FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE -
November 25, 2013More information contact:
Eric Mihelbergel (716) 553-1123; nys.allies@gmail.com
Lisa Rudley (917) 414-9190; nys.allies@gmail.com
NYS Allies for Public Education - www.nysape.org
Parents Demand More Accountability in
the Appointment of Members of the Board of Regents
Parents
across New York State are demanding that members of the Board of Regents up for
re-appointment this March, Regents Christine Cea, James Jackson, James Cotrell,
and Wade Norwood, publicly clarify their positions on the current education
reforms.
“Those
members of the Board of Regents who do not support an agenda that includes an
immediate moratorium on high stakes Common Core testing and the sharing of
student data must be replaced with new members who will recognize their
responsibility to protect our children and our schools,” said Eric Mihelbergel,
a public school parent in Buffalo and a founding member of the NYS Allies for
Public Education. Mihelbergel went on to say, “the people of New York have lost
confidence in Commissioner John King, Chancellor Merryl Tisch and the current
Board of Regents to call a halt to these destructive education policies.”
Lisa
Rudley, a public school parent in Ossining and a founding member of NYS Allies
for Public Education, said “As evidenced in the Albany
Times Union, Sunday, Nov. 24, 2013, the Regents’ policy on allowing
privately funded fellows with little to no public education experience to drive
curriculum calls into question the integrity of the system. We need an educational plan in New York not a
marketing plan.”
The
process of electing Board of Regents members has long been an elusive process
that has not been widely understood by the public. Persons wishing to apply for a position
submit a resume to Assemblywomen Catherine Nolan, Chair of the Education
Committee, and Deborah Glick, Chair of the Higher Education Committee, by
January 31, 2014. In-person interviews
are then conducted in Albany in February by Nolan and Glick.
Although
all legislators vote in early March, the process is controlled by the
Democratic Majority of the Assembly.
Many Republican members abstain from the voting process altogether,
because it is so strongly controlled by the Democratic Majority and Assembly
Speaker Sheldon Silver. Legislators are typically given less than 24-hour’s
notice of the vote, and up to now, a current Regent is almost automatically
re-appointed until they resign or retire.
"As
a parent of four school-aged children, I am shocked at how the majority of
Regents members have not listened to the protests of their constituents --
parents, educators and members of the communities whose interests they are
supposed to serve, and have been silent while the Commissioner imposes one
damaging policy after another. It is time for REAL change at the Board of
Regents and at the NYS Education Department" said Tim Farley, a parent and
a principal of the Ichabod Crane School in Kinderhook, New York.
NYS
Allies for Public Education is proposing parents adopt an Action
Plan to lobby their legislators to appoint four Board of Regents members
who will support a call for a moratorium on high-stakes testing, data sharing,
and the Common Core modules and curriculum.
In alignment with this goal, the organization will be sending out a
survey to the current Regents members whose terms are up, as well as other applicants
for these positions, to seek and publicize their views on these critical
issues.
Jeanette
Deutermann, public school parent in Bellmore and Long Island Opt-Out Facebook
founder, says, “Parents will no longer allow Board of Regents members to be
re-elected when they are not doing their job for children. We will hold legislators accountable for
their votes for or against individual Regents.
New Regents must be elected that support a moratorium on current
practices.”
Leonie Haimson, Executive Director of Class Size
Matters and a founding member of NYS Allies for Public Education said, “Many
educators have pointed out the high costs and low quality of the Common Core
modules adopted by the NYS Education Department. These critics include Carol Burris, an
award-winning NY Principal who in the Washington Post, pointed out that NYSED paid more than $14
million for faulty math modules produced by a company called Common Core
Inc. At the same time, this same company
has received millions from the Gates Foundation, which also spent $100 million
to fund inBloom Inc., a corporation that is collecting highly sensitive and
personal student information without parental consent, and putting it on a data
cloud, so that it can more easily be shared with for-profit vendors.”
Though seven of the nine original inBloom states
have pulled out, Commissioner King says he is determined to go ahead with this
data-mining project, and is sharing the personal information for the entire
state’s public school students with inBloom, despite the protests of parents,
school board members, and Superintendents, as well as a lawsuit filed in court
two weeks ago. The Gates Foundation is
also helping to pay for the salaries of the Regents fellows who have been
placed in charge of implementing the Common Core and this data-sharing project.
“This evident conflict of interest calls into
serious question who is controlling education policies in this state, and
whether private funders have been allowed undue influence over our children,”
says Bianca Tanis, a public school parent in New Paltz and steering member of
Re-Thinking Testing Mid-Hudson Region.
New York State Allies for Public Education represents forty-five grassroots parent groups from
every corner of the Empire State. The organizations are proud to stand with the
parents, community members and fellow educators in NYSAPE to call for a change
in direction and policy beginning with new leadership at the New York State
Education Department.
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