March 18, 2024 Today, the City Council is holding hearings on the education budget; public testimony begins at about 2:30 PM. You can sign up to speak in person or remotely here, to protest the looming budget cuts, the rising class sizes, and the fact that the DOE has slashed billions from the capital plan, […]
By Leonie Haimson & Michael Rance On February 29, dozens of public officials, teachers, parents, and advocates gathered at City Hall and spoke up passionately for smaller classes and the class size law. We’ve included a video of the press conference above, which includes some remarks by Leonie, our Executive Director. Thanks to everyone who […]
March 1, 2024 The DOE performance at the class size hearing yesterday at the City Council was very depressing. Despite urging by Council Education Chair Rita Joseph and other Council Members, Senators Liu and Robert Jackson, UFT leaders, and many parents, DOE officials refused to commit to any steps to lower class size. Instead, COO […]
Class Size Hearing on Thursday 2/29/24 at 1 PM; press conference at 12 noon in front of City Hall; please come! To testify remotely or in person sign up here: https://council.nyc.gov/testify/ The best testimony is to speak from your own experience as a parent about how your child would benefit from smaller classes; but here […]
Our new hand-out with an updated FAQ on the new law, complete with a brief rebuttal of some of the myths surrounding the law here and below.
Here is the brief presentation I gave as part of a Workshop at the Black and Hispanic Caucus weekend in Albany on Feb. 17, entitled “Every Student Deserves Small Classes: The Road Map towards Compliance with the State Law.” Please share with others if you can!
January 30, 2024 Two important deadlines this week. 1- The deadline to submit your views on Mayoral control is tomorrow, Wed. January 31, at 5 PM. You can upload your testimony here. The borough hearings were very well attended, and the overwhelming number of speakers, whether parents, teachers or community members, were […]
January 16, 2024 1. News update: The State Education Department added to their regulations the required timeline for public hearings and DOE’s submission of their annual class size plan, as AQE, ED Law Center and Class Size Matters had requested, important to ensure that this happens before the school year has begun and the […]
Feb. 8, 2024 1.Save the date! The City Council Education Committee will hold a hearing on Thursday Feb. 29 at 1 PM on the proposals of the Class Size Working Group, and what the DOE is doing or not doing to lower class size. If you support the goal of smaller classes, please sign up […]
Feb. 7, 2024 Here and below is our Feb. 1 testimony to the State legislature on the budget, and how DOE is doing nothing to comply with the new class size law. In fact, as we point out below, class sizes have increased in most schools over the last two years, a trend that is […]
Sign here to urge NYC to implement a real, multi-year strategy to lower class size, as the law intends, without exempting up to half or more of all students.
Talk out of School radio show and podcast airs Sunday night at 7 PM on WBAI 99.5 FM or online at www.wbai.org when Leonie Haimson and Daniel Alicea interview guests and discuss issues affecting public schools in NYC, the state level and nationally. You can stream or subscribe to the podcast here; or at iTunes, Spotify or Google.
We held our annual Skinny award dinner Wed. June 28, 2023, honoring Rep. Jamaal Bowman, former Bronx principal and now a progressive trailblazer who is fighting in Congress to protect and improve our public schools. More photos on Facebook .
