are public schools - when it suits us and private schools when it doesn't and C3S supports all public education - as long as they are charter schools that keep saying they are public schools.
From the desk of Norm Scott
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The actual release is below the break - for a few more laughs.
I saw this a few weeks ago and it reinforces the case that hook or crook, charters skim the cream despite claims all the kids in public and charters come from the same demographic and socio-economic status. Any teacher who works(ed) in public schools in certain neighborhoods, like I did in East Williamsburg (old-style) for 35 years saw how different kids from the same projects could be. Since classes were set up based on reading scores, the top class had more kids with two parents, a parent that worked (parents with school lunchroom jobs were like aristocracy), parents who came up open school night, kids that didn't move, etc. I was lucky to have two of these out of the 17 self-contained classes I taught and the difference between top and bottom - and even middle - was astounding. The kids in both classes had mostly been together since Pre-K (another thing we saw -- parents who put kids in pre-k made a difference).
Some teachers would kill for those classes and the principal faves were able to manipulate their way into getting them year after year despite the contract's call for rotation.
What happened under BloomKleinCott was that the classes were mixed and those protected kids were thrown into the general pool with all kinds of kids -- violent, unstable, etc. Charters here we come. Yes, those policies drove the top kids out of the public schools into the arms of charters.
The article below by Andrea Gabor confirms what we've known from the beginning.
How interesting that the right opposes common core because they see it as mandates from the federal government but ignores parent trigger laws and the charter school movement, which are more invasive takeovers of local education control - by both government fiat (see NYState Cuomo backed charter give-away law removing mayoral authority to charge rent or deny space in public schools.)
On the surface, the right and tea partiers support movements that kill teacher unions by signing onto the phony "choice" concept. In reality, the charter movement removes choice from local communities that pay for and support their public school. An outside charter management organization like KIPP, by gaining political support from outside the community - say the governor or state legislature - can force a community to divert funds from its own schools to support an invading charter.
In essence, this boils down to the very same issue the right is complaining about when it comes to the common core.
In 2013, the
Success Network requested and received a raise in management fees to 15
percent of the per-pupil funding it receives from the state and city. The total
amount of management fees charged by just four of the city’s charter
chains in 2011-12 — Success, Uncommon, Achievement First, and
KIPP — was over $12 million.
This is a pretty good report from the UFT on the charter scam. While it touches on the charter waiting lists by pointing out that public schools have waiting lists (which are open to public scrutiny) it doesn't go far enough to actually question the validity of those lists, which I view as vapor.
all the teachers at this charter school are white and from out of state. The school's administrators did manage to get two coaches that are African-American from the New York City area. They are the two in charge of the detention room. Is there something wrong with that picture?.....
his teachers were directed to video tape him in every classroom. One of the teachers according to him followed him with a camera into the lunch room when he went to pick up his lunch, followed him up the stairs into the hallway and continued videotaping him while he was eating lunch.....
It's time to examine the police state structure of some of the charter schools model in the minority community in New York... Former Democracy Prep mother
Ahhh, that ole' plantation mentality at Democracy Prep. Message to Seth Andrews: Don't tick off a parent who is a professional journalist.
Gary Rubinstein pointed out just how bad the Democracy Prep (relative to public schools despite their significant advantages) test scores were in this post: Petrilli’s Desperate Attempt To Save Democracy Prep’s Reputation. Now, as Gary says, I don't view school success and failure based on test scores. But if charters are going to make big claims based on the scores, then die by the sword. Especially when they set up a regressive "zero tolerance" situation (when there are so many progressive means of discipline, like restorative justice.
[Our buddies at Teachers Unite have done an excellent film called "Growing Fairness" -- I attended the premiere the other night and will write a review soon. -- but see the trailer. ]
One of the most riveting parts of our film response to Waiting for Superman was the testimony of former charter school parents.
Here are the links -- make sure to have some tissues handy.
Here is another parent who removed her child from Democracy Prep (from their point of view: mission accomplished).
Extracting high test scores at Success
And even with these policies they still had horrible test scores. Eva is smarter at extracting high scores I guess. Has anyone checked to see if kids at Success
Academy schools still have their fingernails?
When Zero Tolerance Becomes Psychological War Fare: Democracy Prep Charter Middle School By Bukola Shonuga
Finally, in the last hour and all my tolerance threshold and mental power exhausted I had no choice but to remove my 12 year old son from Democracy Prep Charter Middle School in Harlem - two weeks before graduation from 6th grade. After months of mental torture of my son by overzealous teachers, endless meetings, tons of emails and paperwork that's turned me into a social worker/mom/psychologist, I realized that it has become unhealthy and unsafe to keep my son at Democracy Prep. The latest episode of the daily psychological abuse of my son occurred on June 6, 2013 when I placed one of my routine calls to the school to check in on him. I was informed that he has been suspended and that his suspension papers were being processed when my call came in. It's time to examine the police state structure of some of the charter schools model in the minority community in New York.
