Insideschools is one of many projects housed at Advocates for Children of New York. Jared Stein is our colleague at NYS-TEACHS, which strives to ensure that the educational rights of homeless children are both recognized and implemented in New York State.

HearUS posted a link to an electronic petition requesting that President Obama meet with a determined 14-year- old who is completing an 1,100 mile walk to raise awareness about child/youth homelessness. HearUs writes:

“14-year-old David Ashby has walked 700 of 1,100 miles to meet President Obama to urge more national efforts to help homeless kids.

We need petitioners to get the President’s attention.

It won’t hurt if David’s amazing effort inspires people to do something local to help homeless kids.” (more…)

Thanks to our readers for your many generous donations and thoughtful suggestions on how to keep Insideschools.org alive and thriving. Please know that we are exploring your ideas and many, many others.

The good news is that Insideschools will not go dark. The sad news is that we have had to let go some of our gifted and committed staff members. And given our severely constrained financial circumstances, we will be curtailing some of our features.

During the coming months we will explore many strategies to determine how to continue providing a high service to you, our loyal readers, while we focus on finding alternate, sustainable sources of revenue.

At the same time, we’ll keep sending regular e-mail alerts to bring you the latest schools news. We’ll keep you apprised on The InsideSCOOP about what’s happening with school admissions and other Department of Education news. And, with your help, we’ll update individual school information as often as we can.

But, we cannot continue to provide this service without you!

How can you help?

• Post a comment. Tell us — and others – what’s going on in your school. It just takes a minute.
• Know of an event of interest to parents? Post it on our calendar
• Start a conversation - or join a conversation - on our forum.
• Share your contacts: Do you have contacts in business, philanthropy, or government that may be interested in Insideschools.org? Let us know!
• Donate! We’re more than halfway to our goal of $10,000 in individual donations by July 31. That is a small fraction of our total operating costs, but we know that generous support from people like you will help us to secure significant funding from other sources. (A special thanks to those who have already donated!)

Thanks for your support. We’ll keep you posted.

What’s special: Insideschools.org provides independent, professionally written reviews of all New York City public schools and gives free advice to parents about school choice.Downside: Due to a lack of funding, the website may have to fold, or severely curtail its free services. On Sunday, the Daily News urged New Yorkers to “rally to save” Insideschools.org. Calling us the “single most valuable independent source of information on New York City public schools,” the editorial lamented that we may go out of business.Our financial woes might not surprise our regular readers, who receive our appeals for donations and see the notices on the website. But many of our users have asked how we got in this financial predicament and what’s going to happen next.Since 2002, Insideschools.org has produced independent, in-depth, professional reviews of all New York City public schools. When we launched, there were 1,100 schools – today there are more than 1,500, including 100 charter schools. The New York City school system has undergone several overhauls under Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein - and we have done our best to stay apace and keep you informed of the changes.But even with a tiny (and modestly paid) staff, and a small cadre of freelancers and volunteers, it is increasingly expensive to keep doing what we do best: send trained reporters into the schools and write reviews that are professionally edited. At the same time, we’re keeping up with what’s happening in school policy, politics, and admissions. There is truly no other site like ours in the United States, but what makes us unique is also what makes us “expensive.” In today’s economy, even the most established for-profit news gathering organizations are struggling to stay afloat. And this is where we find ourselves today – seeking generous, civic-minded funders who would allow us to continue the work that New York City public school parents have come to rely on: 1.1 million readers visited our site in the past year alone. Barring an infusion of new funds, we will have to reduce our staffing significantly while we regroup and look to find a more sustainable model.If you are able to help out with a contribution, please visit our Donate Now page (and a sincere thanks to everyone who has already donated.) If you, or anyone you know, can help Insideschools in a “big way,” please contact us. Thanks for your support… we’ll keep you posted.

The Daily News editorial board wrote an editorial about Insideschools’ funding plight today:

 ”The single most valuable independent source of information on New York City public schools is about to go out of business forever. Are we nuts? With advocates raising a hue and cry over giving parents a greater voice in the schools, it is simply unbelievable that no one is rallying to save a Web site called Insideschools.org… Parents, teachers, advocates and officials should support the group in connecting with donors who’ll keep this service going as a trusted and independent help for the school community.” 

