School Scope: Those SHSAT Tests, Part 2

Published in The WAVE: WWW.Rockawave.com - August 23, 2019

School Scope:  Those SHSAT Tests, Part 2

By Norm Scott

Debates over the controversial SHSAT special high school admission tests has roiled the local education world and has driven a rift between the Asian and Black/Latinx communities. State law forces the city to use only the SHSAT despite de Blasio’s attempts to have it changed. Let me state right up front: I am opposed to using a standardized test as a sole criteria for admission to specialized high schools for a number of reasons, which I will get into in a follow-up column. (For SHSAT news - https://shsatsunset.org.)

In a previous column (Those SHSAT Tests Part 1 https://www.rockawave.com/articles/school-scope-315). I wrote about my experiences prepping for tests in the late 1950s/early 60s for Brooklyn Tech (which I didn’t get in) and the NY State Scholarship exams in my junior and senior high schools (where I was successful). I described my evolution in learning how to take tests between the disaster in the 8^th grade where time was called with 65% of the test completed and 12^th grade where I had mastered test time management. Both times I had been well-prepared to answer the questions but the test prep my schools offered did not address the “how to take a test” issue. I pointed to a Malcolm Gladwell podcast that addressed test taking using the LSAT (law school admissions) as an example. Gladwell referred to a tortoise and hare concept of test taking and how time limits favor hares whereas tortoises who take a slow and steady course bring skills to the table that hares may lack. (https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/revisionist-history/.)

What if the SHSAT were not timed? Would some tortoises pick up enough right answers to get into the specialized schools? A for-profit web site actually has a guide on how to apply for extra time on the SHSAT, a legitimate exercise for students with IEPs, but something that has been abused for SAT’s and other tests, as pointed out in this March 14, 2019 NYT piece:

Is the College Cheating Scandal the ‘Final Straw’ for Standardized Tests?

“For parents desperate to boost their children’s SAT or ACT scores, the test preparation company Student-Tutor offered an enticing solution: claim a learning disability and qualify for extra time. “This time advantage can help raise their scores significantly!” the website blared. “Some students have even reported raising their score by as much as 350+ points!” This week’s college admissions scandal provided an instruction manual for gaming the SAT: bribe the proctor, hire a stand-in, see the right psychologist to get a signoff for more time.

college admissions experts said that in some communities, it is well known which psychologists will provide paperwork attesting to disabilities like A.D.H.D. — for thousands of dollars. “Parents have figured out that this is a freebie,” said Miriam Kurtzig Freedman, a special education lawyer. ‘This was a scandal waiting to happen’.”

The NYC Marathon has no time limits and when I used to volunteer there were people coming in late in the evening. We often hear this said about many aspects of life – even applying to the baseball season: it is a marathon, not a sprint. Should this concept be applied to standardized tests? What if we totally removed time limits? I see the good, bad and ugly to that. I could see myself spending hours on a question that stumped me once freed from the time limits.

I went from a tortoise when I took the Tech test in 1958 to a hare when I received a NY State scholarship in 1962. But was I any smarter other than having figured out how to use limited time on tests to my advantage? Well, I did figure out how to manage a test. I learned to take the number of questions and divide it into the amount of minutes I had and to set up sign posts as to where I should be at different times. Thus on a 50 question test in 60 minutes I had a little over a minute for each question. My strategy was to run through the test answering all the quickie questions to gain time, putting a little dash next to those questions that looked solvable with a little more time – I would go back after knocking off the easy ones. The ones that seemed hardest got a dot, so they could be attacked with the balance of time. The aim was to come down to two options and guess, giving me a 50-50 chance even on the hardest questions. If half the test were in the hardest category, that was a sign to just go home.

Norm takes unlimited time when he blogs at ednotesonline.com.

