Correction requested from NY Times on high-stakes admissions policy of specialized HS; five of eight schools under the Mayor's control

This morning I sent the below letter to the editors of the NY Times, which had made an error in an article on the admissions policy of the eight specialized high schools in NYC, claiming that in the case of all of these schools, it would take an "act of the State Legislature" to alter their policy of basing admissions on a single high-stakes exam.

The truth is that in five of these schools, all it would take is a decision of the Chancellor to remove their designation as specialized high schools and a vote of the Panel for Educational Polcy, which has a super-majority of mayoral appointees and rarely if ever overrules his wishes. 

Yet in my experience, it is far harder to get a correction in the NY Times than in any other media outlet -- not because the paper is error-free, but because of an apparent attitude on the part of the editors that if the Times says it, it must be true. Note the experience I had trying to get the Times to correct their stories promulgating the myth of  rising  student achievement during the Bloomberg years -- prominently displayed on the front page while Bloomberg was trying to renew Mayoral control and overturn term limits.

These articles consistently refused to report on the contradictory data provided by the more-reliable NAEP scores -- or the fact that the state test scores were wildly inflated, a fact long confirmed by the reporting of bloggers and every other major media outlet, including the New York Post and Daily News.  Though I never got a correction in that case, my attempt and the ensuing controversy was reported in the Village Voice by Wayne Barrett.

As I subsequently wrote on my blog, "Two days after the Times article ran, the NY State Senate voted to renew mayoral control without any checks and balances, essentially allowing Bloomberg to retain his stranglehold over the schools.  The "paper of record" could not have done a better job at burying the story that DOE's gains were illusory than if they had actually tried."

The Times only conceded that there was state test score inflation years later, after NYSED and the Commissioner admitted the truth of what had been common knowledge by anyone paying attention over the previous three years.   Our subsequent analysis of NAEP scores shows during the Bloomberg years, NYC came out second to last among large cities in student achievement gains, when the scores are disaggregated by racial and economic status.

Or note the way in which a gullible reporter for the NY Times  Magazine section delivered the DOE's myth of rising test scores even after the state test score bubble burst -- by reporting figures of a rise in test scores derived by a fraudulent graph that Klein and DOE produced, re-arranging the cut scores to where they had been before as though inflation had never occurred.  In that case, after two weeks, I got a correction of a sort -- but only after another Times reporter interceded to say I was right.  Even  then, the wording of the correction was so confusing that no one reading it could understand what it said.

It once took six months for my husband, a scientist, to get the NY Times to correct a clear scientific error about acid rain- and he had to marshal many other scientists to weigh in.  Even then he had to go over the heads of the departmental editor to the Managing Editor for a correction.

Why is this important in this case?  As pointed out in the NYC Kids PAC report card, while running for Mayor Bill de Blasio promised to “make sure that all children, regardless of SES and race/ethnicity have access to our city’s selective and specialized high schools.”  The administration recently  announced a new initiative that is unlikely to have this effect -- by expanding a test prep program that even now, enrolls a minority of black and Latino students.

By neglecting to mention that the Mayor could change the admissions policy at will of five of these schools, the paper of record is letting him off the hook -- just as the Times let the previous Mayor off the hook when he expanded the use of these high stakes exams.  These eight schools are the only public schools in the country to base admissions on a single high stakes exam and enroll a steadily diminishing number of black and Latino children.  Moreover, the test has never been analyzed for racial or gender bias, and also has allows the admission of fewer high-achieving girls as well as student of color.

The "paper of record" also falsely reported big improvements in achievement, when the evidence pointed otherwise, bolstering Bloomberg's ability to renew Mayoral control and be re-elected to a third term.  Let's see if the editors are any more responsive this time!

To: nytnews@nytimes.com

The NY Times article entitled “New York City to Help Blacks and Hispanics Attend Elite High Schools,” June 8, 2016, says the following:

"There are eight specialized high schools in the city, like Stuyvesant and Brooklyn Technical High School, that admit students based solely on their performance on a single assessment, the Specialized High School Admissions Test. ....The city cannot change the admissions criterion at these schools; that would require an act of the State Legislature.”

Actually, the state law specifically mandates the admissions process of only three of these schools: Stuyvesant, Brooklyn Tech, and Bronx Science.  The six other specialized high schools were put in that category by Joel Klein when he was Chancellor, and all it would take to change their admissions policy would be a decision by the current Chancellor and a vote of the Panel for Educational Policy to undesignated them as specialized high schools.

