Your independent guide to NYC public schools

Our colleagues at GothamSchools have a nifty new feature built to assess the impact of the coming budget cuts:  If you know what's on the chopping block at your child's school, chime in and help paint an e-portrait of what 5 percent cuts look and feel like across the city.

A big budget hurdle for charter schools was just lowered.

"Despite a prohibition on using state funds to build charter schools, the city has quietly expanded available funding for charter school construction to as much as $3.8 billion," writes the New York Post. The extra money is part of a provision in the capital construction plan.

To date, charter schools have not received public funds for facility expenses. Many charter schools in New York City have been able to survive because Mayor Bloomberg has allowed them to use Department of Education buildings rent-free. Charter school advocates have long lobbied for the ban on state funds to be lifted, since depending on who controls the school system next, charter schools could have to start paying steep city rent prices.

Last week, we asked you what you would cut from your school's budget if you had to make the difficult decision to let something, or someone, go. The most respondents, 39 percent, said that they would cut non-teaching staff, such as office workers and school aides. Twenty-two percent said that they would cut afterschool tutoring, remediation, and test prep. Letting go of arts and other specialty teachers was the least popular option, with only seven percent of respondents choosing it. Click here to see the full results.

Under Mayor Bloomberg, every school is graded annually, but this week, we want you to grade the mayor. Since the mayoral control law sunsets on June 30, school governance is being vigorously debated. Many argue that Bloomberg has staked his legacy on education - how do you think he has performed?

Last week, we asked if you had a plan for saving for college. The most respondents (35 percent) said that they would have to rely on scholarships or more moderately priced schools. Another 18 percent said “We’ve saved, but the tumultuous markets have taken a big bite out of our funds.” Almost 30 percent of respondents would like some help with their planning – 14 percent of them feel that they have no extra money to save and 13 percent said that they have tried to put a little aside but need guidance. A small fraction of respondents – 5 percent – will have family help with tuition bills, and 18 percent have been saving and feel that they are on the right track.

This week, we are wondering what you would cut from your child’s school if you were in charge of slimming down the 2009/2010 budget. Some schools will have to cut up to 5 percent of their budget, and principals will have to make some very difficult decisions. As always, we welcome your comments.

Today, Chancellor Joel Klein previewed budget cuts at the city's schools in a message sent to all principals. The news is good or bad, depending on your point of view -- and your school's fiscal status, he said.

"In aggregate," Klein wrote, "the total dollars in school budgets will be reduced by 3.8 percent."

In specifics, which he described at a briefing today at Tweed, more than 40 percent of schools may experience cuts of 4.9 percent, while others, such as the approximately 80 schools with large Title I populations, might "get a slight bump" in funding, Klein said.

Schools that managed to save and "roll over" funds from Fiscal Year 09, which ends on June 30th, will experience less severe cuts than those who spent their budgets down, said Klein.

"To be clear: if you rolled over money, the good news is you will be able to spend that money. We are not cutting the money you rolled forward," he wrote in his letter to principals. Schools were cautioned to save money from this year to plan for the next, although the rate and ability to save varies from school to school. The cut is designed to save approximately $318 million in the coming fiscal year, in addition to the $100 million in midyear cuts.

Principals will be responsible for making decisions about whether to cut programs -- Saturday school, after school programming and professional development were three options the Chancellor mentioned -- or to trim staff.

"Most schools will be able to find significant portions of this in OTPS [Other Than Personnel Services]." But school leaders are free to lay off staff, "if an aide or a para that they feel is more cuttable than a program," Klein explained.

At LaGuardia High School, our student blogger writes that upper-level math courses will be snipped.

Specific budgets for each school will be presented to principals tomorrow, and according to the DOE, posted to the DOE website.

The city's budget woes will force a ban on new teacher hiring, reports the Times (today and last week), the News, and others. The teacher's union has high praise for the new strategy, which aims to place 'excessed' teachers, often languishing in DOE rubber rooms, back into classrooms citywide. Multi-million dollar savings are anticipated, based on projections by the New Teacher Project, which met with significant UFT derision only last year. (The worrisome projected attrition in the profession, highlighted in an April report, seems to have been forgotten.)

Chancellor Klein and Mayor Bloomberg have long beseeched the 'best and brightest' at American colleges and universities to consider teaching as a profession. Education Secretary Arne Duncan and President Barack Obama have often said the same, and consistently support efforts to elevate the status of teaching as a competitive, desirable career choice -- as it is in many world cultures whose students outshine their U.S. counterparts.

What's it to be? Can the city be pro-teacher and anti-hiring? Can city leaders credibly encourage talented young professionals and committed career-changers to consider teaching -- and then say, 'sorry, not this year'? It appears the answer is, "Yes, they can -- and yes, they have," although the net result, for the city's students, teachers, and schools, remains uncertain. Not to mention, a very large gamble.

Clarification:   Teachers who will be hired for the coming school year are mainly those who were assigned to the reserve pool of teachers whose schools have been closed, reconfigured, or otherwise restructured so that their jobs are no longer open.  Educators assigned to the "rubber rooms" face disciplinary evaluations before they may return to the classroom.  