School Scope: Teachers Go Wild with Strikes in Virginia, Denver, Los Angeles, and a Wildcat in Oakland

Published in The WAVE print edition, Feb. 1, 2019. www.rockawave.com

School Scope: Teachers Go Wild with Strikes in Virginia, Denver, Los Angeles, and a Wildcat in Oakland
By Norm Scott
January 28, 2019

Teacher strike fever has struck the nation. Last year we saw the anti-union Trump red state strikes in West Virginia, Oklahoma and Kentucky. Teachers revolted, not only against the Republican state legislatures and governors, but against their own union leaderships that often urge caution. This week thousands of teachers in Virginia left their classrooms to march in a rally at the capitol. Virginia Educators United, a grassroots campaign formed by educators, parents and members of the community, organized the rally on Monday. The movement has spread to blue states where stronger union leaderships have taken leadership. Denver teachers are going on strike. Teachers are getting the message that going it alone as a union without outside support is a losing proposition. Pay has been a key factor, one reason we won’t see similar actions here in the UFT.

United Teachers, Los Angeles (UTLA) strike Ends - Charter Schools Curbs on the Agenda
In Los Angeles, the pay issue seemed to take second place – both sides agreed on a roughly 6% raise. Contrary to what has happened here in NYC where the opposition to Unity Caucus’ domination of the UFT has been in disarray, in 2014, a group of teachers in LA came together under the banner of “Union Power” an amalgam of various groups and independents and won the election under the leadership of Alex Caputo-Pearl. I first met Alex about 10 years ago when he was a high school teacher and also an elected member of the UTLA Executive Board and it was clear he had a strong vision that went far beyond narrow trade unionism. (See NYT: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/28/us/charter-schools-los-angeles.html).

Caputo-Pearl and his team began preparing the membership for a strike from the day he took office, with 99% of the teachers supporting a strike. They built alliances with parent and community groups by not only emphasizing raises but also calling for drastic class size reductions and more support personnel like librarians, school nurses and guidance counselors. And through these tactics, they seem to have won a great victory.

The elected school board in LA has been under the control of the pro-charter billionaire boys club led by Eli Broad and they have installed hedge fund managers instead of educators to run the schools, with a pro-charter bent. Broad tried to push through an initiative to turn half the schools into charters. Broad wasn’t successful in trying to undermine public education, but hasn’t given up. Charters get support as a way break teacher unions, as has been done in New Orleans which no longer has any public schools. The UTLA’s call for a moratorium on charters got some results, at the very least putting a discussion in the public sphere.

[Speaking of charter moratoriums, here in NYC some district community education councils are taking stands against charter expansion in their district. Tonight [Tuesday Jan. 29] I’m going to the District 15 CEC meeting (Park Slope and Sunset Park) where such a resolution is on the table.]

The media, other than the right wing Fox types, has been mostly friendly to teachers over their recent struggles. What is interesting is that LA is a the first big city strike since Chicago in 2012 started the strike fever and California is a blue state totally controlled by Democrats, many of whom have also been charter friendly. My litmus test for any candidate running for president is whether they showed up on the UTLA picket lines or offered support, threatening contributions from pro-charter hedge hogs.

Let’s see how many candidates in the upcoming Public Advocate campaign take a pro-union, anti-charter stand. The WAVE is taking this election seriously and doing some great work. I will be perusing the interviews with the candidates for where they stand on the big education issues of the day.

Norm is one of the few people in NYC not running for public advocate but check his blog, ednotesonline.com, in case he changes his mind.

School Scope: Test Scores from Spring ’18 Released - Oct. 5

School Scope: Test Scores from Spring ’18 Released

By Norm Scott

In case the news passed you by, the New York State reading and math tests students took last April and May were released last week, tests that are no use to students, parents or teachers so long after the school year ended;  expensive tests that have distorted education at every level from pre-k through high schools are fundamentally useless. But they are used to rate part of teacher performance, also useless since that practice has also been discredited. They are also used to rate overall school performance and as an excuse to try to shut down public schools whose buildings are coveted by well-funded charter school chains.

Testing mania is not a new thing. I remember how standardized testing (as opposed to teacher or school-wide tests) was important in my elementary and middle schools in the 1950s and regents test-driven in high school in the early 60s. And as an elementary school teacher from the late 60s through the late 90s testing was a driving force. But it was used mainly to address the outcomes of children and we received the results before the school year ended, still too late to do much with them. (I advocated that tests be given in September so teachers could actually use the outcomes to assist their students.)