The six specialized schools that are not named in state law are: the HS for Math, Science and Engineering at City College; the HS for American Studies at Lehman College; Queens HS for Sciences at York College, Brooklyn Latin and Staten Island Tech. 

See the discussion of this issue here:   http://www.gothamgazette.com/index.php/government/5392-the-history-of-new-york-citys-special-high-schools-timeline

“Although the City has no control over the test only mandate for Stuyvesant, Bronx Science and Brooklyn Technical High Schools, it does have the authority to designate and un-designate specialized status for the five newer high schools that were established during Michael Bloomberg's tenure as mayor.” [Actually, Staten Island Tech is not a new school and its more holistic admissions policy was changed by Joel Klein.]

As the Gotham Gazette article points out, for each of the others, “As a newer specialized high school and not one of the original three, the PEP has the authority to change its admission policy."

Or as state law 2590-H puts it, “The special high schools shall include the present schools known as:

 the Bronx High School of Science,  Stuyvesant  High  School,  Brooklyn  Technical  High  School,  Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music and  the Arts in the borough of Manhattan, and such further schools which the  city board may designate from time to time.”  See http://law.onecle.com/new-york/education/EDN02590-H_2590-H.html

Clearly, it would NOT take “an act of the State Legislature,” as your article claimed, to change the admissions process of these six schools. Please make a correction as soon as possible.

Thanks, 

Leonie Haimson

Executive Director
Class Size Matters

Do Korean students agree with Amanda Ripley about their educational system?

The NY Times has a review today on the front page of the Book Review--and a featured podcast --  of a new book called "Smartest Kids in the World" by New America Foundation fellow Amanda Ripley.  The review was written by another New America Foundation fellow Annie Murphy Paul. While through twitter, Paul says that she disclosed this connection to the NY Times book editors, they went ahead anyway in assigning her the review (and podcast.)

@leoniehaimson @NYTimes All potential conflicts of interest were disclosed before the review was assigned.
— Annie Murphy Paul (@anniemurphypaul) August 24, 2013

This violation of acceptable journalistic standards should be protested to the NY Times Public Editor Margaret Sullivan at public@nytimes.com.

Unsurprisingly, Murphy Paul has written a rave review of a book with a highly questionable thesis: that the South Korean educational system, in which students sleep in class because they have spent so many hours after school in expensive "cram schools" that families spend nearly 20 percent of their disposable income paying for -- and which causes huge stress on kids, is better than the US system because this strenuous competition makes them stronger and more able to succeed in a global economy.

I guess she doesn't  count all those Korean families who choose to uproot themselves and move here to escape the pressures of their educational system.  Or the fact that youth suicide rates are extremely high, attributed largely to academic stress -- so much so that suicide is the leading cause of death for South Koreans age 15-29. Here is an excerpt from Murphy Paul's NYT review:

Ripley is cleareyed [sic] about the serious drawbacks of this system: “In Korea, the hamster wheel created as many problems as it solved.” Still, if she had to choose between “the hamster wheel and the moon bounce that characterized many schools in the United States,” she would reluctantly pick the hamster wheel: “It was relentless and excessive, yes, but it also felt more honest. Kids in hamster-wheel countries knew what it felt like to grapple with complex ideas and think outside their comfort zone; they understood the value of persistence. They knew what it felt like to fail, work harder and do better. They were prepared for the modern world.” Not so American students, who are eased through high school only to discover, too late, that they lack the knowledge and skill to compete in the global economy.

Really?  Is this the best way to be prepare students for the modern world?    

Check out the photographs below of South Korean students, who were asked by Fulbright teaching assistants to comment on their lives. 

And let us know in the comment section below if you agree with Ripley that the South Korean school system is superior to ours. [credit photos:Buzzfeed]. 

New York Times editors sadly return to cheerleading Bloomberg's status quo

Today the NY Times editors returned to their status quo ante position when it comes to the city’s public schools, and sternly warned the mayoral candidates to stick to the dreadful Bloomberg dysfunctional and autocratic policies of school closings and privatization.

Much of the editorial, entitled “A New Education Mayor,” reads like it was written by City Hall PR machine, without any reference to reality: “He swept away a byzantine bureaucracy that had defeated his predecessors and created clear lines of authority.”

