Two recent Times stories bookend the issue of parent involvement. At the first Mayoral Control hearing, held by members of the State Asssembly last week, an engaged and occasionally boisterous crowd held officials for hours as they asked questions and raised grievances. (Detailed coverage on the...
We asked readers to weigh in on test-prep for children who will take the OLSAT exam as part of the gifted and talented application process. More than half of the poll's respondents, 56%, supported preparing their young children for G&T testing, although as many people were enthusiastic (28%)...
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...
Today at noon, Mayor Bloomberg will give his annual budget address-- the last before the November election. The mayor's budget is expected to include 23,000 job cuts, nearly a billion in new taxes, and other "doomsday"strategies to stanch a $4 billion budget gap. (Slim consolation in the Times'...
This afternoon, the DOE announced that 26 schools will take occupancy on 22 new or improved sites in Sept. 2009, including six entirely new school buildings. Part of the Mayor's $13 billion, 5-year capital plan, these new, expanded and relocated schools will add more than 14,000 seats for New...
About 27,000 eighth graders and their parents will learn next Thursday, Feb. 5, whether they will be offered seats at the city's eight specialized high schools, based on the results of the SHSAT, or specialized high school admissions test. The test, administered in October and November, is long,...
Parents who initially opted out of gifted and talented testing but have reconsidered now have an opportunity to sign their child up for testing: The DOE just announced an extension in the G&T deadline. Requests for Testing forms will be accepted at public schools for students currently...
Brooks was in the bathtub last week, and here's what I overheard: "You don't have to be worried, cow. Your friends are here. Look: pig is here, horse is here, duck is here. If you cry, someone will give you hug. See? Horse wants to give you a hug. Mmmmm. There. Don't you feel better?" In the old...
Lauren Thomas' post last weekinspired a flurry of weekend responses. Many tackled serious philosophical quandaries, like asking what happens to those "left behind" when the brightest students are culled into special classes -- and challenging the merits of mixed-ability class groupings,...
I always know when the New York State tests are coming up, and not because I hire tutors or visit the many websites that offer practice tests and tips, including the state education department. It starts with my younger son's sniffles. They become more pronounced in the days before the test. A...
Over the past week or so, we and others have written about the DOE's Garth Harries. He's in charge of the Portfolio office, which controls the closure and opening of schools, charter school development, and Career and Technical Education programs, among other large-scale projects. Harries has...
Q. My daughter is a high school junior. We want to start visiting colleges this year, and we want to know of programs or colleges offering scholarships to minority students (we are Haitian-Americans). We have heard of a program called "Posse" do you know anything about this? Also, my daughter...
More than 3,000 public school students from all over the city converged at the Harlem Armory this morning to watch the inauguration. The event was hosted by Democracy Prep Charter School (check back soon for their new review), but students from 34 schools spanning all grade levels waved flags,...
Earlier this week, DOE announced a new data-management system for special education studentsin the city's schools. Hard on its heels comes news, thanks to GothamSchools' Philissa Cramer, that DOE wunderkind Garth Harrieswill oversee an evaluation and, it's thought, eventual revamp of special...
Budget cuts proposed by Gov. David Paterson threaten to trim the Department of Education's Office of Library Services a whopping 40 percent, according to Library Services Director Barbara Stripling. "These cuts are so huge we can't get our head around it. I don't know what we're going to do,"...
TheDOEannounced today a 5-year, $55 million contract to electronically track records for students with special needs, both within the public schools and for a minority of students in private or parochial schools who receive city-funded special ed services. (The bid was awarded to a Virginia...
Insideschools has learned that a sixth-grade student was mugged yesterday afternoon at J.J. Bryne Park in Park Slope, the city park that essentially serves as MS 51's de facto schoolyard, lunchroom, social hub and outdoor gym. The boy, who was chatting with friends after school, was approached by...
In a city like ours, with so many immigrant families and tens of thousands of students who are themselves first-generation citizens or born overseas, English Language Learners have long comprised a sizeable fraction of the city's student body. Now, a national project published by Education Week...
Middle-school families across New York City now join the ranks of high-school applicants and their parents: The waiting game is in full flower, with everyone on tenterhooks, hoping for good news from their schools of choice. The deadline for middle school applications was this past Friday,...
Public charter schools straddle an uncertain divide -- with public money, they often serve targeted constituencies, from the consistently underserved to families looking for cultural connection and context. What the charters characterize as focus -- on a particular community, ideal of academic...
Apparently neither rain, nor snow, nor sleet, nor hail shall keep potentially-gifted and talented tots from their testing. The Department of Education has announced that despite the foreboding weather forecast (there is a 90 percent chance that 1-3" of snow will fall over the 5 boroughs...
Yesterday, the DOE announced the phaseout and eventual closure of Bayard Rustin High School in Chelsea. No new 9th graders will be permitted to enroll in September 2009. The news landed hard on the school's new principal and faculty, and it left me wondering about the 8th graders and families...
<!--StartFragment-->To the extent that parents' voices are represented in the New York City education system these days, Community Education Councils are charged with representing them at the school district level. The Community Education Council of District 3 passed a resolution last June...
As students poured out of Bayard Rustin High School for Humanities this afternoon, most of them were discussing the news that principal Nancy Amling had announced during fourth period: the Department of Education is phasing out the large, comprehensive high school beginning this June. No new...
The Globe today highlights an MIT/Harvard study of Boston-area charter and 'pilot' schools, in which charter schools steadily outperformed both the pilot schools -- essentially, charter-style schools run by the city with union contracts for teachers and staff -- and Boston's traditional public...