With the No Child Left Behind Law pushed by the Bush administration with the support of Democrats in the early part of this century, testing became a political cudgel used to attack entire school systems, close down schools, and punish teachers and students. The punishment put careers of educators and politicians on the line and that drove us to the present hysteria.

Along side that has grown a vast educational-industrial complex forming a testing industry that makes enormous profits from the tests and to ensure those profits there has sprung up a pro-testing lobby funneling money to politicians who control the state education departments. Our own NY State Education Department (NYSED) has pushed hard on tests and I suspect this is more about politics than education.

There has been a counter reaction against testing – the opt-out movement to have kids sit out the tests. Despite enormous attacks against opt-outers by educational bureaucrats in NY City, the opt out rate in NYC was slightly up to 4.4 percent, a .4 percentage point increase from last year. Statewide the numbers are still around 20%. The highest refusal rates have been in the wealthier/whiter districts with District 15 (Park Slope) leading the pack with 12% opt-out.

NYSED has tried to lure opt-outers back by making cosmetic changes in the test along with reducing some testing time. But this has not affected the many schools that focus on the tests with enormous test prep time that takes away from curriculum.

You  can read Fred Smith, a major critic of the testrocracy, who takes apart the tests on my blog: Fred Smith: Opt-out movement is viable and capable of growth in NYC - https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2018/09/fred-smith-opt-out-movement-is-viable.html.

It’s all about politics

You may have noticed that I have focused more on politics than education recently. As you can see from the above we can’t isolate educational policy from the politics and politicians behind it. Both political parties are responsible for bad education policy – Obama’s Race To The Top funneled billions  to schools based on some of the worst policies we’ve ever seen. But what about local politics? Our local electeds and the political machines that back them say little or nothing about bad ed policies. It is time to hold them accountable.

Norm Races to the Bottom at ednotesonline.com.

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School Scope: The UFT and Janus: Better Service, YES, More Democracy, NO

To be published in The WAVE June 15, 2018, www.rockawave.com

School Scope: The UFT and Janus: Better Service, YES, More Democracy, NO
By Norm Scott

Recent columns have addressed the probable Supreme Court decision in the Janus case that will make the entire nation right-to-work (RTW), which means those who don’t join the union won’t have to pay dues, thus leading to weakened unions. (Background at: The UFT and Janus: https://tinyurl.com/y9kyljjq and Is the UFT in Danger from Janus as Staff Layoffs and Retirements Loom? https://tinyurl.com/y789glbb.) Unions must represent all people covered by contracts even if they choose not to join the union. In non-RTW states they must pay dues, known as agency fees, at a somewhat reduced rate. In the UFT there are reportedly over 3000 agency fee payers. They do not have the right to vote in general union or school elections and, theoretically, can be kept from attending school and citywide union meetings. Post Janus, expectations of members leaving the UFT run anywhere from 10-25%, which would be a damaging loss.

The UFT leadership has blitzed schools and membership with appeals to stay, even going so far as to visit members at home and organizing school-based teams to lobby colleagues. The UFT as the sole bargaining agent for all employees must continue to provide services to everyone, even those who leave the union, a serious and unfair drain on resources. Politicians recognize the threat to undermine strong unions like the UFT, which helps manage members’ expectations and militancy, is also a threat to the ability to run the schools if teachers were free agents unbound by union contracts. We saw this in the red state rebellions, all in RTW states where strikes are illegal (they are here too) where weakened unions were outflanked by a militant rank and file.

A recent state law pushed through by the UFT’s former enemy and now best friend, Governor Cuomo, would free unions from having to provide lawyers, possibly putting a scare into people thinking of leaving. I think the UFT needs to do more to offer positive reasons for staying, like better service and a more militant stance against the DOE and de Blasio. The UFT has not done enough to defend members from abusive principals. Untenured, who must wait at least four (or more) years for tenure, basically are without union protections. They can be discontinued at any time for practically any reasons. (Tenure forces administrators to provide some basis and guarantees a hearing.)

The anti-union forces have gone on a blitz to urge people to drop out and “give themselves a raise” by saving on dues, which in the UFT amounts to around $1400 a year. The salary structure is regressive as the gap between newer teachers and those at the top is so wide. Will new teachers opt in to join the union, especially if they intend to leave after a few years (over 50% do leave by the 5th year)?