Nothing could be more byzantine – and without any clear lines of authority -- than the inexplicable networks that have replaced the district structure.

“Mr. Bloomberg’s policy of closing large, failing schools and replacing them with smaller schools is unpopular with teachers, many of whom have to find jobs elsewhere in the system. And some adults have emotional ties to a school, however terrible it has become.”

This is totally dismissive of the terrible impact school closures have on communities and the children in these schools. 

The editorial is similarly dense about the damaging impact of charter co-locations:

“In a few extreme cases, critics say, the regular school students are treated like second-class citizens in a building that once belonged to them.”

A few extreme cases, critics say? The loss of classrooms, art rooms, access to library and gym – and the inequitable conditions that result -- are all too common among co-located schools.

This editorial is a huge contrast with the far more accurate May 19 editorial that clearly recognized the failure of the Bloomberg policies and criticized administration figures who complained that some of the mayoral candidates wanted to take a different tack, called “Education, Vision and the Mayor’s Race.”

Here’s what that earlier editorial said about school closures, less than two months ago:

“Yes, Mr. Bloomberg has shown disdain for consultation, as in his rush to close underperforming schools without the full and meaningful involvement of affected communities. The system needs to strengthen neighborhoods’ connection to schools and reconnect with parents who feel shut out.”

And here’s what it said about the awful co-locations:

“And while charter schools can be a path to excellence, they can also cause problems. Shoehorning them into existing school buildings over local objections can alienate parents and reinforce among students a harmful sense of being separate and unequal.”

But my favorite sentence in the earlier editorial was this:

“But after 12 years, this mayor’s ideas are due for a counterargument. The critiques the candidates are offering hardly shock the conscience, and their complaints about the Bloomberg administration can be heard from teachers and parents in any school in the city.”

Exactly.  The fact that the New York Times editorial board, which had consistently ignored the protests and discontent of parents and the evident damage that Bloomberg had done to our schools, and had now appeared to awaken from its somnolence and emerge from its insulated fortress, made me hope that the situation had improved.  I speculated that perhaps there was now a Times editorial writer who actually knew a NYC public school parent, or even had a child in a city public school herself.

No such luck. Inadvertently or not, this earlier editorial has now been omitted from the list of Times education opinion pieces here.

What explains this schizophrenia? Was Brent Staples, the Times education “expert” and reliable Bloomberg ally, on vacation when the May editorial was written? Will we see any more trenchant education critiques from the Times before the election?  Sadly, this prospect now seems unlikely.

The city's desperate attack on the NAACP following their lawsuit to block the closings of 19 schools

Yesterday, the UFT, the NAACP, the Manhattan and Brooklyn Borough Presidents, city councilmembers, state legislators, and two Community Education Council presidents all joined to together in a lawsuit to block the DOE's plan to close 19 schools.

The lawsuit states that the DOE failed to comply with the public process outlined in the new governance law, and that its Educational Impact Statements were woefully inadequate, points we have made repeatedly on the blog and in our official comments to the DOE. (Here is the memo of law; here is the notice of petition and affidavits from the two CEC Presidents.)

The best coverage of the lawsuit was from NY1, whose education reporter, Lindsey Christ, continues to excel. See below.



Unbelievably, the NY Times did not run any story about the lawsuit, though it carried the news on its blog (Teachers' Union and NAACP Sue to Stop School Closings). The lack of judgment on the part of the Times editors never ceases to amaze.

Meanwhile the NY Post has a twofer, in their effort to undermine the credibility of the NAACP for joining the suit; a predictably misleading oped from Dennis Walcott and a predictably nasty editorial: The NAACP in the schoolhouse door. The Post's own news coverage on the lawsuit runs only eight lines: NAACP, UFT in school suit.

Methinks the city and its toadies on the Post doth protest too much.

Really, who are NYers going to trust about the effects of these destructive policies on the city's neediest kids, the NAACP or Rupert Murdoch?

The Leadership Academy: the real deal?

Last week the Aspiring Principals Program of the New York City Leadership Academy, made headlines. On August 24, a NYU press release announced:

“Public elementary and middle schools in New York City led by ‘Aspiring Principals Program’-trained principals have achieved comparable or higher rates of student improvement than schools led by other new principals ... These results were obtained even though APP-trained principals were more likely to be placed in chronically low-performing schools.”