On May 21, 2011 (2 days after the premiere of the GEM film response to the ed deform film Waiting for Superman, The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting for Superman that Julie co-narrated, co-produced and co-wrote), Community Board 12 in upper Manhattan convened a panel to discuss charter schools.
Dennis Walcott was supposed to be on that panel but never showed up [he was as scared of Julie as Mike Mulgrew is]. Also Pedro Noguera, [former] chairman of the SUNY Charter Schools authorizing committee (which authorized both Eva/Success and UFT charter schools) and James Merriman, CEO of the NYC Charter School Center. They said their pieces and left before Julie Cavanagh got to go, clearly not wanting to hear what they were doing to undermine the public school system.
Merriman, as the charter school movement usually does, blamed the UFT for resistance, which if you know Julie, it was their LACK of resistance to a co-location of a charter in her school that activated her in the first place. In the early part of the 20-minute video Julie refutes this, showing the opposition to charters is growing from the grass roots far from being led by the UFT.
In the full presentation she presented a comprehensive case against the charter school movement (view it in full here) as she goes into details of her activation as she saw PAVE, with the complicity of Tweed, grab more and more at the expense of her school while the UFT stood on the sidelines.
Here is a short excerpt where she focuses on the inequities the Eva Moskowitz Success Academy brings into the schools. http://youtu.be/z3XSm3b64Gk
Hey teachers, don't go on the radio to talk about charters if you don't know what you are talking about.
I was listening to the Brian Lehrer show on NPR yesterday where there was talk about charters. Two teachers called up and while they made some good points they also made inaccurate statements and missed the most important points --
that the very idea of a lottery is a form of cherry picking
that the advertising for charters to targeted audiences also is cherry picking
that if some child or parent who are "difficult" should get through the lottery they are counseled out
the impact of co-locations which squeezes the public schools and denies them the ability to grow or offer the same options the charter in the same building does
that the DOE, the very people running public schools actually favor charters and starve the public schools to make the charters look better.
I could go on.
The UFT has done nothing to educate its members as to the threat of charters. Talk to any teacher in Chicago and they will nail every point. Maybe it takes losing 20-25% of your members before the point gets made.
Here a chapter leader takes the bull by the horns and sends his staff the updated color version of the Grassroots Education Movement pamphlet, "The Truth About Charters," embedded below. I have hard copies if you want a few to share with your colleagues. Or you can download and share with your colleagues here.
Dear All,
I am sending you a very good flier, made by my friends of the Grassroots Education Movement, NYC teachers and proud union members, to give you a little more insight into this topic. We will need to educate ourselves a lot more about this issue as it is no longer far away, affecting other schools or other cities.
Eva Moskovitz, former NYC Councilwoman, with no background in education, someone who pays herself a salary close to 400.000 dollars a year to run her growing education empire wants to co-locate one of her Harlem Success Academy schools inside the Washington Irving Campus.
As proud PULIC school teachers we cannot ignore the implications of what it means to have more and more charter schools replacing public schools in this city, state and nation.
Do you believe that education should be and should remain a public domain, overseen by democratically elected - the community representing, and accountable to the public - officials or should we hand over the education of our children to privately - many times FOR PROFIT - run hedge fund nourished, corporations to educate our children?
Do you think it's a good thing that unionized teachers have due process rights, spelled out rights and duties that have been fought for hard to achieve in a fair and democratic process we call "collective bargaining"?
If you do think so, you know that it gives dignity and security to our members. It's not true that the unions want to protect bad and lazy teachers!
Michael Mulgrew said it just last week when he addressed us at the Chapter Leader meeting on Wednesday:
He said: "Teaching is a challenging profession. Teaching is not for everyone. Not everyone can be a great teacher. We have no interest in protecting the worst teachers, but we have every interest in protecting the dignity, the working conditions and fairness for the vast majority of our teachers all of whom that are dedicated, compassionate and hard working."
Do you think that teaching should remain a profession that a dedicated teacher can expect to practice as a life long career, then you need to fight for public education?
Do you think it's great to transform the profession of teaching into a revolving door, where you hire young idealistic college grads for 2 or three years so they can move on to "real jobs" only to be replaced by a new crop new cheap teachers then you need to oppose the idea of charter schools?
Let's name the Elephant in the room:
The charterization of our public schools on a ideological level has NOTHING to do with improving the education of the children in this country but EVERYTHING to do with the privatization of Public Education.
I really believe that. What is going on here is the corporatization of public education, the promise of profits for private corporations from a still largely untapped $600 billion market in this country.
I hope you have a few minutes to read the flier "The Truth behind Charter Schools" and I hope you join us in educating ourselves and our community about this issue!