Dear Judy, We are in the process of applying for middle schools in District 15. Almost every school we have looked at says (1) they are highly selective with many more applicants than spots and (2) will only consider kids who rank them first or second. Are the middle schools (unlike the high...
While thousands of fifth graders will hand in their middle school applications on Friday, approximately 2,000 sixth graders will sit for the Hunter High School admissions exam. A recent Times article showed how seriously some of those students have been preparing for the exam: taking up coffee,...
Imminent budget cuts to the city's schools will hamstring some programs, and simply erase others, like after-school activities and non-academic enrichments, depending on how individual principals parse out the cuts. But even in this arid economic climate, creative New York City teachers find ways...
Before New Years Eve celebrations begin, we wanted to point out a New York Times storythat you may have missed while away from your computers during last week's holiday rush. The premier high school for the arts in the city (and perhaps nation), Fiorello H. La Guardia High School of Music &...
Astory in today's[Times](http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/26/education/26fifth.html?r=1&ref=todayspaper)_ heralded the season of middle school admissions mania, since - according to the newly standardized timeline - the application deadline has been moved up this year to Jan. 9. Parents in the...
Last Thursday in District 3, the Department of Education and parents attempted haltingly to hold a conversation about what schools should replace the closing MS44 and PS241. I say “attempted” because parents mostly wanted to vent —about how small gains at those schools were not recognized, and...
Parents of prospective kindergarteners, take note: The admissions process will begin in January 2009. For details, read the whole storyhere. Parents new to the process might also want to have a look at our guide to elementary school enrollment; there's a lot to learn, and not just for the tots.
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 overallanalysis that predicts regression over progress in city schools fill the daily papers. Against this black canvas, the...
It isn’t easy getting information from a 13-year-old, which is one reason I’m at least mildly curious about the interviews my son had as part of the torturous high school application process. “So how did it go?’’ I asked, after he at least managed to find the high schools in question on his own...
Governor Paterson'sbleak budget previewproposes slicing hundreds of millions of dollars slated for education -- cuts that will inevitably affect the lives New York City's studentsand teachers in the classrooms. While City Council leadership and union heads gird their loins for budget...
Beginning this evening and continuing through the week, DOE representatives will host Middle School Choice Information Sessions,to help parents and students manage the middle school application process. Workshops are brief, from 6:30 to 7:30 pm; clickhere for information on middle schoolsin your...
In a story that's not made many headlines at all, Education Week reports on a new rule by the US Department of Education that permits parents of students with special needs to opt outof classes and programs designed to support their kids, in favor of mainstream, general education. It's not clear...
Some semi-heartening news this week: American students seem to be improving in math, according to the world’s largest survey of math and science achievement, the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (Timss). Since the 1990s, Asian countries like Singapore and Japan, have...
In a good economy, college grads go to work; in a bad economy, they go to grad school. So goes the long-held thinking -- but it seems that the current crop of incipient grads has other ideas, if GRE (for Graduate Record Examination) applications are any guide. Early projections anticipated over...
At a time of escalating economic contraction -- and when the City Council, which not so long ago fought potential education budget cuts to the penny, now proposes $ 75 million in DOE trims-- parents and educators understandably wonder what will become of non-academic but vital arts education in...
This week was filled with bad news for schools and students, but on the same day that the DOE announced it would close three schools, nine other city schools were lauded in US News as among the nation’s best. The news magazine also interviewed Chancellor Klein, who has just wrapped up his tour...
While working with DOE to develop last month’s resolution, District 3 CEC members heard that MS44 was on a list of schools under consideration for closure, but that no final decision had yet been made. Members of the Community Education Council toured the MS44 building just a few weeks ago, to...
News that the DOE will close three schoolsarrived with a thud; the schools will close in June, and open, reconfigured (or reimagined entirely) in September. The schools on the present chopping block include CES 90 in the Bronx, MS44in Manhattan, and PS 225in Queens, a pre-K-8 school that will...
Both the Times and the Washington Posttoday offer dire news for college-bound families, based on Measuring Up, the annual report from the National Center for Public Policy in Higher Education(complete report/pdf here). Escalating costs outstrip family incomes -- average family income's risen by...
With thanks to Andy Jacob of DOE for the information below, here are answers to some questions from readers about the kindergarten admissions process, both general-ed and gifted and talented. Siblings. For nonzoned schools like Midtown West, the Tribeca Learning Centerand the Manhattan School...
If anyone tells you the high school process in New York City is relatively painless, don’t believe them. Would you believe someone who told you they breezed through high school and loved every moment of it? Essays, interviews, test and portfolio preparation and auditions eat up nights and...
The DOE's repeating the 'hybrid' middle-school admissions process it piloted last year -- applications and calendars centralized by DOE but individual schools, programs, and districts setting entrance criteria and making actual admissions decisions and offers -- and middle-school fairs commence...
The blogsare abuzzwith comments and critique on the NY TImes Sunday magazine cover storyabout surrogacy; while it's far from this blog to comment on issues of class, privilege, and maternity, one telling fact tucked into the story deserves outspoken mention. Here's the sentence that made me sit...
The Community Education Council of District 3 officially released its resolution to address overcrowding in District 3 today. The buck is now passed to the Department of Education, which ultimately controls what actions will be taken. (DOE cannot redraw zone lines without CEC approval, but all...
My 13-year-old son turned to me on Sunday morning with the first expression of genuine interest – and fear – since the search for a New York City public high school began this fall. He made this solemn declaration: “What happens today,” he said, as we raced out the door for his audition at the...
Good news for teachers this week: most educators who participated in the experimental bonus program last year have elected to continue with the program this year, and the Department of Education agreed to a deal that will encourage principals to hire excessed teachers, despite the budget cuts....