The New York Times chimed in: “Graduates of a program designed to inculcate school principals with unconventional thinking have gone on to help drive up English test scores even though the graduates were often placed at schools with histories of academic failure.” The article went on to explain that the APP graduates helped increase English Language Arts scores at elementary and middle schools “at a faster pace than new principals with more traditional résumés”; while in math the APP principals made progress, but “at a pace no better than their peers.”

The report

What did this report actually say? Written by Sean P. Corcoran, Amy Ellen Schwartz, and Meryle Weinstein of NYU’s Institute for Education and Social Policy, it compared the performance of schools under the leadership of graduates from the Aspiring Principals Program (APP) with that of schools under other new principals.

Both groups had to have been placed as new principals and to have remained in their positions for three years. Of the 147 graduates in the 2004 and 2005 APP cohorts, 88 (60 percent) met the inclusion criteria. 371 non-APP principals met the criteria; of these, 334 were in schools with comparable grade configurations. So there were 88 APP principals and 334 comparison principals in the study.

The schools in the two categories were significantly different. Compared to other new principals, APP principals tended to be placed in lower-performing schools and schools trending downward in ELA and math. There were also demographic and geographic differences.

The study used two types of comparison: (a) a straightforward comparison of average achievement in both types of schools and (b) a regression analysis (controlling for various school and student characteristics). It was the regression analysis that suggested an APP edge in ELA (but not for math) for elementary and middle schools.

The findings

The study found that test scores at schools in both groups improved over the period of the study in terms of test scores– but not as much as schools in the rest of the city. More specifically, the regression analysis indicated that the ELA standardized scores of APP elementary and middle schools were relatively stable, compared to schools headed by new principals who were not APP graduates. In math, APP elementary and middle schools fared slightly worse than comparison schools in relation to the city, but the differences were not statistically significant.

At the high school level (not mentioned in the NYU press release or NYT article), the differences between APP and comparison schools were “minor and inconclusive.”

Unanswered questions

There are many questions that the study did not address. Only 88 out of 147 graduates in the 2004-2005 and 2005-2006 cohorts met the inclusion criteria. More than 18 percent of APP graduates were never placed as principals at all. The rest stayed in their positions for fewer than three years.

Is this a high or low number? The authors wrote that they did not have comparative mobility information for the non-APP principals, but they presumably could have reported the average attrition rate for New York City principals overall.

Also, the study only analyzed test score data – which alone are insufficient to fully evaluate a school’s performance. Wasn’t there other data that could have been examined? What about the parent and teacher surveys at APP-headed schools compared to schools run by other new principals?

Though the study compared the size of the schools for both cohorts (APP graduates on average headed smaller schools) they did not compare class sizes – or other school-level conditions that could have contributed to the relative performance of both groups.

Most intriguing is the finding that the relative test scores at both sets of schools continued to decline compared to the rising achievement of schools citywide, but schools headed by APP principals declined less –at least in terms of their ELA results:

“... relative student test performance falls modestly in the years following the installation of a new principal, in both APP and comparison schools…..we find a statistically significant negative relationship between new principals and achievement in both mathematics and ELA.”

It was only after doing a regression analysis, by controlling for various factors (including student background), that they found that the relative performance of APP schools was relatively stable while the comparison schools continued to decline. See this graph:

Thus, the reigning philosophy of the Klein administration – that new leaders properly trained in the methods propounded by the Leadership Academy will spark significant improvements in low-performing schools does not seem to hold true. Instead, these appointees may stabilize what otherwise would be expected to be continued decline resulting from a new principal.

As a way to deal with ongoing attrition and fill positions in elementary and middle schools, the Leadership Academy might be said to be “promising”. But as a way to “turn around” schools it does not seem to be promising at all.

Unmentioned in any of the news articles was the fact that the research organization Mathematica had originally been commissioned by DOE to do an in-depth, multi-year study of the Leadership Academy. Yet after several years of analysis, this study was cancelled by DOE, just months before the results were supposed to be released. What Mathematica might have been discovered about the program and its graduates will probably never be known.

For another close look at this study, see Aaron Pallas’ critique at Gotham Schools.

Diane Ravitch's oped: a wake-up call for democracy?

Patrick already posted a link to Diane Ravitch's terrific oped in the NY Times, and described the way in which it convincingly disputes the Bloomberg administration's claims of having significantly improved student achievement.