Are you able to help us out? Please visit our donation page. And if you, or anyone you know, is able to help Insideschools in a “big way,” please contact us. We hope to be able to keep helping parents navigate the school system by providing independent school news and reviews. Thank you for your support during this difficult time for Insideschools. 

In 2002, Mayor Mike Bloomberg won the right to control New York City public schools for seven years. The state law is due to expire on June 30, and unless the New York State Legislature acts, the mayor will lose much of his ability to direct the school system, including the all-important power to appoint the chancellor and to control votes on the Panel for Educational Policy. As the deadline looms, legislators are vetting different proposals while opponents of mayoral control continue to rally for changes to the existing system.

Prior to mayoral control, public schools were run by a seven-member Board of Education (BOE) typically composed of prominent New Yorkers, some of whom were professional educators and education activists. Each borough president appointed one BOE member, and the mayor appointed the remaining two. Under the current system, a Panel for Educational Policy (PEP) has 13 members, eight appointed by the mayor, and one by each borough president. The PEP members serve at the will of the mayor or the borough presidents who appointed them. The mayor also chooses the chancellor, and all superintendents of the 32 community school districts. There are also 32 local school boards, called Community District Education Councils (CECs) and citywide special education and high school education councils, which are elected by a school’s PTA officials.

The issue has mobilized education stakeholders to testify and rally in support of their point of view. While most educators and school advocates don’t want to return to 2002, many want to tighten the reins on the mayor’s power and restore parents’ role in policy making. What and how much should be controlled by the mayor depends on which mayoral control coalition you speak to, but there is consensus on the need for more parent voice and more transparency about achievement data and Department of Education finances. Below is a round-up of some of the most active advocates on the issue, with a sampling of their recommendations. You can read their full reports and agendas at their websites. (more…)

Kids in foster care from across the city gathered Friday afternoon in the Lewis Auditorium at Hunter College to watch Speak for Yourself, a passionate documentary which describes the challenging lives of New York City foster youth and clarifies their legal rights. The film, produced by Friends of Foster Youth, will be publicly released within the next two weeks.

The film emphasizes ten of the basic rights afforded to foster youth. For example, foster youth can request to go home to their biological parents; they can suggest who should be their foster parent, such as a family member, a friend’s mom, or neighbor; they can fire their attorney; and they cannot be discharged to a homeless shelter at age 21. (more…)

A new report released today says that for the 160,000 students with special needs, educational options and services have not improved much during the past seven years of Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein’s education reforms. Students in self-contained special education settings - classes comprised only of students with special needs - fare the worst, with only a 5 percent high-school graduation rate.  

 The report was released by the ARISE Coalition, an association of 33 different organizations and individuals devoted to New York’s children with special needs.  ARISE was founded by Advocates for Children of New York, Insideschools’ parent organization.

Since the Department of Education is considering reorganizing the special education bureaucracy for the third time since Mayor Bloomberg took control of the system, the specific recommendations for reform included in the report are especially timely. But also of great weigth are the stories along the margins - beside the statistics, recommendations, graphs and charts - of specific families who have struggled to gain the best education for their children. Read the full report - and the poignant stories - here.

In the latest weekly poll, we asked whether you thought there was too much focus on test preparation at your school. The majority of you said yes, with 33 percent reporting “way too much” test prep and 20 percent responding that while there may be too much test preparation, the system, not the school, is to blame. Another 20 percent of respondents wished their school provided more coaching and feel the students were unprepared for the high stakes exams.

Just 26 percent of the respondents felt that their school hit the right balance, with strong enough academics to negate the need for much test prep.

This week, we wonder whether immigrant parents who don’t speak English are included in your school community. A report just released by Advocates for Children, our parent organization, suggests that many non-English speaking parents don’t feel welcome in the city’s public schools. What have you observed in your school community?

Immigrant parents want to participate in their children’s school, but too often experience barriers that make it difficult to do so, according to a 52-page report released today by Advocates for Children of New York.

“There is a common misconception that immigrant parents are not interested in getting involved in school activities, but 80% of immigrant parents we surveyed said they would like to be more involved in their children’s schools,” said Arlen Benjamin-Gomez, a staff attorney in the Immigrant Students’ Rights Project at Advocates for Children, who was quoted in a press release about the report. “The DOE has to address what keeps these parents out of schools and lead a citywide effort to make schools more inclusive of immigrant communities.”