Your United Federation of Teachers Chapter Leader,
Teachers and parents at PS 24 in Sunset Park will be holding an informational session on charter schools using clips from "The Inconvenient Truth Behind Waiting for Superman" and other materials. I'm expecting to tape the event and put it up online. If other schools want to hold an event similar to this email me and I'll put you in touch with the organizers. Of course the UFT should be doing this all over the city but they don't want to step on too many toes. Why should your school do this? If you don't see the handwriting on the wall where one day masses of schools will be replaced with non-union charters it is time to wake up.
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FEB. 4- STATE OF THE UNION: TIME TO FIGHT BACK
Register at: http://stateoftheunionconference-estw.eventbrite.com/
See Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/.
And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.
The background to this is that SUNY Charter shills who granted Success Academy's application for a school in Brooklyn's District 13 or 14 must now rule whether it is legal for Eva to change her mind and move it to more gentrified Cobble Hill where parents are rising in protest.
Before I go on I want to remind everyone that Pedro Noguera chairs the SUNY charter authorizing committee. He's probably ducking under a desk to avoid this hot cake.
This came across from Leonie:
Rossi of SUNY saying no issues in Success moving location of charter within Brooklyn. letter attached and here
Let’s
make sure that we are clear: “SUNY” hasn’t Ok’d the move of Success
Charter from Bed Stuy to Cobble Hill, a Vice President at the SUNY
Charter Institute, whom the SUNY Trustees and the law recognize as
“staff”, wrote a tortured opinion saying that he believes that Success
is “not required” to get a charter amendment. That SUNY CSI staff
members - whose explicit role is to promote charter schools, rather
than to improve education in the state - have usurped the SUNY Trustees’
decision making, approval and oversight powers and turned them into
nothing more than a rubber stamp, is an outrage.
Would
suggest that rather than accepting Ralph Rossi and the SUNY CSI Charter
Lobby as the law of the land, we instead ask/demand that Noguera,
McCall and the other Trustees (as well as our legislators) come out of
the closet and exercise their legal authority and responsibilities
regarding charter schools in our communities. Will they let stand CSI’s
interpretation that a name change is material but a huge
community/demographic change is not? (Noguera already said he would
not). Are the Trustees ok when they authorize charter schools
explicitly to recruit, prioritize and educate ELL and “at risk” kids
with the fewest educational options, and instead these schools end up
ignoring those kids in order to cream skim the most involved parents and
kids from our minority communities? Or, as in the case of Upper West
Success and now Success Academy Cobble Hill, when the SUNY authorized
schools simply mock their charter guidelines and the law altogether, and
instead proudly announce – with the DOE’s complicity - their new
mission to provide middle class white communities with additional
options and more “choice.”
I
live in hope that the SUNY Trustees – and the press – will investigate
why the SUNY authorized Upper West Success Academy still hasn’t been
able to fill almost 15% of its seats halfway into the new school year,
or why the number of ELL’s test takers at all the Success Academy
schools combined is fewer than the fingers on one of my hands, or why
our co-located public schools have 10x the number of homeless students,
double the number of kids requiring free lunch, and an infinite number
more of self contained special needs kids (Success Charter has zero).
What happened to claims in Success Charter’s applications touting
increased options and prioritization of our most vulnerable kids, the
world famous “transparent” and leveling lottery system, the tens of
thousands of applications and the “massive waiting lists” all driven by
“huge demand” for “choice”?
Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/.
And make sure to check out the side panel on the right for important bits.
Hey, is it July already? You mean we've passed the last day of school? My how one loses track in retirement.
...anyone who brings up out-of-school factors such as poverty is both defending the status quo of public education and claiming that schools can do nothing to overcome the life circumstances of poor children. The response is silly and, by now, tiresome. Some teachers will certainly be able to help compensate for the family backgrounds and out-of-school environments of some students. But the majority of poor children will not get all the help they need: their numbers are too great, their circumstances too severe, and resources too limited. Imagine teachers from excellent suburban public schools transferring en masse to low-performing, inner-city public schools. Would these teachers have as much success as they did in the suburbs? Would they be able to overcome the backgrounds of 15.6 million poor children? Even with bonus pay, would they stay with the job for more than a few years? Common sense and experience say no, and yet the reformers insist they can fix public schools by fixing the teachers.
I know we're preaching to the choir here, but Joanne Barkan's article should give you much ammunition when you get into those July 4th arguments with teacher bashers. Here's the link.
Where Barkan doesn't go in this piece – and there may be follow-ups – is the motivation of the ed deformers in the "blame the teacher" campaigns: Defanging the unions (non-unionized charters, Teach for America/Educators 4 Excellence shock troops, merit pay) - not that the unions have put up a strong fight - but at least they have the ability to bring a unified teacher force to the table. In the ed deform world each teacher is on an individual contract and competing with each other. That is the holy grail of ed deform. While luring teachers with the promise of higher pay through merit pay, they will be able to lower the average teacher salary substantially - think of the south.