Diane also eloquently points out how the autocracy that currently prevails in NYC under the name of mayoral control is contrary to our entire concept of democracy:

....no mayor has exercised such unlimited power over the public schools as Mr. Bloomberg. Previous mayors respected the independence of the board members they appointed. The present version of the board, the Panel on Education Policy, serves at the pleasure of the mayor and rubber-stamps the policies and spending practices of the Department of Education, which is run by Mayor Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein.

....Not every school problem can be solved by changes in governance. But to establish accountability, transparency and the legitimacy that comes with public participation, the Legislature should act promptly to restore public oversight of public education. As we all learned in civics class, checks and balances are vital to democracy.

Also see this further exploration of many of the themes in her piece in the Daily Kos.

How long before the elite in this city become aware of the abuses and lies inherent in this administration's dictatorial reign over our schools?

Let's hope that Diane's oped represents a much needed wake-up call.

One Parent's Response to NY Times Article

Ms. Gootman,

It is truly unfortunate that your article on Chancellor Klein (Taking Sides on New York 's Chancellor, March 6) misses the point. Most of us, parents, are not fighting against Mr. Klein's values. We do not question his intent and motivation. Surely only a truly dedicated person can take on the job of the Chancellor in this city. Many of us also understand that sometimes unpleasant decisions must be made for the greater good. We are not fighting because we don't like the decisions Mr. Klein makes: what we are fighting for is democracy.

Mr. Klein has made most of his decisions without consulting the people who actually know a thing or two about education and children -- parents, teachers, and administrators. When one man makes all the decisions without public input, that is not democracy. Democracy is hard work. It is much easier to take a top-down, dictatorial approach when policy changes are made, as Mr. Klein has done in his haste to reform the system. But educating our children is worth every bit of hard work and deserves the time and effort a democratic process requires.

It is peculiar to read Ms. Rhee quoted as saying that Mr. Klein " ... doesn't try to act like he knows everything." With parents of New York City , he has certainly acted as if he knows best and that we should leave him be to do whatever he wishes. No education reform will succeed if you eliminate meaningful participation by parents.

Term limits: the NY Times shows its hypocrisy

The NY Times reveals its double standard when it comes to democracy here in NYC.

Though the editors of the paper now insist that since Venezuelans "believe in their democracy" they should vote against extending term limits for their President, the paper vehemently opposed the same right for New Yorkers less than six months ago.

Indeed, Hugo Chavez has proven himself to be more of a democrat than Bloomberg, who refused to give voters the chance to decide on term limits -- a position that the Times supported. In this case, the ruling class reserved the right to keep one of its own in office -- whatever New Yorkers might prefer.

NY Times Editorial: Venezuelans' Right to Say No
Published: February 13, 2009

Hugo Chávez apparently doesn't believe Venezuelan voters, who just more than a year ago rejected his bid to eliminate the term limits that are blocking his continued rule. On Sunday, he is giving them another chance. For the sake of Venezuela's democracy, they should again vote no on changing the nation's constitution. . . . . Voters should not yield. Mr. Chávez needs to be reminded that Venezuelans believe in their democracy and cherish their right to say no.

NY Times Editorial: Term Limits and the Council
Published: October 22, 2008

The City Council is expected to vote on Thursday on Mayor Michael Bloomberg's proposal to revise New York City's term-limits law. The proposal would allow the mayor and most of the city's elected officials to run for a third four-year term. We urge the Council to approve it. . . . We are fully aware that this proposal has stirred great controversy,not least because New York City voters twice voted for term limits, in 1993 and 1996. . . . . .We agree with the mayor that the Council is best positioned to quickly settle the matter. It would be technically difficult and perhaps legally problematic to organize a meaningful citywide referendum before the 2009 elections.

thanks to Mel Meer.

Why does the NY Times feature the voices of LA public school parents, but not ours?

See the latest column by LA public school parent activist, Sandra Tsing Lo, on the NY Times blog , called Public School Parents, Unite!

It’s a good column, pointing out that parents of public school children should have a real voice in the policies in their children’s schools, as well as nationally, and how her group has been actively working so that a fellow parent can elected for a seat on LA’s school board.

It’s sad that parents here in NYC do not have the same opportunity, as we have no elected school board. The PEP is made up of mostly mayoral appointees and votes in lock step with every decision announced by Joel Klein, no matter how arbitrary and ill-considered, and as a result, its meetings are almost never covered by the NY Times.