According to the report, Our Children, Our Schools: A Blueprint for Creating Partnerships Between Immigrant Families and New York City Public Schools, parents don’t know how to get involved and are made to feel unwelcome by school personnel. Immigrant parents say their concerns are often not addressed by administrators even when they make the effort to reach out to someone at the school. A few parents say they are active and involved because school staff speak their language and make efforts to include them in school activities.

The report, which surveyed 82 immigrant parents whose children attend New York City public schools and the staff at 16 community organizations, offers 48 recommendations on how to make schools more welcoming. Representatives from these community groups and public school immigrant parents attended a press conference held today by Advocates for Children to share their personal experiences, attesting to the barriers that the report documents.Parents who spoke at the press conference emphasized the need for schools to create parent identification cards for immigrant parents who do not have state-issued ID, one of the recommendations in the report. They acknowledged the need for school security but not to the extent that parents are effectively barred from entering their children’s schools.

The report suggests that all school employees be trained on how to create a welcoming environment for non-English speaking parents who are new to the education system. Additionally at the school level, the report advises that schools educate parents about parent associations and school leadership teams, as well as record phone messages in different languages. On a broader scale, the report advocates for the creation of an Immigrant Family Resource Center in each borough for parents who need assistance communicating with their school or resolving a problem.

The report stresses the importance of collaboration with community organizations that already serve as trusted resources for immigrant families. It suggests that the Department of Education would do well to tap into the knowledge of these organizations in developing resources for parents and in conducting well-planned outreach. As an example, the report notes that turnout for the DOE’s Office of Family Engagement and Advocacy Native Language Forums, which strive to inform parents about school-related issues in eight languages, significantly improved when community organizations were involved in an advisory committee to plan the meetings.

Advocates for Children Executive Director Kim Sweet said, “We’re really pleased with the content of this report, and we believe that it will have a significant impact on forming equal partnerships with immigrant families in the schools.”

-Catherine Man, additional reporting by Cristin Strining, March 18, 2009

The Education Committee of the New York City Council convened a hearing yesterday on the DOE’s nascent reorganization of special education. It’s the third planned reorganization of special ed since Bloomberg-Klein’s Children First initiative and according to Kim Sweet, Executive Director of Advocates for Children (AFC), the structure implemented in 2002 “has been wiped out and rebuilt twice in the past seven years.”

DOE representatives Deputy Chancellor Marcia Lyles, District 75 Superintendent Bonnie Brown and Executive Director for Special Education Initiatives Linda Wernikoff spoke of steady, incremental progress (while acknowledging profound shortfalls, both academic and procedural). Advocates from the United Federation of Teachers, the ARISE coalition, Parents for Inclusive Education (PIE) and AFC, among others, steadily chipped away at the good-news testimony from the DOE, describing problems in communication, transportation, the provision of mandated special services, enrollment, and outright discrimination against children with special needs and their families.

Even as the DOE was promoting one version of reality, advocates proposed another, and council members seemed caught in the middle, trying to understand basic processes — how a child gets evaluated, what is an IEP (individualized education program) — while seeking answers to questions brought by constituents in their districts. No one could deny the basic facts on the ground: Of high-school students with IEPs, fewer than one in five graduate within four years (about one in four graduate after five years). And the IEP “diploma” many students earn essentially functions as a certificate of attendance and confers zero access to post-secondary or career options like college, the military, or technical training, prompting committee chair Robert Jackson to ask, “So why do we call it a diploma?”

The pending review (and likely restructuring) of special education, and its oversight by Garth Harries, troubled many advocates present, who raised pointed questions of political expediency, economic necessity, and Harries’ preparedness for the job. (A lawyer and MBA, Harries has no special education expertise.) Harries’ responsibilities commence next week, according to Lyles. No end date was made public for a report or preliminary recommendations.

No matter how long the process may take, children and families need and deserve ongoing guidance. Families with questions can explore Insideschools resources, DOE information, or call 311 and ask for the Special Education Call Center, which has resolved more than 15,000 special ed questions since its inception in 2007, according to DOE’s Linda Wernikoff.

As the holidays descend in earnest, the time seems ripe to thank our readers for their continued support and steady comments — and to thank the many creative, outspoken voices who add their particular 2c to the Insideschools online community.