This ties in to Barkan's next article on the rise of education entrepreneurship where there's a whole lot of money to be made out of education. First you kill of the only force capable of putting up opposition. Then you milk the cow until a generation later - or less - it is clear what it was all about. By then it is too late.
Thus, my intense anger at the UFT/AFT/NEA (which opens its meetings today in Chicago) for basically laying down in front of the ed deform juggernaut. Every single UFT official talks about how they are not against charter schools or even co-locations when they are done right. When I talk to them they seem to understand what is afoot but are helpless to get in the way other than trying to make the procedure work - procedures set up in a stacked deck. Thus the law suit to "make them do it the right way." I won't get into the whys of how the union functions because that is a longer story about the ideology behind the AFT/UFT, an issue some of us will be exploring this summer in study groups.
Here is a short video of my speech to the PEP on Monday about charters.
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Check out Norms Notes for a variety of articles of interest: http://normsnotes2.blogspot.com/. And make sure to check out the side panel on right for news bits.
On April 14th, I attended a District 14 Community Education Council meeting where Eva Moskowitz, the CEO of the Success Academy Charter School Network, was supposed do a small presentation about her plans to open three more Brooklyn Success Academies. She was also expected to field questions from the public. I have written about charter schools and this particular charter chain on more than one occasion, but I continue to be shocked by its approach and steadfast commitment to shirking the truth. For those who don't know, Success Academies is a network of charter schools in New York City. There are currently seven Success Academies open and all are co-located inside public school buildings. Moskowitz's schools have a track record of under-serving the neediest students and counseling out students who have significant academic and behavioral needs. In addition, Moskowitz's schools have received preferential treatment from the Department of Education and she has been allowed to open school after school despite mounting public opposition. (http://articles.nydailynews.com/2010-02-25/local/27057283_1_e-mails-charter-space-in-school-buildings)
There are many who believe that Eva Moskowitz’s schools represent the kind of change we need in education, and this is certainly the message Moskowitz spends millions to market. However, the reality is far different. At this CEC meeting I witnessed two Success Academy staff members avoid answering community member's questions and make numerous false statements—all in the hopes of preserving their image.
Before the CEC meeting began, we received word that Moskowitz would not actually be present at the meeting—she would instead be sending a couple of her marketing staff members to field questions and give her presentation. The meeting began with a small crowd seated in the auditorium of I.S. 71. After a rousing performance by the P.S. 257 marching band and a few CEC announcements, the microphone was given to a Success Academies employee, Nicole Foster. As she took the microphone, parents, teachers and principals in the crowd held up large signs expressing their opposition to Success Academy schools coming in to District 14. Before Foster even began speaking, the CEC president brought forth some concerns about the way in which this meeting was scheduled and pointed out some glaring errors on the part of the Success Academies staff. Right from the start, it was clear that this was going to be a tough crowd for the two, young Success Academies staff members.
Ms. Foster began by thanking us all for being there and stressed how excited Success Academies was to be coming to District 14. They were, she claimed, attending this meeting in order to start a "respectful dialogue" with the community. Yet, she did not address Moskowitz's absence. How important is dialogue with the community to your organization if your own CEO doesn't show up to meet the community? She talked briefly about her background, the Success Academies philosophy and their plans to open more charter schools in District 14. Next, she called upon two Harlem Success Academy parents to speak to the audience. They told brief stories about why they believed so strongly in their school. The two parents certainly seemed excited about their schools; however, they didn't refer to anything very specific about why their schools were so extraordinary. It seemed an odd move bringing in these parents. If there was, in fact, such a high demand for these Success Academies (as their staff members claimed), why bring parents in from Harlem to convince us?
Soon after the parents finished their presentations, the crowd had a chance to ask some powerful and critical questions. Throughout this back and forth, the Success Academies employees tried to make nice and appear gracious and respectful, but they were challenged by the community's questions and struggled to communicate anything more than half-truths.
One of the first questions was about why Success Academies felt any need to come to District 14. Foster responded that there was "demand" for their charter school. When asked to explain this demand, Jenny Sedlis (Director of External Affairs) joined her colleague at the front. She claimed there was a demand because 1,400 families had entered the lottery for the 168 spots available at their school slated to open in District 14. When probed further and asked repeatedly how many of these applicants were actually from District 14, Sedlis became flustered and said that all the applicants were from "Brooklyn." Success Academies is claiming a false demand for their schools. It is not accurate to say that there is a demand in District 14 for this school, if the applicants do not actually live in the district. Success Academies choose District 14; the district did not choose them.