Many of the deepest critics of the UFT/Unity Caucus leadership in the opposition to Unity Caucus are urging people to stay in the union and keep paying dues. In UFT elections they get about 25% of the vote and those who leave are more likely to be anti-Unity. But politics aside, Janus presents an existential threat to the lifeblood of all employees. Still, one of our major complaints has been the lack of democracy. While the UFT may offer better services, don’t expect democracy to be on their agenda. But does anyone really care about democracy in today’s world? More on this next time.

Norm runs his ednotesonline.com blog in a democratic manner – he makes all the decisions but argues with himself first.

School Scope: Red State Teachers in Revolt – Can It Happen Here?

Published at www.rockawave.com on Friday April 6, 2018

School Scope: Red State Teachers in Revolt – Can It Happen Here?

By Norm Scott
April 2, 2018

As I write this on Monday morning, teachers in Oklahoma are on strike, following up on the 9 day strike in West Virginia and last Friday’s walkout by teachers in Kentucky (over pension cuts) which is continuing today. Arizona teachers are also threatening to strike. Many of these actions are wildcat strikes, meaning they are not being called by the unions themselves but by a membership in revolt, not only against the state, but their own union leaderships which have been forced to go along. “Union leaders haven’t been aggressive enough. We need to be more aggressive,” said Kentucky teacher Nema Brewer, one of the organizers.

That all these states are right-to-work (RTW) red states who voted for Trump by vast margins is no accident. Super majority Republican control of these states have cut taxes so much, especially on the energy companies, education has been cut to the bone, including teacher salaries. And since union members in RTW states don’t have to pay union agency shop fees, the union structures in these states are weakened, thus not having the infrastructure in place to control the members.

I assume most of the teachers in revolt are not left wing or even liberals. A number of them may have even voted for Trump. Usually in strikes you hear attacks against outside agitators. Not in these cases, as the revolts are truly from the grass roots. Are some of the deplorables engage in a militant revolt, including their own leadership? I know people who voted for Trump just because they were generally pissed off and are very militant against the Democrats who sold out teachers and the teacher unions that support them. This militancy may be carrying over into their unions.

The Supreme Court, in the Janus case, is about to make every state, including NY, RTW. One of the arguments used against Janus is that the unions are often partners with the states and in essence help restrain the members. I wonder if these red state teacher revolts, coming so soon before the Court rules, will influence the Justices.

What does that mean for militancy here in NYC where we have the largest and most entrenched union leadership in the nation, where Unity Caucus has enormous reach? Now if 30% leave the UFT, that is a massive reduction in incoming dues. The patronage machine and possibly the high salaries that keeps them coming to Unity take a hit and Unity begins to lose some control - and if people in the schools get pissed off enough, who knows? But I'm a realist. But my guess is that the politicians in NYS know better - to make sure the UFT leaders remain as strong as possible to assure there are no teacher revolts here. Watch Cuomo and the Democrats figure out ways to help the unions keep collecting dues since they know full well the leaders of the UFT are their friends.

Hear an audio feed of a conversation with West Virginia and Oklahoma teachers at: https://www.facebook.com/jacobinmag/videos/2087299477963409/

Norm is always revolting at ednotesonline.com

School Scope, The Wave: The Bitter Taste of Success - Rockaway Schools Being Shut Down, Success Charter to Benefit

My column in the Friday Jan. 5 edition of the Rockaway Weekly, The WAVE.

Gary Rubinstein has just posted this piece The Hidden Attrition Of Success Academy. I will use some of his material in next week's column as I continue my series for Rockaway readers. 

School Scope:  The Bitter Taste of Success - Rockaway Schools Being Shut Down, Success Charter to Benefit

By Norm Scott

Jan. 2, 2018

Rockaway Parent Mariya Ultsh said she believes that DOE plays politics when it comes to school closures. "My money is that charter schools will sweep in and once again [special] interest groups will get a payday at the expense of our children... The WAVE, Dec. 22, 20017. 

