Commissioner Elia resigns; let's hope for a better one next time!

The serious concerns we expressed yesterday and shared with the Board of Regents about NYSED's new proposed privacy regs were overwhelmed in news of Commissioner Elia's sudden resignation.  What wasn't reported on in the media crush, at least as far as I've noticed, is that the Regents were set to discuss whether to fire her during their annual retreat that started yesterday afternoon.  Clearly, Elia jumped the gun with her announcement and as a result, she was able to control the narrative, with many of the news stories featured overly positive review of her regime.

Last year, the final RAND report on the teacher evaluation project was released, showing that the initiative she led in Hillsborough County before she was fired by that school board and came to NY had no positive results and in fact, resulted in less access to effective teachers for high-needs kids.  In addition, the initiative left the district in severe fiscal disarray.

I recall when NYSAPE members and I met with her after she was first appointed in 2015.  We detailed the issues with the invalid, overly long and developmentally inappropriate state tests and Common Core standards, as well as many other problems ranging from the state's refusal to oversee the increases in NYC class sizes to their laggardly pace in enforcing the 2014 student privacy law.  She said very little, but ended by claiming that somehow, all the problems with the tests would be solved by putting them online. Never did I suspect it would take four more years for them to issue regulations to enact the 2014 student privacy law, and when they did they would attempt to eliminate the ban against selling student data or using it for marketing purposes.


During her time in NY, she never seemed to grasp just how awful the tests were, and compounded their abusive nature by administering them untimed, which led to some children spending up to six hours or more a day trying to make sense out of them, until they collapsed in frustration. Nor did she make the changes in the standards that many of the early childhood experts on her own advisory committees demanded. Her modus operandi seemed to be to form myriad committees and advisory boards, and post numerous surveys, but then pretty much ignore all the public input she received.

As the NYSAPE press release says, let's hope the Board of Regents work with parents and other stakeholders in the appointment of  a new Commissioner this time who will steer the state in a better direction; the last four have been pretty awful.  The press release has a hopeful title.  We shall have to see whether indeed this the end of the state's long-lasting, damaging corporate reform agenda.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 16, 2019
More information contact:
Lisa Rudley (917) 414-9190; nys.allies@gmail.com
Jeanette Deutermann (516) 902-9228; nys.allies@gmail.com
NYS Allies for Public Education - NYSAPE
As NY Closes the Door on Commissioner Elia’s Corporate Reform Agenda, NYSAPE Urges the Board of Regents to Include All Stakeholders When Choosing Our Next Commissioner

MaryEllen Elia was the wrong choice for NY in 2015 when she was appointed as Commissioner by the Board of Regents and former Regent Chancellor Merryl Tisch. The Commissioner continued to demonstrate throughout her tenure an unwillingness to move beyond her corporate reform agenda, resulting in NYSAPE’s repeated call for her resignation. The children of NY deserve a state education leader who will put their well-being at the forefront of all education policies.

“In 2015, NYSAPE sounded the alarms when Commissioner Elia was recruited by national and local education leaders to run NY’s education department as she did in Florida, with privatizing, common core, and high stakes testing, as her main priorities.  As the new leadership and education philosophy of the Board of Regents shifted towards child-centered learning, Commissioner Elia was focused on creating a culture of fear, misinformation, and intimidation throughout NYS school districts,” said Jeanette Deutermann, co-founder of NYSAPE and founder of Long Island Opt Out.

“Under Commissioner Elia’s direction, our children and schools continued to endure abusive, excessive testing, developmentally inappropriate state standards and data privacy breaches.  At every turn, Elia circumvented the Board of Regents and failed to steer public education policies in the right direction,” said Lisa Rudley, Westchester public school parent, Executive Director and co-founder of NYSAPE.

“The student privacy regulations just released by the State Education Department were the last straw,” said Leonie Haimson, Executive Director of Class Size Matters and co-chair of the Parent Coalition for Student Privacy.  “After waiting five years for NY Education § 2-d  to be enforced, state officials just proposed regulations that would allow contractors to sell and use personal student data for marketing purposes, in direct violation of the language of the law. And she has failed to deliver any of the annual reports required since 2014 that would detail the progress in following up on data breaches and parental privacy complaints.”

“We urge the Board of Regents to work with parents, advocates and other stakeholder groups in appointing the next Commissioner. Our children deserve a Commissioner who will move past the current test-and-punish regime, and towards a whole-child education and project-based learning,” said Chris Cerrone, a Western NY school board member, teacher and a co-founder of NYSAPE.