There are some serious questions, too, as to how Success Academies got parents to enter their Brooklyn lottery. A special education teacher from PS 147 testified that during his school’s parent-teacher conferences, a man stood outside handing out Success Academy advertisements to the PS 147 parents. When questioned, the man admitted he was being paid ten dollars an hour to solicit parents for Success Academies. The PS 147 teacher challenged the consistent Success Academies line about parent choice: "When advertisements are given in the face of people, when they put them in front of them, without dialogue beforehand…that is not choice! That is ‘this is what you should do.’” He shared how parents at his school came in asking, “Should we be worried about our school?”
Foster’s response was evasive at best. She spoke lightheartedly about how their network has reached out to the community and daycare centers in the past. She failed to address any of the teacher’s concerns, but instead kept referring to how Success Academies is trying to engage, now, in a dialogue with the community. (Let’s not forget that the lottery for their school closed on April 1st. Seems like it might be a little late to be starting this dialogue.) While Foster put on a smile to respond to this public school educator, the outright disrespect her organization showed towards PS 147 (and so many other public schools where they do the same kind of soliciting after/before school) cannot be denied. While his school is in the midst of doing something positive and productive--conducting meetings between teachers and families--Success Academies shows up to tell these parents they should consider another school, creating confusion and sowing seeds of doubt.
Another educator from PS 147 challenged the Success Academies model. He spoke of high teacher turnover rates in their schools, and cited a case in which one Harlem Success Academy went through four principals in just five years. He asked Ms. Foster, “How can your school be a replicable model?” as they so often proclaim. He spoke also of their contradictory statements about testing and test prep. While they claim not to be a "test-prep" factory, their teachers don orange t-shirts with the words, “Slammin’ Exam Teacher!” Furthermore, the PS 147 teacher alleged, the schools’ CEO, Ms. Moskowitz, has openly advocated for rewarding teachers monetarily for high student test scores.
When Ms. Foster took back the microphone she began again with her previous tactic, to sound nice, but communicate little substance or truth. She made general statements about the Success Academies philosophy—“The tests are not our end-all…but they are our moral obligation. We have to ensure our students do well on these exams…So, we try to get the students excited about the tests.” While Foster seemed to be communicating the message the Success Academies schools are not unilaterally focused on testing and test-prep, a former HSA teacher tells a different story: "There is a one word focus at any HSA school: testing." (Anonymous comment left: http://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2011/04/harlembrooklyn-success-academy-video.html)
Foster's response to teacher turnover was even more misleading. She said that many of the teachers at Success Academies don’t leave, they simply move on to other positions within the network. She didn’t exactly specify what jobs these teachers took up, aside from mentioning a few school leaders who were former teachers. Surely the 50% turnover rate at Harlem Success Academy 1 (see for yourself on the State’s Accountability and Overview Report) is not due entirely to teachers becoming principals. Some teachers likely do move up, but what happened to the rest of them?
Throughout the evening, Foster and Sedlis continued to use three phrases repetitiously: “partnership, respectful dialogue and parent choice.” An educator from Harlem, whose public school has been forced to share space with a Harlem Success Academy, spoke strongly about how these empty phrases are tossed around by Success Academy employees. He spoke of how Moskowitz brought parents into his school for a co-location hearing and how they aggressively called his school, “a failure.” There was no basis for this accusation--Moskowitz had been pining for this school building and used this public hearing as an opportunity to attack and overwhelm this public school. (See http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=sites&srcid=ZGVmYXVsdGRvbWFpbnxueWRuZG9jc3xneDoyMjFlOTliYmVlNjUxMmIw&pli=1 for access to the emails between Moskowitz and Klein. See pages 47 to 50.)
He spoke also of the numerous injustices his school and students have been subject too since the co-location began. Each year, Harlem Success Academy has taken more and more space away from his public school. Kindergarten, first and second grade students at his public school have been forced into classrooms in a sub-level basement—all to make room for Harlem Success Academy. Foster attempted to respond, explaining that in each co-location there is a team of people who work together within the building to divide space equally and fairly. The Harlem educator responded and shared how his school community consistently and opening opposed the move to basement classrooms, and how, in the end, they were not allowed to be a part of this decision. They were told to move their classes into the basement. Foster continued to stress how her schools work in partnership with their public school neighbors. It is easy to say you partner with a community or a school, but to actually do it requires a degree of honesty and consideration Success Academies have not shown themselves to possess. Partnership requires a give and take; Success Academies only know how to take.
As the evening continued, a consistent pattern revealed itself. The community raised concerns. Then, Sedlis and Foster deflected and attempted to minimize what the community brought forth. The most glaring untruths came later in the evening. Someone from the audience mentioned her concern that Success Academies fail to enroll equitable numbers of students with special needs and English language learners. Nicole Foster actually said that the new District 14 Success Academy school will have 25% English Language Learners. She then went on to say that Success Academies enroll more special education students and more ELL’s than the public schools with whom they share space. Her statements could not be further from the truth.