When I hear that the DOE is closing down schools I always check to see how those closing will benefit charter schools that covet their real estate, especially when the voracious Eva Moskowitz Success Academy charters are involved. So when I saw on the list along with PS/IS 42, Rockaway’s MS 53, where Eva occupies space already, I did my imitation of Claude Reins (Inspector Renault of Casablanca fame) and declared “I was shocked, just shocked, to find out gambling was going on. Now where are my winnings?” Eva is getting her winnings as she will ultimately manage to push out the other schools in the building even if she and her billionaire supporters have to run million dollar ads crying about how the big bad de Blasio is denying them space while he in effect hands them space under the table by closing some superb real estate. I agree with Mariya Ultsh that the PS 42 closing will ultimately benefit some charter chain. The late and lamented DNAInfo (shut down by its owner when the reporters voted to unionize) had a great piece by Katie Honan back in 2015 addressing the original invasion of IS 53: https://tinyurl.com/ydde4ad4.

Last year the targeted school favoring Eva was JHS 145 in the Bronx which was closed a year earlier than promised under bogus reasoning as Success was growling for more space in the building. When I went to the closing hearing and saw the magnificent building and the attached park I had to laugh. JHS 145 teacher Jim Donohue who helped lead the unsuccessful battle to try to save the school said:

“A full 3 weeks before the DOE’s closure proposal even becomes official, and 2 months before the PEP vote takes place, and despite the DOE’s claim that the closing has NOTHING to do with the charter school, Success Academy’s website has begun advertising for applicants to its new middle school, opening in 2017, at JHS 145. In recent weeks, Success Academy staff members have been measuring our classrooms, apparently 100% confident that the PEP will rubber stamp our demise in March. (See videos  I made of the pleas from teachers, parents and students to keep the school open on my blog: https://tinyurl.com/y8by5mea. So we were not surprised to see yet another school occupied by Success end up on the closing list.

Avaricious Eva is asking to expand in the old Sarah Hale HS in Boerum Hill, Brooklyn and there has been community resistance. Leonie Haimson reports that “The average utilization of District 15 schools, according to the 2015-2016 DOE Utilization report, was at 105%, and 61% of K-8 schools in the district overcrowded (at or above 100% target utilization). About 74% or nearly 20,000 K-8 students were in overcrowded schools, and 94 cluster rooms were missing from these schools. according to DOE’s utilization formula ….. as cited in the letter from the Community Education Council in District 15, many of the students at the Success Academy Cobble Hill do not reside in the district….  any expansion of this school would increasingly crowd out districts students in the future, and thus should not be allowed. We also oppose allowing the expansion of any Success Academy charter school, given the huge number of civil rights violations and abuses that children enrolled in these schools and their families are subjected to, as well as repeated violations of student privacy rights. We have real doubts as to the legality of the request to authorize any change in a charter school’s enrollment in the middle of the current school year, as Success Academy – Cobble Hill is proposing, from 558 students in grades K-6, to 686 students in in 2017-2018.

As to PS 42, Councilman Donovan Richards, whose office donated nearly a million dollars to the school, the benefits of which will one day accrue to some charter chain, is also being closed. The Dec. 22 WAVE article noted that Richards will be holding a rally on Jan. 10 before and maybe at the closing hearing at PS 42 - at 6:30. The MS 53 hearing will be held Jan. 11 at the school, also at 6:30. PS 42's PTA president, Kevin Morgan, is organizing a bus trip to Albany on Jan. 9 -- call him for more info at 347-410-3061.

Renewal schools were not supported despite claims

Leonie Haimson has written an excellent blog detailing the failures of the de Blasio/Farina plan for the renewal schools.

Titled, DOE announces more Renewal school closings without ever having giving them a real chance to succeed, Leonie points out: “Instead of capping class sizes in these schools, the DOE spent about $40 million per year on consultants and bureaucrats to oversee the Renewal program, many of them with records marked by scandal and incompetence, as well as millions more on wrap-around services to create "community schools." Though perhaps of value in themselves, these services do little to improve students' opportunity to learn or teachers ability to teach.” Read the entire piece at: https://tinyurl.com/y7slpyrq. Also see Alan Singer on the failure of de Blasio/Farina renewal program, “Newly Reelected New York City Mayor Decides His School Renewal Plan Failed But Still Claims Success”. Have fun reading at: https://tinyurl.com/y79g42dk.