Nor, to my knowledge, has the Times covered a single one of the many hearings and debates on Mayoral control that have occurred over the course of recent months, sponsored by legislators and other independent groups, featuring the informed views of countless disillusioned parents, advocates and the elected officials themselves, who have openly decried not only the manner in which this administration unilaterally imposes its policies but have also offered substantive critiques of these policies.

Indeed, it is disappointing that the NY Times has never offered the same sort of platform to a NYC public school parent as they have to Ms. Lo, but consistently excludes our voices from the public debate.

As a result, I think they have done a disservice to their readers, as few regular subscribers to the Times, supposedly the paper of record, probably have any idea how discontented most parent leaders feel about this administration.

Please let the NY Times know what you think, by posting your views in the comments section of Ms. Lo’s blog. My comments to the NY Times are below.

-------------

I enjoy these columns by Sandra Tsing Lo, admire her activism and agree with many of her positions, especially as regarding the need for bottom-up reform from actual stakeholders like public school parents, rather than the top-down ideological approach that now prevails on how to reform urban schools, propounded by so-called experts, most of whom have never actually sent their own children to these schools.

But my question is this: why does the NY Times feature her column, while not giving the same sort of access to any NYC public school parent? Are our views not equally worthy of consideration? Or is our perspective simply too challenging to the opinion elite and the powers-that-be here in NYC?

It is disappointing that in the city that the NY Times makes its home, our views are consistently ignored and shut out of the debate over education policies. And yet there are many NYC public school parents who can write with the same passion, conviction, and intelligence as Ms. Lo.

Take a look, for example, at our NYC public school parent blog. Perhaps the NY Times might someday consider our voices as worthy of being heard as the public school parents in LA.

Gifted and talented policies: the NY Times finally catches up

The NY Times had a front page story yesterday describing how the Chancellor's changes to the Gifted and Talented admissions process have led to far less diverse group of students being served by the program, both economically and racially, a fact that was pointed out weeks ago on our blog as well as in a far more detailed manner, Eduwonkette’s.

Months before that, when the city first proposed to centralize the G and T admissions process and base its decision solely on uniform cut off scores on standardized exams, we pointed out that this would likely significantly diminish diversity and benefit wealthier students at the expense of poor and minority kids.

Here are excerpts from entries that Patrick Sullivan, Debbie Meier and I wrote about the likely effects of Klein's policies back in Oct. and Nov: here, here and here.

Apparently others warned the DOE as well, including Joseph Renzulli, who serves as a consultant to a city task force on the gifted.

Using standardized exams for high stakes decisions has a racially disparate impact, according to the National Academy of Sciences task force on the subject – and thus is racially discriminatory.

But Joel Klein’s notion of “equity,” as it is becoming more and more clear, is not to increase diversity and opportunity for all kids – but to base all decisions on abstract, numerical formulae that he and his minions devise without input from anyone else – like the DOE's controversial "fair student formula" that would cut half of all failing schools by an average of $400,000, and the absurd formula for school grades -- no matter what the results or the real impact on kids.

The truth behind the new small schools

Andrew Wolf has a good column in the Sun about the deceptive ads from the Fund for Public Schools, called "Evander Childs Turnaround". The statistics clearly show that the students who were recruited for the new Gates-funded small schools now housed in the Evander building were much higher achieving before they ever enrolled in these new schools than those who had previously attended the school, undermining the administration's claim that it was its reforms that improved graduation rates.

The NY Times last spring ran both a credulous article and an editorial that read like press releases about the rise in graduation rates in these schools, without mentioning this salient fact. An excerpt from Wolf’s column:

The Fund for New York City Public Schools, a charitable group run by the Chancellor that once raised money to buy things to enhance the education of our public school children, is now spending millions on television commercials to convince the public that the programs are working. One of these commercials, highlighting "progress" at Evander Childs High School in the Bronx, has drawn particular attention on the growing network of blogs that critique the conditions in city schools.

Wolf credits the statistical findings that the students enrolled in these new schools started out way aheadto a recent Eduwonkette column and one posted last spring on the UFT blog by Leo Casey . Both were terrific pieces of work, and it’s great that this issue is finally receiving the attention it deserves, but it is long overdue.