“The New York State Education Department under Commissioner Elia was never straight with parents regarding the state's high-stakes testing program. Rather than present neutral information, the department engaged in deceptive practices, including creating PR "toolkits" designed to persuade families of the legitimacy of the tests, even though a growing number of respected educators and researchers have questioned their effectiveness. I hope her successor will be more focused on equity and partnering with schools rather than punishing them,” Kemala Karmen, co-founder of NYC Opt Out.

"Elia repeatedly feigned inclusivity, exaggerating stakeholder input, such as the role of teachers in creating standardized exams, the ESSA implementation workshops where a popular Opportunity Dashboard was stealthily removed, and the “public” comments on teacher evaluations which were never made public. Elia also never responded to requests asking for the research showing the scientific validity of standardized testing, nor would she make public the invisible scoring formulas which make the results unverifiable,” said public school parent and NYC educator Jake Jacobs.

New York must get it right this time. The children of New York and our public schools can’t afford to wait any longer for the education leadership they deserve.

​
NYSAPE is a grassroots coalition with over 70 parent and educator groups across the state.

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Elizabeth Rose resigns from DOE; who will take her place but hopefully not adopt her positions and policies?

Former Deputy Chancellor Elizabeth Rose resigned yesterday.  Her resignation letter to DOE colleagues below recounting her record omits the countless school co-locations she pushed through despite huge parent and community opposition, her failure to address school overcrowding honestly with accurate reporting and reasonable enrollment projections, and her view that neither class size nor school overcrowding matters in terms of student learning.  

All these attributes and beliefs reflected the same ideological biases that she carried over from Joel Klein, who first plucked her from the corporate world to appoint her as Director of Portfolio Planning in 2009. This division was in charge of pushing through unpopular school closings and charter school co-locations, and throughout multiple hearings, Rose appeared indifferent to parent and student concerns. Others who preceded her in this job during the Bloomberg years include the current Superintendent of Louisiana schools John White and the head of the pro-charter Walton Family Foundation Marc Sternberg. Rose then rose through the ranks swiftly to become Deputy Chancellor Kathleen Grimm's chief of staff, and after Grimm died, inherited her position.

Though Rose mentions the removal of PCB lights in her resignation letter as one of her proudest achievements, she omits the fact that DOE faced lawsuits and EPA pressure that forced them to speed up the PCB removal process.  She also doesn't mention the months of delay before DOE began to test school water for lead according to the new state law, and the confusing and even dishonest messages she put out about this issue to reporters and parents. 

It probably didn't help her case either that Rose was revealed to have engineered a secret, illegal deal with Eva Moskowitz that she could move a new Success charter middle school into the PS 25 building after DOE closed the school, without going through any of the legally mandated process for changes in school utilization.  This move was only forestalled when the parents of PS 25 won a temporary restraining order against closing their school.

Her resignation comes after her two major demotions in recent months; first her removal by Chancellor Carranza from the Deputy Chancellor position to a new post entitled "CEO of School Operations," and then, after the busing scandal broke, a further demotion to “senior contractors advisor for transportation." 

No one person seems now to be exactly filling the powerful position of Deputy Chancellor for School Operations that Rose once held.  The new organizational chart appears to divide her responsibilities between former Mayoral adviser Karin Goldmark, now Deputy Chancellor for School Planning and Development, Chief Operating Officer Ursalina Ramirez, Deputy Chancellor for School Climate and Wellness LaShawn Robinson, and Josh Wallach, Deputy Chancellor for Early Education and Student Enrollment. 

Goldmark served during the Klein years as Vice President of  the controversial Leadership Academy, which was known for training non-educators to be principals, who when assigned to schools were too often shown to be inept and/or corrupt.  Moreover, the DOE's spending on the program was later found to be riddled with "waste, fraud and abuse," according to a scathing audit by the City Comptroller.

Incidentally, in  emails recently released by the Mayor's office after the NY Post and NY1 successfully obtained them via a Freedom for Information lawsuit, both Goldmark and Wallach were revealed to have been in favor of adopting a Unified Enrollment plan for the DOE in 2015 that would have helped recruit NYC students to charter schools. 

Preliminary draft of Mayor's 2015 speech

 
This enrollment system has been supported by the Gates Foundation which awards additional funding to districts that agree to adopt it, and has been heavily promoted by Gates-funded pro-charter advocacy groups like the Center for Reinventing Public Education.  

Though as Chalkbeat notes,  "De Blasio's aides quickly worked the idea into a draft of his 2015 speech," an excerpt of which is to the left, the Mayor deleted this passage and did not adopt the system. The final speech delivered September 15, 2015, and entitled "Equity and Excellence" is posted here.

Rose's resignation letter sent yesterday is below.

__________________________

Dear Colleagues,

When I first joined the DOE in 2009, I never imagined that I would still be here nine years later.  I can honestly say it is because I have loved the work we do, and loved serving our students and this City.

