This afternoon, the first debate on education among the
mayoral candidates took place, hosted by Manhattan Media.
The candidates included two Bills, one Tom,
one John and one Christine, absent Scott Stringer, given his
announcement today that he will run for City Comptroller instead.
The consensus among most of the observers I talked to afterwards is
that the candidates did not distinguish themselves much from one another on the hot-button
issues. Also, despite the best efforts
of the moderators, Lindsey Christ of NY! And Philissa Cramer of GothamSchools, who
tried to get them to be as specific as possible, given the limited time frame, there
was a lot of ambiguity in their responses.
Below are the questions and answers, as best as I could record them:
Question: Would you select a Chancellor who is an educator, and would
that person be from inside the DOE or outside the system?
Bill Thompson: Would choose an educator and someone outside
the system; the “best of the best.”
Bill De Blasio: An educator, with a screening process
that includes the public (how?).
Tom Allon: Would choose someone like the following individuals:
former Deputy Chancellor Eric Nadelstern, Jennifer Raab, head of Hunter
College, Linda Darling-Hammond professor at Stanford, or John White (formerly
of DOE and now the controversial Louisiana education chief) .
John Liu:
An educator, possibly from within the DOE.
Christine Quinn: Would rule no one out, there are many great
people inside DOE including principals, network people and Superintendents. Jennifer Raab is a “fascinating” example, who
was not an educator when appointed head of Hunter but has done an excellent
job.
Question: The next mayor will probably have to negotiate a new
contract with the UFT; would you push for merit pay and/or limit tenure?
DeBlasio: I
want to compliment Cory Booker, who got an excellent contract for Newark
teachers [I don’t think Booker had much to do with it]; he put incentives into
system to get teachers to teach in high need subject areas like science. As to tenure, there is “merit” in new state
system; it’s a “wtep in the right direction”; he would partner with the union
on improving the system.
Allon: For merit pay, would establish a new “career”
track; gives example of New American Academy which pays master teachers more.
50% attrition rates of teachers in 5 years a disgrace; he would weaken tenure
(how that would improve attrition unclear).
Liu: There’s
a reason for tenure: teacher jobs were used by pols to give jobs to
cronies etc.; tenure should be protected.
Merit pay; depends how you measure “merit”; in the current system there’s
a 40-50% margin of error; first you need an evaluation system that makes sense.
Thompson: NYC
tried merit pay before; it hasn’t worked, but he wouldn’t take it off the
table.
Quinn: Newark
contract should be model for nation; it was developed in a collaborative process
; gives extra pay to teachers to teach in tougher schools; would not support
score-based merit pay; teachers do not go into profession for money. (So why
would financial incentives work to attract them to high needs schools?) Tenure: agrees with new state system that if
you have a poor evaluation two years in a row, with mentoring and support, you
should lose tenure. She would push to implement this system in NYC.
Question #3: What
one thing would you do to improve school system?
Liu: Would
hire more guidance counselors, so instead of 1 per 100 students.
Thompson: Moratorium
on school closings.
Allon: No
more standardized testing in 1st through 5th grade (unfortunately there
are federal and state mandates requiring testing in 3-5th grades); make foreign language mandatory in
elementary schools and require at least two years classroom experience for all teachers.
De Blasio: fund
Universal preK and more afterschool programs.
Quinn: stop
vilifying teachers, tone down rhetoric, reduce test prep, intervene in struggling
schools to get them help they need before closing.
Question #4: Have schools gotten better or worse under
Bloomberg?
De Blasio: Progress has “stalled”; we need “reset” and cannot continue status quo.
Allon: Schools
slightly better, but we need to properly train teachers, need at least 3 years of
clinical practice;
Liu: Not
sure, some schools better, some worse, hard to measure; we need to reduce
emphasis on high-stakes testing; stop co-locations and listen to parents more,
make sure students really ready for college.
Thompson: Mayoral control has not worked; there’s been an excessive focus on test-taking.
Quinn: tThere’s
been progress, but not enough; need to bring parents in real ways; too much
test prep, should be more emphasis on college completion.
Question #5: Would
you give charters free rent in public school buildings?
Quinn: I would
not stop this practice, though all sides think current system is broken, including
charter proponents. Process needs to be more “transparent.”
