Did your school receive class size funding for next year, or was it rejected? Please let us know!

 

The DOE has still not released the list of the 746 schools receiving funding next year for class size reduction, nor the total amount directed towards that purpose. So we have posted a VERY BRIEF survey for parents, teachers, and school administrators to fill out, asking if your school applied for these funds and whether they will be getting them, along with a few other relevant questions. The survey is here: https://forms.gle/SiQBQZtKETb5iNpR9 All responses will remain fully confidential unless you say otherwise.

Please fill it out if you know the answers, and if not, forward it to someone on your School Leadership Team who would likely know –your PTA president, chapter leader, or Principal.

I found the photo above on Instagram. The SLT at Brooklyn Arbor celebrated the fact that they will be getting four additional classroom teachers and a music teacher next year by ordering a special pizza. Feel free to share with me any reactions or celebrations your school may have had in learning the news, or your disappointment if not.

Thanks so much, Leonie

Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters
leonie@classsizematters.org
www.classsizematters.org
Follow on twitter @leoniehaimson

Yet another expensive high-tech school opening in NYC - now with the promise of AI learning

Wow. A branch of the Alpha school is opening up as K-8 private school in downtown NYC at 180 Maiden Lane in the fall in which students will be taught academic subjects for only two  hours per day via an AI platform at a cost of $65K; what a bargain! 

More on this teacher-less chain of schools, founded by a MacKenzie Price, a Texas businesswoman with no previous experience in education, who claims that her model will  "ensure mastery of the material 2-5x faster than traditional method".  Peter Greene reported on this woman and her chain of schools when she applied to open up a cyber online charter school, called Unbound Academic Institute Charter School, in Pennsylvania. 

The Pennsylvania Department of Education wisely rejected the school, explaining that "the school received no letters of support, was not insured in any capacity, and pointed to issues relating to how the school’s address in Lancaster, a coworking space, lacked certain facility requirements."

The rejection letter also pointed out that "The artificial intelligence instructional model being proposed by this school is untested and fails to demonstrate how the tools, methods and providers would ensure alignment to Pennsylvania academic standards,” an understatement if I've ever heard one.

As Fred Aebli, a professor at Penn State pointed out, "at the end of it all, teaching is by far one of the most human things that we do, especially in K through 12. They’re (kids are) not just learning reading, writing and arithmetic, they’re learning people skills, and life skills.”  

Perhaps that's why the proposed daily schedule for the private school in NYC includes an afternoon session devoted to teach "Limitless life skills", such as riding a bike.

But haven't we heard this story before?  Remember the Altschools, just a few years ago?  The much hyped, high-tech, for-profit private school chain opened with four schools in the Bay Area and in NYC, starting in 2013, and yet closed their doors just a few years later,  after losing as much as $174 million in venture capital funds from Mark Zuckerberg & other tech mavens.  

Or Summit Learning , another multi- million dollar effort by Zuckerberg, that put kids on computers for much of the school day, with inadequate materials and little human teaching.   

After a number of exposes, in the NY Times, the NY Post and elsewhere,  showing a huge amount of student and parent discontent with the program, its founder, Diane Taverner, left Summit for other ventures, and the organization renamed itself "Gradient Learning,"   

In its recent materials, its operators claim that their program is based on "Whole Student teaching," whatever that means,  and that "we've been diligently listening to your feedback and working closely with educators to identify areas to enrich."  How many schools have adopted and stuck with the program, versus the countless number that have abandoned it,  is unclear.

With the rise of AI, however, we should expect the number of schools and programs claiming great results using this technology will only grow.  How much of that will be based on grift and hype, and how much on actual learning will be critical for all of us who care about the future of education to study and carefully dissect.  One thing for sure, the Alpha School won't be a shining exemplar of AI's potential.

Spending Sunday with Tim Walz on his birthday & the wonderful Network for Public Education conference

The annual conference of Network for Public Education, on whose board I sit, was held last weekend in Columbus, Ohio.  It was terrific as usual, with wonderful speeches and incisive and illuminating workshops and panel discussions on how to strengthen our public schools and protect them from the depredations of budget cuts, privatization, and censorship.

But the highlight for me and many others was Tim Walz' inspiring keynote address on Sunday afternoon, where he spoke about how we have to fight Trump's attempt to dismantle and defund our public schools. An article about his speech is here, though the article underestimates the numbers in the audience and the response: there were actually about 350 people there, including state legislators, Commissioners of Education, educators, parents, and advocates, who were ecstatic to hear him speak.

Walz was introduced by Randi Weingarten, who was introduced by Diane Ravitch.  Diane approvingly noted how earlier, Randi had been called "the most dangerous person in the world" by Mike Pompeo.

Randi said that we cannot give into the "autocrats who want to bully people into silence," and asked what does it mean when the President "wants to destroy the only federal agency devoted to education."

She noted it was Tim Walz' birthday, and after he stepped up to the dais, she presented him with a cake and we all sang him Happy Birthday.

Both Tim Walz and Randi hailed the protest rallies and marches the had occurred nationwide the day before, demanding that Trump and Musk take their "Hands Off" our democracy and our schools.  Tim Walz assured us that we aren't overreacting, since "The road to authoritarianism is littered to people saying you’re overreacting." 

