Parents & Class Size Matters file legal challenge to DOE plan to place students in online classes without parent consent

  On June 12, Class Size Matters and four parents launched a legal challenge to the DOE guidance on online learning.  See our press release, the legal papers, and articles in the Daily News and Politico.  Listen also to my interview on last night's Talk out of School, with attorney Laura Barbieri and two of the plaintiffs, teacher and parent Amanda Vender, and Tanesha Grant, parent and founder of Parents Supporting Parents NY.

While the state regulations approved by the Board of Regents on April 28, 2024 clearly require parent consent before a student can be assigned to an online class, the DOE guidance sent to school administrators two weeks later says that while schools should try to obtain parent consent, they can "program students for virtual/blended courses in STARS in anticipation of getting back Parent Opt-In Forms…. The student may remain in the virtual/blended course in accordance with the school’s existing add/drop policies or until the parent declines to have their student participate in the virtual/blended course, whichever occurs first."  

Clearly, this is not parent consent but parent opt-out, a much weaker procedure that is non-compliant with the regulations.  And as several parent plaintiffs pointed out in their affidavits, given how haphazard and inconsistent communication with families is at many schools, many parents may not even become aware to the  fact that their children have been assigned to online classes until it is too late to pull them out.

According to the UFT contract, teachers also have to consent to teaching a remote class before they can be assigned to one, but many are apparently unaware of this fact. Instead, at least some principals are making these decisions without conferring with either teachers or parents.  For example, a high school teacher told me that his principal  applied to DOE to  hold all classes remotely on Fridays, without polling him or other teachers first to see if they had agreed to this.

I urge all parents to immediately ask their principal if there is a plan to hold online classes next year, and if so, if they will obtain parental consent before assigning their children to these classes. Parents should also contact your School Leadership Team to see if they've discussed this matter, and if online learning is being adopted, ask if that is part of the school's Comprehensive Education Plan that all SLT members must consent to.  Teachers should also ask these questions, and  understand their right to refuse to teach online classes, according to the UFT contract.

As is obvious to nearly everyone, online learning during the pandemic seriously failed the great majority of students.  Many fell behind academically, became disengaged, and suffered mental health challenges as a result.  The fact that DOE has proposed to expand online learning as part of their plan to comply with the class size law rather than building enough additional classroom space is especially unacceptable - as remote classes will likely undermine any of the benefits that smaller classes would otherwise be expected to provide.

Yet during his campaign,  more than a year before the class size law was passed, Eric Adams proposed expanding online learning in February 2021, an idea which met with much controversy and even some ridicule.  While both he and the Chancellor now admit that no other large district in the nation is considering such a move, they point to this as a matter of pride, rather than acknowledging that perhaps others learned important lessons from the pandemic that they are resistant to learning for some reason.  

When Adams announced the new UFT contract in 2023 that allowed for the expansion of online learning, he said “Look, you all aren’t going to appreciate what I’m doing until I’m done. You are going to look back and say this guy was just ahead of what other people want. This is New York – we lead from the front...”   

Chancellor Banks proclaimed that this is "not just a reimagined experience for kids, it's a reimagined experience for teachers as well... when you want to really focus on how to make the profession respected at an even higher level, you have to engage in new and creative ways for teachers to even be able to teach. And I think that this is 21st-century thinking. We're the first major school district in the nation that is even taking this on."

If Adams and Banks are stubbornly resistant to understanding how virtual learning risks severely undermining the quality of teaching and learning in NYC schools, it must then be the responsibility of parents, educators and  advocates to do what we can to stop this runaway train.

Amanda Vender, Queens parent and teacher, critiques the vagueness of the DOE class size plan & their intention to expand online learning.

Here is another comment from last night's Queens hearing on the DOE's class size plan, pointing out how vague it is, this one provided by Amanda Vender, Queens parent and teacher.  This critique was echoed by many of the other parents and teachers who spoke. 

 

Amanda also pointed out how the city loses families each year to private schools because of the large class sizes in our public schools, and blasts the DOE's intention to using online learning instead of providing sufficient space by building more schools.  This idea of expanding virtual instruction is vehemently opposed by most NYC parents, especially given its failure during the pandemic.