Let’s look first at English Language Learner enrollment. New York State complies information on all schools and creates an “Accountability and Overview Report” for most schools in the city. The 2008-2009 reports can be found online. See the chart below to see the enrollment of English Language Learners at three Success Academies and their co-located neighbors.
For some reason, “Accountability and Overview Reports” do not yet exist for the other Success Academies schools. Most likely, this is due to their youth—some have only been open a year or two. However, the public schools they share space with enroll significant numbers of ELL students.
English Language Learners in other Public Schools co-located with Success Academies
P.S. 241, co-located with HSA 4
24%
P.S. 123, co-located with HSA 5
20%
P.S. 30 Wilton, co-located with Bronx Success 1
28%
P.S. 146 Edward Collins, co-located with Bronx Success 2
16%
Foster also claimed that her schools enroll higher numbers of special education students, but the numbers just don’t add up. On the Department of Education website (schools.nyc.gov) you can view all kinds of statistics for each public school in our city. Statistics for charter schools are not as easily accessed. In the beginning of February, I came across a new link with enrollment data on each school’s page. It was titled, “CEP School Demographics and Accountability Snapshot, 2010-2011.” This was, at the time, a snapshot available for all schools—public and charter. I recorded the data for the Success Academy schools, as well as the public schools that have been forced to share their space with this charter chain. Within a couple of weeks, this link was removed from all of the charter school web pages, however it is still available on public school pages. (It is listed near the bottom of each school's “Statistics” page.) The data used in the graphs below comes from these snapshots. If the Success Academies schools would like to provide updated and detailed enrollment information, I would love to see it.
The first graph shows the percentage of students enrolled in special education classes, both Collaborative Team Teaching (CTT) and self-contained classes.
While it is undoubtedly clear that our public schools serve more students in need of special services, the differences are even more glaring if you examine the number of students in self-contained classes alone. Students who need self-contained classes typically have the highest needs.
The Success Academies Network is not interested in serving high-needs students and have counseled out many students when they felt overwhelmed by their needs. Go into any of the schools co-located with a Success Academy and you will find former Success Academy students—students who “won” the lottery, but were then asked to leave. Success Academies seem to have adopted an attitude now shared by many charter schools—it is accepted practice to exclude students instead of giving them the support they need to succeed. (The NY Post just ran an article about these exclusionary practices, "Charters Nix 23% of kids: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/charters_nix_of_kids_jXEEhJtQx9eQiGUiD3vInN)
The job of a public school is to work with all of the students who enroll, regardless of their strengths, weaknesses, needs or shortcomings. When a student presents with a need, it is up to the school to help meet that need. Although they receive substantial public funds, charter schools are not public schools and easily avoid doing the true and hard work of educating our neediest children.
As the CEC meeting ended around 8:15 pm, two tired and weary Success Academies employees exited I.S. 71. I wondered, how they do it every day? How do they work for an organization that, in the name of educational equity, creates division, tension and inequality in our communities? Moskowitz invests extraordinary resources in the presentation and preservation of her organization's image. But as one community member said at the end of his testimony, "Imagine if that money went to kids!"
In advertising and marketing, truth is usually obscured or manipulated in an attempt to convince people (consumers) of something--to buy a product, to take a trip, to take a drug, to buy a kind of food, to go to a school. McDonald's spends millions of dollars every year marketing and promoting its food. It fills its advertisements with images of seemingly healthy people stuffing their faces with unbelievably unhealthy food. It slaps up joyous slogans and avoids including the information about their food's damaging nutritional content that might dissuade people from buying it. McDonald's advertising campaigns are not focused on sharing any truths. Rather, they hide the truth in the name of increasing profit. The Success Academies Charter School Network is guilty of similar practices. Moskowitz wants us to believe what her organization says and ignore what it does. But if we ignore what is happening, our children are the ones who will pay the price. They deserve honesty and integrity, not lies and deceit.What is it going to take for more people, especially parents, to see through the empty slogans of Success Academies?
Through my work with GEM and our efforts to counter the movement to privatize education in New York City, I have come across a common theme when my fellow activists talk about parents who choose charter schools for their children. While we challenge the existence and necessity of these schools, we often say that we understand why parents send their children to charter schools. While I of course respect charter schools parents and I do not want to draw a line in the sand—I think some revision of this position is necessary. The argument often made by charter school supporters is that parents choose charter schools because they are dissatisfied with their neighborhood public schools. They allege that our public schools are failing and that charter schools provide a better alternative to families.
I worry that by simply saying we understand why these parents choose charter schools that we are also, in a way, condemning our public schools. By saying we understand, I fear we stop ourselves from actually dialoguing with these families. When we say we understand, I believe we are sending the wrong message.