Thank you, Marni Goltsman and Toni Bruno, Liz Willen and Jennifer Freeman, for your heartfelt prose over these past months. Your insights have enriched us all - and as 2009 unfurls, we look forward to hearing more of your unique spins on public education in New York City. (Such a simple phrase! Such a complicated reality!)

We’ll be blogging on a rather reduced schedule for the next week or so, but will ramp up our reporting once the new year swings into gear. In the interim, thanks in advance to Lindsey Whitton Christ, who readers will likely hear from while our generous and much-appreciated regulars take a well-earned break.

With every good wish for the holiday season and beyond, we send you our very best.

A worried, back-to-the-1970s fatalism seems the mode du jour: ACS may fall deeper into debt or lose funding, doubts about funding for class-size reduction, and a bleak overall analysis that predicts regression over progress in city schools fill the daily papers.

Against this black canvas, the DOE announced yesterday $7 million for new programs for English language learners — 148,000 students citywide who, in addition to learning math, science and literature, have to (eventually) master English as well. Grants of up to $100,000 will be distributed to 110 city schools; funders include the DOE, the New York City Council, the UFT, and the New York Immigration Coalition Task Force.

All city schools are mandated to support students learning the language, although in practice, efforts vary widely, and outcomes are mixed . Overall, nearly as many ELL students drop out of high school as graduate — 28.9% vs. 30.8%, in 2007 — while former ELL students graduate at rates higher than citywide averages — 70.9% in 2007, vs. 60% citywide — and far fewer, less than 10%, drop out.

It may be just a tiny glimmer, but it’s a welcome glint of hope, just the same.

While some of the Mayor’s closest supporters launched a $20 million PR effort to maintain mayoral control of the city’s schools, additional support for mayoral governance has come from Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum’s office, via her Commission on School Governance, in a report officially released today (and leaked early to the Times). But the Commission’s support doesn’t come without (proposed) strings, aimed at strengthening parent voices in the public-school debate and creating stronger structures for oversight (of the DOE) and independence (of the Panel for Educational Policy, the Mayorally-appointed group that ‘replaced’ the old Board of Education).

The Commission, which included Insideschools founder Clara Hemphill and Advocates for Children director Kim Sweet, recognized that mayoral control brings a ‘buck stops here’ mentality that has improved school funding and collective bargaining efforts and permitted the possibility of change in a “once immovable school system.” But the same strength that focused attention, energy, and dollars on the city’s schools has muted or excluded diverse voices — from education leaders to parents and from school district offices to school leadership teams. Accordingly, the Commission recommends greater checks on “the power of the Mayor” — including appointing PEP members for four-year terms, no longer vulnerable to mayoral ouster — and more opportunity for parent and community voices in the education debate, largely by restoring Community School Districts (dismantled by Bloomberg and Klein and sorely missed by school administrators citywide) and the reinvigoration of Community Education Councils and school leadership teams.

Commission Chair Stephen R. Aiello said that over months of testimony by parents and advocates, consistent themes emerged:  “Meaningful dialogue and participation are not really taking place” in the current structure,  he said.  Restoring the voices of those with  ”something to say about what’s taking place in their community” is a signal goal, noting the still-controversial decisions to close schools imposed by the DOE.   

In a recommendation that seems sure to draw critical heat, the Commission encouraged outside oversight of the DOE by the city’s Independent Budget Office, which “should be given explicit responsibility to report on the performance of the Department of Education.”  According to Aiello, IBO oversight would extend beyond budget, contracts, and bidding questions to issues of testing, student data and research.  “It’s a matter of credibility,” he said, citing apparent contradictions between the city’s stated gains on reading and math scores and flat-lining values on national assessments.  If accountability’s the theme, as Bloomberg-Klein declaim loud and often, it seems sensible that it has to work two ways.  

Sensible’s one thing, Albany’s quite another.  Whether the recommendations become law will be determined by the State Legislature — and influenced, no doubt, by the myriad interest groups that each have a stake in the issue. 

Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum’s office today released survey results on their efforts to reach Family Advocates during the week of August 12 to 15. Guess what? They very nearly struck out, with only about a third of calls answered by actual people, 12 of 32 districts unreachable despite multiple attempts, and a paltry 6 of 63 voicemail messages returned within five business days. The news won’t surprise many parents but may serve as a wake-up call for the Office of Family Engagement and Advocacy, which announced cuts in Family Advocate staffing last month.