Last week, a  number of LaGuardia juniors found out that their math tracks are being abruptly ended. As a junior in trigonometry this year, I was expected to take pre-calculus in the fall, and take the Math B Regents Exam in January.  Now, because of budget cuts, seniors will not be allowed to take pre-calc. To learn the semester of content and prepare for the Math B exam, tutoring will be offered over the summer.  This is not really an option for people (like me) who have summer jobs.  Also, the only  math classes being offered to seniors next year are Advanced Placement classes.  For the juniors are in pre-calc this year, the situation may not be much better. Calculus may be cut next year, too, giving these juniors no way to complete their math track.  A letter is being sent to all colleges explaining the sudden death of advanced, non-AP math at LaGuardia.

When I expressed my concern, the assistant principal of math told me, "Write to the Chancellor and Mayor and ask them to stop taking our money away in the middle of the year." I told her I already had, and that was the end of the conversation. But this conversation is far from over. My school has been forced to make hard choices because of circumstances outside its control. LaGuardia has done its best to maintain its unique dual mission to provide students with both good arts and academic educations. But no school should have to make the choice to end a curriculum like advanced math mid-year, without preparation or prior warning.

If, as the Chancellor and the Mayor insist, cuts must be made, they should not come from the classroom and force schools to make decisions like this one. How can these leaders say they're committed to rigor and higher standards in education, and then limit funding for motivated math students?

Perhaps the cuts could come from the testing budget. It seems that tests are multiplying faster than rabbits;  kids as young as kindergarten are now being tested. Perhaps the needed savings can come from the production and administration of school Progress Reports, which are often inaccurate representations of a school.

The pattern is scary.  Mid-year crunches are resulting in the loss of teachers and classes, which are the last things that ought to be taken away.  If “students” were a budget item, we'd probably be the next to go.

The Post, the Times cityroom blog, and GothamSchools all highlight Comptroller (and mayoral hopeful) William Thompson's testimony on outsized Department of Education budget overruns, which he outlined at a crowded, consistently adversarial City Council hearing yesterday afternoon. At issue, in addition to overspending, is the DOE's position as an agency that's neither bound by the local laws that govern other city agencies nor beholden to state governance: The current mayoral control law effectively sets the DOE outside both structures.

Also under close Council scrutiny were no-bid contracts, like a $170 million contract awarded because the contractor was already engaged, hired by private money -- "the intertia was there," according to DOE's Chief Procurement Officer David Ross -- and book-purchasing contracts that deny local minority- and women-owned businesses and reward multi-million-dollar Midwestern publishing giants Ingram and BookSource. (See this NY1 clip for more.)

No vote was taken at this initial hearing, but many Council members expressed a desire to bring the DOE to heel, under the contract and procurement rules that govern all other city agencies, as part of a possible revision of Mayoral Control.

Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer weighs in on the mayoral control debate, with a report that urges strengthening Community Education Councils (CECs) and increasing their independence, by transferring their training and supervision from the Department of Education's Office of Family Engagement to the offices of the city's five borough presidents. Stringer says his proposal reflects the "desire to give parents more of a voice in the education decisions that affect their children" -- and that the move could mean savings of up to $5 million, if the work now assigned to OFEA were undertaken by borough president office staff.

From Brooklyn, City Council member (and public school parent) Bill de Blasio charges $57.3 million in overspending by the DOE, on "unnecessary tests, courier services, and an expanded press operation, with a seven-person 'Truth Squad'" -- press monitors who follow DOE coverage. (Gotham Schools has details here, including $10,000 a-school-day fees for courier services.) De Blasio illustrates his charges with a nifty chart, comparing moneys spent with an 'average' teacher's salary of $55,000 a year. While it's a far stretch to think that DOE would abandon its data management system ARIS or dramatically scale back accountability, their cost together would support almost 700 teachers, a calculus many parents might prefer.

Chancellor Klein threatens layoffs for up to 2000 teachers; de Blasio identifies expenditures that could fund more than 1000 teaching positions. Perhaps these savings are in his sights as a contender for the post of Public Advocate -- or in Stringer's field of vision as he contemplates a 2010 Senate run. It's spring; high season for budding campaigns -- and budget fights.

Today in Albany, the New York State Education Department issued its annual list of schools and districts in need of improvement (SINIs and DINIs, in education jargon.) Because these schools receive Title I funds, they are accountable to No Child Left Behind benchmarks, and face consequences that don't apply to schools in more prosperous communities.

The good news: Of 543 current SINI schools statewide, the number newly listed, 62, is less than half of the 123 schools newly listed last year. Statewide, 85 schools were removed from the list, for making adequate yearly progress, including 44 schools in New York City. The percentage of schools considered "in good standing" in New York State has risen from 84 percent to 85.4 percent (with schools slated for closure omitted from the calculations). In New York City, the percentage of schools "in good standing" rose from 69 percent last year to 71.1 percent this year.

Most of the city schools new to the state's SINI list are elementary and middle schools, many of which serve large populations of non-English speakers and students with special needs, both real challenges to test-score 'progress. ' Of the six high schools added to the 2009 list, five are new small schools created during Klein's small-school initiative. None of the six high schools received failing grades on their 2009 Progress Reports; in fact, two are too young to have progress reports published at all.

Look here for more on the how and why of state accountability; here, for consequences for failing schools, and on the links that follow for the state's district-by-district list of all schools that need improvement and of this year's new additions.