I argue that we need to change our position to this: “We understand why parents think they need to send their children to charter schools.” Let me explain…
Since September, five of my Kindergarten parents have approached me asking if they should send their children to charter schools. They showed me numerous mailings they received in the mail and appeared quite confused. Many thought they were required to fill out the paperwork, but didn’t have a true interest in sending their child elsewhere. One parent actually had a letter that claimed her child had been accepted to a charter school, yet she had never heard of it, much less applied for admission.
Parents across the city are being bombarded with similar advertisements, while the media continues to condemn and criticize our under-resourced public schools. The message many parents receive is oversimplified—“public schools are failing and you should get out while you can!” The reality is that many of our public schools—particularly those that serve low-income and high-poverty communities—are not receiving the support or resources they need to be successful. It isn’t that they are failing—it’s that they serve the most difficult populations and are expected to deal with the challenges of poverty all on their own. Rather than actually addressing the causes of poverty, our mayor and other corporate education reformers are creating a system that encourages people to ignore and avoid societal realities. They have vilified the schools that serve the highest needs students and are encouraging parents to enroll in privately managed charter schools.
When parents opt for charter schools, I often wonder what has actually transpired to lead them to that point. There are those who have actively sought out charters schools, but I wonder how many others are enrolling their children simply because they have been overwhelmed by the million dollar advertising and messaging machines at work.
While I know that many of our public schools need more support, resources and attention, and that the system needs a serious overhaul, most of the charter schools in New York City are not actually providing children with an education they deserve. Instead, they have been able to market the perception that they are doing what is best for children.
I recently discovered that Success Academies (Eva Moskowitz’s charter chain that currently operates five charters in Manhattan and two in the Bronx) was going to try to edge its way into District 14 where I live. A few months ago a woman approached me on the subway platform. She asked if I would sign a petition to help a new public school open in district 14. I was curious, so asked to see the petition.
The Success Academy logo was right at the top. I handed her back the clipboard and attempted to explain why I could not sign. I crossed my fingers that their plan to invade my neighborhood would fail. A public hearing was recently held in an attempt to co-locate an 8th Success Academy here. Within days of the hearing announcement, bus stops lining Graham Avenue (one of the neighborhood's busiest streets) were outfitted with large, colorful Success Academies’ advertisements. A beaming child’s face was surrounded with the words, “Next Stop, College.” Next, the subway station was home to these ads and finally Success Academy flyers hung on every doorknob in District 14. Many of these ads began with the phrase, “Better schools are coming to your community.”
As a resident of District 14, I know of a great number of high-performing public schools and I would be proud to send a child of mine to one of the public schools near my house. Moskowitz’s declaration that our district is in need of her schools in order to improve is misleading at best. A large part of her marketing campaign is selling the message that the schools we already have are not good enough. While Success Academies likely spends the most on its advertising (sending out 15,000 applications for only 400 seats), other charter operators use the same deceptive and divisive tactics.
When exploring the Success Academies website I came across a section titled, “Why choose Success Academies?” It listed many of the claims I have seen on their advertisements:
• We hire only the best teachers.
• Our public elementary schools have proven track record of success.
• Our schools are joyful and promote a love of learning.
When we look closely at what actually goes on inside the doors of Success Academies, it is quite apparent that they are not, in fact, providing their students with the kind of education they claim.
The best teachers?
Success Academy schools hire mostly young, novice teachers and show a high rate of teacher turnover. My partner works at a public school that has the misfortune of co-locating with a Harlem Success Academy. HSA’s teaching staff struggles no differently than any other teaching staff that is predominately made up of rookies. They struggle to maintain focused connections with so many children simultaneously and find it challenging to keep order in their classrooms and hallway. Like many new teachers grappling with how to lead a group of children, some HSA teachers rely on threats and give out checks (their version of demerits) when dealing with discipline. Parents are routinely called in to either supervise their own children or take them home early from school. It is not easy or simple work guiding a group of young children during a long school day. It requires great skill—skill that is not a taught in school, learned over the summer or developed in just a year. Mastering the art of teaching takes commitment, dedication, humility and most of all, experience. Success Academy teachers are much more ordinary than Eva Moskowitz wants us to believe.
A track record of success?
While Success Academy students do often score well on standardized tests, this is not a true measure of success. Success Academies have a track record of counseling out students who have behavioral or academic difficulty. When examining their enrollment data one sees stark drops as students get older. Large groups start in kindergarten (usually around 80 to 100 students), but by 3rd, 4th and 5th grade these numbers are between 30 and 60 students. My public school experiences some degree of attrition, but we never see enrollment fluctuate to this degree. Public schools that share space with the Success Academies schools frequently report former Success Academy students enrolling in their schools. Often these students were asked to leave or the parents withdrew them out of frustration with the school's punitive practices. In The test scores gains that the schools tout are less significant when one considers how many students the schools failed to educate along the way.