My previous articles on the Success charter monster are on my blog at:

https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2017/12/school-scope-how-do-you-spell-success_16.html

https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2017/12/school-scope-how-do-you-spell-success.html

And a piece on how billionaire hedge fund Success Board member Paul Tudor Jones consoled Harvey Weinstein: https://ednotesonline.blogspot.com/2017/12/eva-moskowitz-return-paul-tudor-money.html

In case you didn’t get the message, Norm blogs way too much at ednotesonline.com.

The Ten Plagues of Bloomberg and Klein by Norman Scott

The School Scope column appears every 2 weeks in The Wave (www.rockawave.com).
December 14, 2007.

The Ten Plagues of BloomKlein by Norman Scott

1. Closed schools based on single letter grades!
2. Inflated test scores!
3. Distorted graduation rates!
4. Use of statistics instead of educationally sound principles to make basic decisions about children’s lives!
5. Reduced services for special education students!
6. Attacks on senior teachers!
7. Parents treated like pariahs!
8. Enormous sums spent on testing rather than reducing class size!
9. Even more enormous sums spent on high priced consultants and computer systems!
10. Constant chaotic reorganizations based on untested principles!
11. Dumb merit pay schemes for teachers and students!
12. A gutted, compliant, ineffective union that capitulates and collaborates with the BloomKlein administration while deceiving the membership.

Oh, sorry, did I pass ten? Is it too late to change the title? Can I try for twenty? Nah! Let’s keep this column short. As I told [Wave publisher] Susan Locke at the Wave Xmas party the other day, “Cut the column when you fall asleep.” Zzzzzzzzzz.

The big local news was the announced closing of Far Rockaway HS. Following on the Wave reports a few weeks ago about the increased problems at Beach Channel HS from over the counter (OTC) refugees from Far Rock, expect more of the same next year when Far Rock’s freshman class has to go elsewhere. The over/under on Beach Channel’s future is already being set in Vegas.

When the reorganization of Far Rock was announced in April 2005, I wrote, “Far Rockaway HS has been put on a fast track to be reorganized by September [2005] which could lead to the creation of four mini-schools, including a vocational ed track, and the replacement of up to 50% of the teachers. Teachers who want to stay will have to apply for jobs. You know the story – if it’s a failing school it’s got to be the fault of the teachers. Their resistance to change must be the reason the school is perceived as failing; probably not willing enough to drink the Workshop model Kool-aid.”

That reorganization must be viewed as a failure by the NYCEDOE if they are closing it now. Who is responsible for that “failure” (their definition, not mine) if not the DOE? Why are they allowed to get away with blaming everyone and everything but themselves? They are always talking about "no excuses” yet they are the biggest excuse-makers.

When BloomKlein announce they are closing schools, there are shock waves, part of their “shock and awe” strategy in “reforming” the educational system. But when they close a school they are announcing their failure to fix it, while absolving themselves of responsibility. After all, they control the administrators and most of the teachers who are there. So, what will change when they close a school? New administrators, new teachers and mostly, new kids. Where will the ones denied entry into the new school go? To the next school to be destabilized? If you can’t fix what’s wrong without closing the school, then you have failed.

Questions have been raised about small schools and charter schools actually being more successful considering these issues: getting a higher achieving pool of students and eliminating students with special needs; getting a disproportionate share of resources; forcing the larger, traditional schools to be even more overcrowded and receiving those students who have the least chance of succeeding.

Joel Klein wrote an op-ed in the New York Post ("Closing Time") on December 10, outlining the rationale for closing schools. Klein said:

Starting in 2002, we began phasing out and shutting down schools that had a history of failure. These decisions...were an acknowledgement that the schools weren't remotely educating students - and that they weren't going to get better on their own. [Why is a supposedly failing school being left to drown on its own?]