 

I am a public school ENL [English as a New Language] teacher and public school parent in Queens. My children are currently in classes with sizes of 30 and up. The classes where I teach are smaller than that, but ELLs [English Language Learners] need much smaller classes for teachers to be effective with this special population that is brand new to English and in a new country. I have excellent student teachers from Queens College ready to take jobs. Yet the principals I’ve talked to are completely in the dark about how the class size law will affect their school.

 

I am outraged that our class sizes in NYC are still 15-30% larger than classes in other parts of the state. Every year I hear parents of means talk about enrolling their child in a private school for lower class sizes. It’s not right. New York is a very wealthy state and now we have the money to give our kids the attention with the class sizes they deserve. 

 

The money from the State is there. Lower class sizes. There is no better investment than this. Hire teachers, build new schools. Put the $6.8 billion you plan to spend on new jails into building new schools. It is appalling that the City appears to still be resisting lowering our class sizes decades since the NY Court of Appeals found the City was not providing a sound basic education for our kids. 

 

Your plan isn’t specific enough. Please use SMART goals like we teach our students. You need to show which schools and how many classes will meet the new sizes. Your plan needs to be more specific about recruiting, supporting and retaining teachers. We need to see benchmarks to meet projected needs. 

 

Lastly, we saw the dismal effect of virtual learning necessitated by the pandemic. Most students experienced terrible academic and social outcomes with virtual learning. Why does the DOE class size reduction plan include more virtual learning? It almost seems like the City wants to set up our students to be academically unprepared. Enough already. Do what NY State and the public is asking. Follow the law. Make a real plan with SMART goals.

 

Amanda Vender, parent and ENL teacher, explains in her C4E comments why putting extra teachers in the classroom is NOT as beneficial as reducing class size

The last borough hearing for the DOE's proposed Contract for Excellence's "plan" is tonight, Thursday,
August 5 at 6:30 PM at Isaac Newton Middle School for Math & Science, 260 Pleasant Avenue, New York, NY 10029, 2nd floor auditorium.  You can send in your comment via email as well to ContractsForExcellence@schools.nyc.gov.  

Below are comments sent in by Amanda Vender, Queens parent and ENL teacher, who points out from her professional experience how putting extra teachers in the classroom does not provide the same benefits as a smaller class size.  While the DOE's proposed plan allocates nearly $100 million to put extra teachers in a classroom for inclusion and NEST classes,  not a single penny is targeted specifically towards class size reduction.

To Whom It May Concern:

I am a public school ENL teacher and public school parent in Queens. I am concerned that our class sizes in NYC are 15-30% larger than classes in other parts of the state. That’s why I’m so pleased to know that we now have $530 million additional aid from the State to lower class size, concurrent with the CFE legal decision. I urge you to ensure these funds are used as they are intended, to lower class size.

As an ENL teacher who has taught both push-in and stand-alone classes, I can confirm what the research shows: having a second teacher in a room is nowhere near as good as a smaller class size. As you can imagine, only one teacher can speak to the whole class at a time. During that time, the second teacher can’t do much other than help direct students’ attention to the teacher speaking, or wait around. It is not a good use of our professionals’ time. During group work and independent work, both teachers can circulate in the room and offer support or work with targeted groups, but students’ ability to focus in a classroom of 30 students is much less than compared to a classroom of 15 or 20 students.

I teach high school students who are new immigrants and have interrupted formal education. (SIFE) A portion of our ninth graders have not been in school for several years. They have been out fishing or doing agricultural work full-time in their home country. They are not used to sitting at a desk and engaging with print text. While we have excellent curriculum resources provided by CUNY Grad Center and the NYS DOE to quickly develop these students’ literacy skills in English, we cannot achieve this without small class size.

My own children attend IS145, across the street from where we’re meeting tonight. I observe that class sizes there are always at the maximum, 30 students. 90% of students there are Latinx, 90% are low-income and many students are English Language Learners. The school is one of few middle schools in the area with a dual-language bilingual program. How can children learn a second or third language effectively in a class of 30 students, especially in a school that remains intensely segregated like IS145, where so many students speak Spanish at home? Students need exposure to English and opportunities to practice speaking that cannot be achieved in a class of 30 students. 

A large body of research confirms my statements. I urge you to use the funds to mandate smaller class size immediately.

Thank you,

Amanda Vender

Parent in District 30

ENL teacher in District 24