Almost two years earlier, I pointed out some of these same facts to the Panel on Educational Policy and the United Parents Associations, in a summary posted here. Much of it was based on a report by Policy Studies Associates completed in March 2005, but suppressed for many months by New Visions before it was finally leaked to the NY Times eight months later. The authors of the PSA report based their analysis on background student data received directly from DOE. Too bad the reporters – and editors – of the Times seem to have conveniently forgotten its findings.

The PSA report examined not just those new schools placed in Evander but throughout the Bronx, those Gates-funded New Visions schools grandly called the New Century High Schools. It described how the creation of these schools had led to worse conditions and more overcrowding for those students left behind in the large schools who shared their facilities, and/or those who had been diverted to other already overcrowded schools nearby. And it pointed out how these excluded students were far needier academically than those who had been recruited for the new small schools:

Here is an excerpt from my summary:

“By gaining access to student records, the [PSA] analysis substantiates what DOE officials have long denied – that these schools recruit students with better scores, attendance, and overall records than the population from which they are drawn. See for example the recent [Sept. 2005] NYC Partnership report -- which misleadingly compares NCHS students to the average student citywide.

As the Policy Studies report points out, "These citywide comparisons are of only limited usefulness, since [this] initiative is intended to improve education opportunities and outcomes for students who might otherwise attend some of the city's most troubled high schools." Thus their evaluation properly compares the earlier records of students at the new small schools to those attending neighboring or host comprehensive high schools.

The students at the small schools had eighth grade math and reading scores significantly higher than their peers in the comparison schools; and 97% of them had been promoted in the prior year, compared with only 59% of the students at the comparison schools. They had better attendance records (91% compared to 81%), and were less likely to have been suspended. They were much less likely to need special education services. Only six percent of Bronx NCHS students had IEPs, compared with 25% at the comparison schools; and none of the NCHS special education students had the most serious disabilities. Indeed, teachers at the new small schools praised their principals for "recruiting more high-performing students".

I also pointed out that these schools did appear to be doing a better job keeping their students engaged – something ignored by the recent exposes – but not because of the size of the schools, as New Visions and the Gates foundation claim, but primarily because of their smaller classes:

While the students attending small schools maintained their previously good attendance, even the subset of students who previously had good attendance who enrolled at the larger high schools experienced a 10% drop in attendance in 9th grade. And while 6% of NCHS students transferred schools, and 10% were discharged from the system entirely, the transfer rate among incoming students at the larger schools was 14% and the discharge rate was 20% -- showing that more than a third of these students departed from the larger schools each year. …

Why were the new small schools more successful at keeping their students engaged? Students reported that their teachers were able to know them well, give them individualized instruction and help, and provide lots of attention in and out of class. As one pointed out, "the teachers I have had at other schools never knew me."

While class sizes at the larger high schools average 30 students or more, class sizes at most of the new small schools were between 13 and 20 students, as pointed out by the first year evaluation. The fact that these schools provided much smaller classes was noted by students themselves in surveys as their most valuable quality. As a result, “Teachers listen to you and get your opinion.” “In a normal high school, they don’t talk to you when you have a problem. They don’t care.” Another student said, “Slipping through the cracks? Not at this school!” Indeed, without smaller classes it's hard to see how these schools could succeed in their mission at all. …

If you take higher achieving students, and give them smaller classes, it should be no surprise to anyone that they will do far better and graduate in larger numbers than the lower-achieving students left behind in classes of 30 or more, attending overcrowded schools on double and triple shifts.

In the New Visions interim report there is a timeline in which by 2010, "innovative educational methods from NYC's small high schools" are supposed to "improve teaching and learning at the city's traditional high schools." This is critical, since even if its ambitious goal is achieved of 200 new smaller schools, fully two thirds of NYC students will continue to attend larger high schools.

As the smaller classes in the small schools appear to be their most successful elements, without a plan to eventually reduce class size and provide more individualized help to all high school students, it is difficult to see how this will ever occur.

As one parent recently asked, where did all those students who once attended Evander go? I wish I knew. Probably into the great ranks of the desaparecidos -- those thousands of poor souls who each year, magically disappear from the system, without being counted as dropouts.

My more recent City Council testimony from last November is here, with more about how the new small schools not only excluded our neediest students, but also provided them with much smaller classes -- and how the administration has no plan to deal with the increasing inequities of the system it has created.

See also our earlier post about the Fund for Public School's deceptive ads that claim class sizes have been reduced in our schools -- and how this organization, which was founded to provide more resources and programs for students in our turned into a PR arm for the Mayor's political image.