He added: "People say that they’re not into politics but I say that  politics are into you. When I’m asked who’s leading the Democratic Party I say they’re in the streets like yesterday."  

Walz pointed out that the takeover of our public schools is being engineered by the oligarchs -- though "we shouldn't call them oligarchs but greedy bastards."  He also said that the middle class was built in the US by our public education system and the unions.

Of course, I did get a selfie with Walz -- and when I introduced myself, I said I was from Class Size Matters.  As a long time teacher, he immediately responded, "yes it does!"  I added that he was the best thing to come out of the 2024 election, and he replied, "You're too kind."  As opposed to so many politicians, he truly comes off as the warmest, most humble human being -- and funny besides.

Earlier that day,  I had been a presenter at a workshop on the risks of AI in the classroom, along with Cassie Creswell from Illinois Families for Public Schools, and co-chair along with me of the Parent Coalition for Student Privacy.  Concluding the workshop with eclat was the retired teacher, brilliant blogger and education guru Peter Greene.  Our presentation is below.

My comments at the School Construction Board meeting and how you can help

 

March 22, 2025

On Thursday morning, I spoke at the School Construction Authority board meeting, down in the bowels of Tweed, explaining how they have failed to fulfill their legal and ethical obligations to provide schools with the space necessary to comply with the class size law, and the requirements of the Public Authorities Law.

Seven people sat around a table, only two of them SCA board members, going over multi-million dollar contracts and appointments.  

After I spoke, Deputy Chancellor Dan Weisberg responded dismissively to my comments, while the other board member, Peter McCree, said nothing. Though the law requires three members at all times there have only been two since August 2023, when Larraine Grillo resigned, as the NY Post reported back in September. [More on this here.] Nor did the President of the SCA, Nina Kubota say anything in response.   My comments in full are below. I sent them a copy of my comments afterwards but have so far received no reply.

On Wednesday night, the Panel for Educational Policy is scheduled to vote on the five-year capital plan, which funds less than half the 70,000 seats which the SCA says are necessary for schools to be able to comply with class size law. Moreover, fewer than half of those seats funded are even specified as to district, subdistrict or grade level, which violates at least two laws requiring SCA transparency. Finally, the SCA board itself has failed to adhere to basic governance requirements, established in the NY Public Authorities Law.

I urge you to send this message to the Panel members before the vote – deadline Tuesday night March 25, 2025. First, you can check if your child attends one of the 500 schools that do not have space for smaller classes, according to the DOE’s own estimates. Then send them the email; and put the name of your school into the subject line and edit it any way you like. Instructions and a template are posted here. Please copy me at info@classsizematters.org

More on what the DOE and SCA should be doing but are not to make space for smaller classes was detailed in our NYC Council budget testimony on March 13.

thanks Leonie

Comments at the School Construction Authority Board meeting 3/20/25

Hi, my name is Leonie Haimson and I am the executive director of Class Size Matters.

While Cora Liu of the SCA testified  at the preliminary budget hearing last week that 70,000 more school seats would be needed to comply with the class size law, passed by the State Legislature in June of 2022, there are only about 33,000 seats funded in the five-year capital plan, and fewer than 20,000 are expected to be completed by September 2028,  the deadline in law. 

According to the DOE, there are nearly 500 schools without the space currently lower class sizes to the mandated levels that enroll nearly half of all students, but no apparent plan on how they will be provided with the space to comply.

·       Moreover, nearly half of all the new seats that are funded in the five-year plan are still unspecified as to district, subdistrict or grade level.  Under no previous administration has the SCA capital plan refused to specify where schools by district and grade level. Not only is this lack of transparency unfortunate, given the need to accelerate school construction to meet the timeline in the class size law, but it also appears to violate two laws.

·       First, the state class size law itself requires DOE to submit an “annual capital plan for school construction and leasing to show how many classrooms will be added in each year and in which schools and districts to achieve the class size targets.”

·       Second, the lack of transparency also violates Local Law 167, passed by the Council in 2018, requiring the SCA to explain where seats are needed by district, subdistrict and grade level, as well as the demographic data and methodology used to make these projections.  Yet Instead of becoming more transparent after this law was passed, the capital plan became even more opaque.

·       We also have ongoing concerns with the School Construction Authority’s lax governance. As reported in the NY Post in September, the SCA Board has been comprised of only two members since August 2023, though three members are required at all times by the state law that established the SCA in 1998: “The authority shall be governed by and its powers shall be exercised by a board of trustees consisting of three members….Each appointed member shall continue in office until a successor has been appointed and qualifies.”  

·       According to the latest report of the NY State Authorities Budget Office, the SCA Board also lacks a Governance Committee, a Finance Committee, as well as official policies for salary and compensation, time and attendance. Nor does it have a Whistleblower Protection policy. According to this NYS Authorities Budget Office, all of these are required by the NYS Public Authorities Law.

We urge you to reform the Board’s structure  and policies according to the requirements in the law, and to revamp the capital plan, so that it clearly shows where and when school seats will be created to allow the city to meet the Sept. 2028 deadline in the class size  law.

Thank you for listening;  I will email you a copy of these comments and hope for a point by point response.