Klein uses the example of Bushwick High School in Brooklyn to demonstrate:

Bushwick HS had a graduation rate of just 23 percent. We replaced it with four new small schools, which now make up what we call the Bushwick campus. Last year, the new schools had a combined graduation rate of nearly 60 percent -almost triple what it once was. The students literally paraded through their neighborhood in June, demonstrating the pride that they feel for their schools and their community.
Blogger Eduwonkette, following up on the work she did on exposing the Evander HS “miracle” where she compared the student populations of the small schools with the large “failing” school they replaced, did the same work on the Bushwick example:

If the intent of school closings is to clear out the students who previously attended the "failing school," replace them with higher performing students, and declare victory, Bushwick is a marked success.

Bushwick stopped taking 9th graders through the formal admissions process in September of 2002, but continued receiving "over the counter students" (OTCs)- students who have not been placed in any school, who are transferring, or who arrive in the middle of the year - in the 2003-2004 school year as well. Zoned schools like Bushwick represent combinations of the formal admissions process students and OTC students; while the small schools do receive OTCs, the proportion of the student population comprised by these students is much smaller. How was the old Bushwick different from the schools that replaced it? The most notable differences include the ELL population and the percentage of students who come into 9th grade proficient in reading and math. Bushwick 9th graders were 30.6% ELL, while in their first year, the new small schools served between 19.5 and 26% ELL. Even more drastically, 83% of the Bushwick OTC kids were ELLs. On most other indicators, the Bushwick 9th graders were lower performing than the 9th graders attending the new small schools. This is particularly true of the Bushwick OTC students.

Eduwonkette blogs at: http://www.eduwonkette.com

It’s the family, stupid

Mike Winerip, one of our favorite commentators on education, was in the NY Times on Sunday [Dec. 9] laying waste to the “No Excuses” argument, something anyone who spends 10 minutes in the classroom understands.

Does that mean we stop teaching? No. But we understand that we must fight for the resources necessary to close the achievement gap, not do education reform on the cheap or throw money at data management rather than classroom management.

But guess where they buried what should be a front page piece because it exposes the sham of NCLB and the entire business-based education reform movement and, in particular, the entire program of BloomKlein? In the regional "parenting" section, which most people in the city environs do not even receive. Winerip starts his piece with:

The federal No Child Left Behind law of 2002 rates schools based on how students perform on state standardized tests, and if too many children score poorly, the school is judged as failing.

But how much is really the school’s fault?

A new study by the Educational Testing Service — which develops and administers more than 50 million standardized tests annually, including the SAT — concludes that an awful lot of those low scores can be explained by factors that have nothing to do with schools. The study, “The Family: America’s Smallest School,” suggests that a lot of the failure has to do with what takes place in the home, the level of poverty and government’s inadequate support for programs that could make a difference, like high-quality day care and paid maternity leave.

The E.T.S. researchers took four variables that are beyond the control of schools: The percentage of children living with one parent; the percentage of eighth graders absent from school at least three times a month; the percentage of children 5 or younger whose parents read to them daily, and the percentage of eighth graders who watch five or more hours of TV a day. Using just those four variables, the researchers were able to predict each state’s results on the federal eighth-grade reading test with impressive accuracy.

Try to read the entire piece – if you can find it (I have links on my blog.)

I want to reiterate that even with these issues, I have a firm belief they all can be overcome. Give us the resources. A kid in pre-k is already 2 years behind? What would it take? A one-on-one person every day for a year? Then do it. The DOE’s Jim Liebman said that it would take 15 in a class, the level of private schools, for class size reduction to make a difference and that is too expensive. When this country suddenly needs trillions to fight wars, the money magically appears, but when education reform is on the agenda, the business community wants to do it on the cheap with gimmicks like merit pay and changing perceptions of low expectations.

Educators who want to reform the system the right way do have low expectations: about the ability of this society to give them the tools they can really use to close the achievement gap.

The Great Escape
One of the notable education stories this week was Tweed’s Chief Accountability Officer James Liebman’s race to escape parent petitioners after testifying at a City Council hearing on the school grading system. Even reporter Jennifer Medina’s story in the NY Times seemed to have a bit of fun with it. Satirist Gary Babad did a piece for the NYC Parent blog on the NY Jets offering Liebman a contract based on his mad dash.

You can read all about these delicious education wonk friendly stories at my blog.
Oh, and Susan. Sorry, the column is not short. Maybe next time as a New Year’s gift.