Success Academy schools also seem to equate success with a test score. Instead of teaching their students to be thoughtful, self-motivated learners, they are teaching their students how to recall information at the most basic level. Instead of teaching their students to be independent learners, their students are completely dependent upon their teachers. Both the New York Times and New York Magazine have published articles about the structure of the day at Harlem Success Academies. The routines are so regimented that students are actually timed while using the bathroom and putting away their coats and bags. What will happen to these children when someone isn’t threatening them with a check or holding a timer in front of their heads? Children need to be taught to control, manage and be in charge of themselves.
A successful school would also be a place with a low turnover rate for teachers. Low turnover rates are a good indication of a stable school environment. Success Academies schools have higher turnover rates than all of the public schools with whom they share space. At Harlem Success Academy 1, 50% of the teachers left after the 2008-2009 school year. Not only do teachers turnover quickly, but principals do as well. Moskowitz routinely removes and replaces her schools’ administrators, often in the midst of the school year.
Joyful schools?
Success Academies teachers tend use very controlling and authoritarian measures with students. “Checks” are dolled out by the minute as punishment. When students are not meeting expectations, the teachers yell out “that’s a check!” What does this empty attempt at discipline teach students? It certainly doesn’t seem to send the message that school is a joyful place.
Students seem to be kept in check with fear and intimidation. And it doesn’t stop there. Parents of Success Academies’ students are required to sign very detailed contracts. Moskowitz has a harsh approach when it comes to working with families, “Our school is like a marriage, and if you don’t come through with your promises, we will have to divorce.” What about marriage vows that say, "Through sickness and health, for richer and poorer ‘til death do us part?" Do we want schools that can “divorce” our children and parents, or ones that are faithful and do their best to educate and provide for our children and families, no matter what?
When students are late or come to a Success Academy school unprepared, Saturday detention is often the consequence—for both parent and child. Parents are also required to attend various functions to promote the school. Recently, I attended a Panel for Educational Policy (PEP) meeting where a motion regarding Success Academies was on the agenda. Moskowitz bused in hundreds of parents and students to testify and cheer at the hearing. Instead of asking her parents to speak about their experiences, they were given detailed scripts and told what to think and what to say.
The motion on the PEP agenda proposed co-locating yet another Success Academy school in an existing and fully functioning public school building. Moskowitz has never opened one of her charter schools in her own building. Rather, she works her way into public school buildings and little by little takes space away from the school that is there. She overtly recruits their public school students and takes their classroom space—all the while claiming that her schools are revolutionizing education. But what message is she sending to her students? Isn’t she teaching them to take what they want without regard to the feelings or rights of others?
Success Academies is just one of many charter school networks operating in New York City. While charter schools currently serve fewer than 5% of our city's children, they garner substantially more support than our deserving public schools. These schools are not the reform our city and our country so desperately need. Rather, they are a distraction. Instead of investing in the reforms proven to impact student learning (class size reduction and maintaining an experienced teaching force), our mayor and President are promoting charter schools as the cure-all. Until parents begin to understand the realities of what is going on in these schools and the inaccuracies of their advertising, this ineffective model of education reform will continue.
Starting the dialogue?
At the PEP meeting I attended, I was sitting near some Harlem Success Academy families. One parent seemed quite annoyed by our comments and began to question our position asking us, “Why are you so angry?!” Two of my fellow GEM activists responded and were able to start a dialogue. They explained the reality of co-location and the devastation it has had on our public schools that have been forced to share space with a Success Academy school. The parent was quite shocked. Our perspective was completely new to him and by the end, he seemed to appreciate our struggle. While he certainly did not storm over to Eva Moskowitz and demand change or threaten to remove his child, I could tell that when we left him, the wheels were churning in his head. He had more questions.
When I had been standing in line to get into the meeting, I was next to a group of Harlem Success Academy parents/teachers. I desperately wanted to engage with them, but I hesitated. What if they got upset? What if they thought I was disrespectful and wrote me off? Instead of asking these “what ifs,” I should have just tried to start a conversation.
This past week I attended an informational session for Brooklyn Success Academy and attempted to dialogue with the parents there. I found that the majority of the parents in attendance were there simply because they had received multiple mailings advertising the event--they were not necessarily interested in leaving their public schools, nor did they have a true understanding of what a charter school was. The Success Academy spokesperson called their charter school a "public school," and presented a compelling (albeit inaccurate) case for why parents should enter their lottery. While I know many of the parents there will likely enter the lottery for this school, I did have some promising and fruitful conversations. If we do not begin to engage with parents in this way, then they will be left with only the destructive and disingenuous messages they receive through advertisements and the media. We need to bring people the truth, even if it is done one conversation at a time.
M.A.B. has been a New York City public school Kindergarten teacher for 5 years. Previous to this she worked in a charter school and a Montessori Preschool. She has been involved with the Grassroots Education Movement for the past 2 years.