The last 9 years have been the most interesting, fulfilling, and exciting stage in my professional career.  I have had the opportunity to see long-term projects from inception to completion: the building of new buildings, the first graduating classes of new schools I helped open, the removal and replacement of all PCB lighting fixtures, identifying gender-neutral bathrooms in all our schools, and expanding universal free lunch to all schools. 

Other initiatives will continue, including significant reductions in suspensions and persistently dangerous schools, systematic improvements to accessibility and transparency of information about accessibility, major initiatives to expand and improve physical and health education, to build new gymnasiums, and upgrades to school cafeterias that increased both the number of students eating lunch and their enjoyment of their meal. Over the past three years alone, the PEP approved 174 proposals related to our schools and buildings, and we worked with CECs to approve 18 re-zonings. 

None of these would have been possible without the incredible dedication and effort of all the talented people I have had the pleasure and privilege to work with, including those on my teams, those with whom we have collaborated in our shared commitment to improving learning conditions and outcomes for all our students, the parents and advocates I have met, and especially those who have mentored me along the way.

I have served under five Chancellors, and am proud of the work my teams and I have accomplished. 

I have decided it is time to leave the DOE, both to spend additional time on some personal needs, and to figure out my next adventure.

 New York is a big city, but a small world; I hope we will cross paths again.  It has truly been an honor to serve with you.  Elizabeth

Isn't it time we had an educator, for a change?

Wow! It sure has been an interesting couple of days. Lots of news and commentary on Klein's resignation and the Mayor's appointment of Cathie Black to replace him. On the disappointing Klein legacy, I was quoted in the AP, the Times, NY1, am NY, Education Week, NBC News, and elsewhere.

I was personally attacked by the NY Post, and by Joel Klein on NY1 last night. When confronted with my quote from the Times, Klein called me a "propagandist" with an "agenda" (see video clip, starting at 2:30 minutes in.) Yes, I do have an agenda: for smaller classes and better schools for our kids.

There has also been much controversy and criticism of the mayor's appointment of Cathie Black, a publishing executive to succeed Klein. See the front page of the Daily News (below), this Times story and and these articles on our blog. Parents and elected officials alike have pointed out that Ms. Black sent her own children to private schools and has no education background, except for serving on the advisory board of a charter school.

Given her lack of education experience and qualifications, Ms. Black needs a waiver from the State Commissioner to be appointed chancellor.

Please sign the NYC Kids PAC petition, to urge the Commissioner to deny her a waiver. As soon as you sign it, the petition automatically sends an email in your name to the Commissioner Steiner, to the Board of Regents, and your state legislators,. Even if you have signed other petitions, please sign this one now, since it has an immediate impact.

The mayor would never dare appoint a magazine executive to head the police or fire departments. Leading the largest school system in the country needs just as much expertise, if not more. Only an educator is likely to recognize the necessary elements of a quality education, and how to work effectively with parents, teachers, and members of the community to create them. No matter what skills Ms. Black may have as a corporate manager, she simply has no idea what our children really need to succeed. We have had nine long years of a non-educator; it is time for a change.

Please also forward the petition link to your friends, and post it on your Facebook page. Here's hoping for better days!

Joel Klein's resignation: it's about time

Many parents will be glad to see Joel Klein leave as chancellor, who had no respect for their views or priorities. In DOE’s own surveys, parents said that class size reduction was their greatest wish for their children, and yet class sizes have risen sharply under his leadership.

He also showed very little regard for the rule of law; and faced multiple lawsuits as a result, including one triggered by his refusal to reduce class size despite receiving more than $2 billion in additional state funds in exchange for promising to do so. He misspent that $2 billion, and stole our children’s futures.

Klein was also an extremely poor manager and kept on reorganizing the department into chaos.

He is leaving us with a legacy of classroom overcrowding, communities fighting over co-located schools, Kindergarten waiting lists, unreliable school grades based on bad data, substandard credit recovery programs spreading like wildfire, and our children starved of art, music and science – all replaced with test prep.

Instead of progress, NYC black and Hispanic students have fallen further behind their peers in all nine other cities tested since 2003 in the national exams known as the NAEPs.The achievement gap has not narrowed in any grade or category. And we are the only city in the nation in which non-poor students now have lower average test scores on the NAEPs than in 2003.

It would be a difficult hole for any successor to dig out of.

As for Cathie Black, it is unfortunate that once again, the mayor has chosen someone with no educational experience, except for sitting on the board of a charter school with teacher attrition rates of 42 -71%, and a student suspension rate of 62%.

Our schools need a chancellor who has a compassionate and deep understanding of how our children should be educated, and I hope that Commissioner Steiner thinks twice before granting Ms. Black a waiver.