Gotbaum’s staffers called all 32 school districts three times — twice during business hours (once in English, once in Spanish) and right after work, between 5 and 6 pm. Of the 96 calls placed, 30 percent yielded an actual human connection. During business hours, a third of calls were answered, as opposed to 3 of the 32 calls placed after 5 pm. Calls in Spanish (32) were answered in 12 instances — but only 7 resulted in substantive, Spanish-language conversations. Granted, mid-August is the deadest of doldrums in New York City, but the DOE was and is still placing students in schools, registering new arrivals, and working in advance of the new school year. Parents have questions year-round; their calls, in any language, shouldn’t go unanswered.

New Yorkers can call the Public Advocate’s schools hotline (212 669-7250) for help with logistics, transportation, and registration information and have a look at Insideschools’ Parent Resources for details on schools, registration, navigating the system and more.

Among the 1.1 million schoolchildren in NYC public schools, 181,000 students with special needs often face unique, daunting, and systemic challenges, and parents of special-needs kids often feel excluded from the mainstream education debate.

To that end, a new coalition (spearheaded by Advocates for Children) has been formed to advocate for special-needs families, share special-ed resources, and raise a collective voice for reform and greater equity in the special-needs community. Visit the ARISE website for more information.

More money woes this week: city funding for pre-K programs run by community groups was cut in half, leading to the overnight evaporation of about 300 seats. Yet Obama accepted the endorsement of the national teachers union (AFT) union, vowing his commitment to “quality, affordable early childhood education for all our children,” and McCain announced his intention to fully fund No Child Left Behind, offer private school vouchers and put tutoring funds directly in the hands of parents. Ambitious plans on all sides, given the current economic climate.

Meanwhile, NYC education bigwigs are going national: Joel Klein is hoping to advise the next president and UFT President Randy Weingarten was elected head of the AFT. She says she’s staying in New York for now (and announcing fresh lawsuits on behalf of city teachers) but just might be grooming a successor. Klein, who claims accountability as his hallmark reform, might want to explain why it apparently took a newspaper article to stop the city school bus system from “losing” parent complaints.

Children’s health came under fresh scrutiny: A new report confirms what parents have known for eons — that America’s active kids morph into sedentary teenagers – and documents health risks that have led others to recommend cholesterol meds for kids. And each successive scandal that the Administration for Childrens Services (ACS) faces tragically impacts the city’s most vulnerable citizens.

Too many teens are stuck in middle school , according to a report released by Advocates for Children. While some kids in the Bronx are apathetic about keeping their neighborhood clean, juvenile offenders are helping restore and reopen classic American diners. And the Times celebrated high school theater geekdom at its best, which seems a lot more wholesome than the current crop of product-infused teen novels. But for now, ditch the screen, shut the book, and get out! It’s summer.

After all the middle-school admissions brouhaha, disturbing reporting on students who can’t get out of the middle grades was released today by the Out of School Youth Coalition, a network of social service and advocacy groups. Some of these ‘overage’ middle-schoolers are 16 or 17 years old — in the seventh or eighth grade.

The DOE, in its wisdom, does not make data publicly available to discern citywide how many older teens are still stuck in middle school. In one survey of nine Bronx middle schools, more than a quarter of the 6,000 students were older than they should be for their grade — due to repeated retentions, disruptions in foster care, and complications in safety transfers, among other factors.

Since 2005, the DOE has developed alternative programs for older, underachieving high school students via its Office of Multiple Pathways to Graduation. But comparable program options for younger students who’ve fallen behind are sorely lacking. It’s hard to imagine the daily difficulty and frustration of being 17 in a sea of 13-year-olds; could we make it any harder for these struggling kids?

Do you love Insideschools.org? Want to help make it better?

We are searching for parents, students, teachers or others who would like to explore and answer questions about the redesigned Insideschools.org.

Commitment is approximately one hour with some users in the office, but the majority testing from home. Contact Catherine Man if interested. Please let her know how much experience you’ve had with Insideschools.