De Blasio: Opinions
of parents ignored and system undemocratic; there needs to be more parent
engagement, if there’s a bad plan should be changed.
Thompson: System
of inequities, students at public school feel they're 2nd class citizens;
should be done differently, but not against charter co-locations per se.
Allon: Charters
are public schools, principals should work together as they do in Brandeis building,
which has four high schools, including Frank McCourt HS which he helped start.
Liu: Would
call for moratorium on all school closings and co-locations; co-locations cause too much
friction and are destructive to educational process.
DeBlasio (in response to Allon); McCourt
HS good example of harmful co-location; successful HS model whose growth was limited
by incursion of charter school (Upper West Success).
Allon True,
they originally wanted 800 seats for McCourt, but DOE limited enrollment to
400, DOE still stuck on small school model that Gates started but has now
discredited. Administrative costs for all these small schools are sky high, paying
for principal/AP for every schools.
Quinn: Lots
of examples of principals working together well in co-located schools; we need
to invest in more leadership training of principals.
Question: class
size reduction is the top priority of parents; is it a priority of yours; and if so, how would you pay for it ?
Liu: Yes, it’s a priority; but there are space issues;
teachers are not fully utilized; we can afford to do this without spending a
lot more money.
Allon: Impossible to
enact this citywide; he would prioritize 1st and 2nd
grade; and in language and science instruction.
Thompson: Most important in K-3rd grades; in other
grades, could provide more time on task through extended day or Saturday
school.
De Blasio: Parents want this intensely; we should fund it by
doing away with all the consultants; reiterates support for preK.
Quinn: Focus on class
size in preK-3rd and ELA
classes. We might find savings in the
contracts budget, to redirect to classroom but in order to implement we need long
term capital planning to make sure there’s space; engage with Census and Dept
of Health in this process.
Question: When
mayoral control up for vote in 2015, would you go to Albany to change system or
keep as is?
De Blasio: We need to keep mayoral control but a
more democratic version, including giving CEC’s a meaningful role in
co-locations and closings like Community Boards have now(CBs also only have advisory
powers). The PEP should be place of real debate instead of Kangaroo court.
Quinn: We need municipal control, DOE treated
like real city agency, under control of City Council and Mayor. That way the Council could
legislate, will full budgetary knowledge and authority and parents can go to
Councilmember for help. [Currently, DOE
is NOT a city agency like any other but primarily under control of state
legislature instead.]
Allon: Mayoral
control “red herring” not important; we need right teachers in classroom.
Liu: I supported mayoral control because I thought
it meant accountability, but we didn’t
get that. We need to modify so there is
more accountability [but how he didn’t say].
Thompson: Doesn’t
matter so much as long as there is a good mayor, he would “tweak” it and bring district
Superintendents back as before.
Summary:
All of the candidates had their high points: Liu came out most strongly vs. co-locations
and school closings; and expressed the most skepticism about theunreliable teacher evaluation system.
Chris Quinn’s notion of municipal control would be a substantial improvement
to our governance system, providing real checks and balances, if the
Legislature would agree to give more power to the City Council. Allon seemed to understand how flawed and
expensive the small school initiative has been, though his understanding of
some other areas seemed weak (testing and John White). De Blasio was most emphatic that the governance
system needs to be changed to become more democratic, and that the PEP must
change as well, but put forward few specifics as to how this should be
accomplished. Thompson was clear about
the need to have a moratorium on school closings and giving back authority
to the district Superintendents, but was weak on charters and how to reform mayoral control.
In the end, they all were somewhat disappointing in similar ways: they
all inveighed against the clear overemphasis on testing and test prep, but
offered no concrete proposals on how to mitigate this, especially as many of
these policies are now coming from state and federal level. They all said that the system had to change
so that parents would be “listened” to more, but none had specific proposals to
institutionalize the parent voice. All
said class size was important but most would limit their efforts to smaller
classes in the early grades, and none seemed to understand how many economic
benefits and cost savings would come from this reform. None seemed to realize how necessary class
size reduction will be towards improving our schools, including for our middle
and high students if the words “equity” and “college and career ready” are ever
to become more than buzzwords.
Hopefully, as time goes on, all the candidates will start to
develop a deeper understanding and more clearly defined policy positions over
the six months. In any case, it will be up
to us as parents, educators and advocates to make sure that they do.