Insideschools’ parent organization, Advocates for Children of New York, announced the settlement of a lawsuit filed in 2003 against the DOE on behalf of parents with students with disabilities. The lawsuit contended that the DOE was not always following through on the (legally required) orders of independent hearing officers who had been called in to settle disputes over students’ special ed. services. The DOE will now follow a series of benchmarks when dealing with these cases and be monitored by an independent auditor.

If this situation sounds familiar, and the DOE has failed to act on the orders of an independent hearing officer in your child’s case, you may be entitled to compensation in the form of a voucher. The vouchers - which are for as much as $15,000 - can be used for services like tutoring, career and vocational training, assistive technology, speech therapy, occupational therapy, and other educational services. Insideschool’s article on the lawsuit, the Advocates for Children press release and the lawsuit website have more information and claim forms.

The blog’s hitting the big-time! This morning at 11 am, Insideschools.org’s Project Manager Pamela Wheaton will be on the air with WNYC’s Brian Lehrer, DOE officials, and others to talk about the g+ t admissions process this year.

Parents and commenters, your thoughts and questions made the difference; don’t take the pressure off now. Listen and call in if you can: 646 829.3729.

Don’t be shy — speak up!

A midday protest on the steps of Tweed organized by Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum and City Council member Bill deBlasio drew a few dozen parents and DOE representatives David Cantor and Andy Jacob, who fielded questions but had few concrete answers to offer.

“The scale of the problem is misrepresented by the amount of noise,” said Cantor, as parents of barraged him with questions. “Everything will be resolved within the next couple of days.” That means a seat in a pre-K program, although not necessarily at the first-choice school, for siblings of already-enrolled students.

DeBlasio and others challenged the DOE’s count of 200 families affected. “The issues this raises for parents are huge,” he said, citing the thousands parents may have to pay for private pre-K, and the fact that many programs are already full for fall. Frustrated parents want to know what to tell their kids, and worry aloud about plans to centralize next year’s kindergarten admissions process.

DOE reps promise that all legitimate sibling priority enrollments will be honored (though again, not necessarily at the first-choice school), and that all calls and emails to OSEPO will be returned (not what we’re hearing). But the issue, while immediately pressing for hundreds of city families, has a much larger import.

“We know pre-K is an essential educational tool,” says UFT president Randi Weingarten. “They’ve done with this what they did with high school enrollment, and with middle school enrollment — they’ve taken all human judgment out of the equation. They dismiss the nature of neighborhoods, they dismiss the nature of human needs, for what a computer tells them to do. It’s a computer, instead of common sense.”

And for the record, even DOE staff aren’t immune from the vagaries of the system: Cantor’s 4-year-old will attend their local public-school kindergarten in the fall — but, he said, “even my kid didn’t get into pre-K” last year.

It’s hard to imagine how much more time the DOE will require to review the pre-K applications that have caused so much turmoil. But as there’s no official word there beyond ‘we’re working on it and will let parents know,’ I don’t have news of substance to report.

For those seeking political recourse, Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum will hold a press conference at Tweed tomorrow, Wednesday, at 12:45pm; Council Member Bill DeBlasio of Brooklyn will speak around 1p. (We’ll be there, too.)

Questions abound in regard to potentially unclaimed seats — those offered to families who, for reasons of distance, convenience or sheer frustration with the DOE morass, will make other pre-K choices. Because the process was a citywide effort this year, schools don’t have official wait lists, and there is no “trading up,” as one poster had hoped, from a spot at a second- or third-choice school if a place at the first-choice school opens. If your child was offered a seat, you can accept or decline — no wheeling-dealing.

Families of children who have not been offered a seat can participate in a second round of pre-K admissions, which opens (no typo) June 23d, just three days before school lets out for summer. Not all schools will have empty seats, but this is how the seats that aren’t spoken for will be filled.

As of this writing, you have to go to an OSEPO borough office to get the paperwork and a directory of schools. Amazingly, the powers that be haven’t yet published a deadline for second-round applications — I’m working on it.

In a week filled with budget cut showdowns, botched pre-K admissions letters, and anticipation of middle school and G&T placement decisions, I’m pretty sure I’m just about the last thing on your minds. But that won’t stop me from trying to insert myself there.

At the end of May last year, the Insideschools blog was still just an idea. A year later, its archive contains more than 525 posts(!) ranging from meeting coverage to analysis of articles and reports to help understanding the DOE’s confusing policy changes. In my three years at Insideschools, I’ve enjoyed nothing more than writing this blog and interacting with the parents, teachers, policy wonks, and school officials who read it.

Today is my last day at Insideschools. After today, I’ll be reading this blog, but I won’t be contributing to it. I’m confident that I’m leaving the blog in more-than-capable hands — Helen Zelon, who has contributed coverage of the budget cuts already, will post regularly through the summer, and you’ll soon see some other new names; let Insideschools know if you’d like to be one of them — but still, I will miss it.

When I see you around the city and the Internet, say hello. And until then, know that I am rooting for you all in this crazy, mixed-up school system.

A new iteration of Urban Baby launched yesterday. At first, the new site had no schools board, but after hours of posts from frustrated parents, NY Schools became an option by which to “filter” all posts — but using that option doesn’t recreate the beloved schools board of Urban Baby past. Naturally, UB users aren’t happy. I’m with the user who says, “Honestly, maybe we should just defect to insideschools.” We’ve got message boards (and, of course, this blog) where parents can talk about schools. And we don’t have any plans to sell out to CNet!

I want to let you know that it’s now easier than ever to comment on this blog — you no longer have to be a registered Google user. Check out the latest news and also the archives, which go back to last June — there’s plenty here that could benefit from your comments!

More details are emerging on the mayor’s new plan to “end social promotion” in 8th grade. According to the New York Times, the 8th grade rules are “stricter” than those already in place in grades 3, 5, and 7 because students will have to pass all of their core subjects as well as score a 2 or higher on state tests. Last year, the Times reports, about a quarter of 8th graders failed to meet these standards.

No one’s suggesting that a quarter of 8th graders will really have to stay in middle school, but as I noted yesterday, summer schools are sure to expand in 2009, when the first set of kids affected by the new policy finishes 8th grade. The Daily News notes that Chancellor Klein plans to head off “mass flunkings” by putting in place stronger intervention strategies earlier in middle school but without new funds to support those strategies, it’s not clear how schools with lots of struggling students will be able to offer intensive support to their weakest students and at the same time scale up their advanced offerings, as a policy announced last summer is requiring them to do.

Advocates for Children Director Kim Sweet told the Daily News, “We’re very concerned that kids are being stuck in the eighth grade who can’t meet the requirements to graduate currently and are already over-age and unable to get into high school.” The new policy could exacerbate that problem.

Fortunately, the Times has some small consolation for advocates and over-age kids, noting, “Officials said it was unlikely that eighth graders who had already been held back twice would be retained a third time.”

For a thorough and thoughtful rundown of the issues surrounding the progress reports, check out a new article in City Limits Weekly by regular Insideschools contributor Helen Zelon. Using the City Council hearing on the progress reports as a starting point, Zelon takes a look at how parents use the grades, the relationship between the grades and school closures, and the role of parents in the DOE’s reforms generally. (Here’s a hint: it’s not meaningful.)

After her staff called almost 100 phone numbers at district offices and received responses to fewer than half, Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum released a report yesterday saying what many observers have long known: the DOE’s reorganization has left parents in the dark. “The start of the school year can be a stressful time for parents and students. The DOE makes matters worse by providing very little information and support,” Gotbaum said in a New York Post article.

Gotbaum has set up an education hotline for parents to find out information that district offices should be making available. Right now, the hotline is just getting started, but it should be fully up and running soon. Call 212-669-7250, and let Insideschools know what you find out!

As always, you can call also Advocates for Children’s helpline at 1-866-427-6033 with your education issues.

There’s been some discussion on our forum about the city’s plan to lease most of the playing fields on Randall’s Island to private schools instead of making them available to East Harlem public schools. The deal seems unfair both because it deprives public schools of access to public parks for the next 20 years and because the city made the deal without seeking input from residents of the affected communities. Now, the Times reports that a group of East Harlem residents are suing the city over the deal — they’re seeking to have the deal canceled because they weren’t consulted before it was made. They’re being represented by Norman Siegel, the former head of the New York Civil Liberties Union who also led the unsuccessful cell phone ban lawsuit. No matter what happens with this lawsuit, we hope it reminds the city that New Yorkers notice when they are excluded from discussions about their neighborhoods, their children, and their rights.