October 3, 2025 Dear all – 1. Diane Ravitch has written a tremendously enthralling book about her life and career, entitled An Education: How I Changed My Mind About Schools and Almost Everything Else. It’s available now for purchase at Columbia Univ Press or Amazon or at your local bookstore. I’ll be interviewing Diane about […]
An analysis of NYC Comptroller audits from 2003 to 2025 finds that Brad Lander has done only four audits of the Department of Education – far fewer than any other Comptroller at this point in office.
July 7, 2025 I hope you had a great Independence Day weekend. Just a quick reminder to let you know that public comments on DOE’s draft Class Size Reduction Plan for next year are due no later than July 8, tomorrow Tuesday at midnight. You can send your comments to ContractsForExcellence@schools.nyc.gov. You can also sign […]
Sept. 15, 2025 1. Welcome back to another school year. Along with the cell phone ban, another important change is that 741 schools received funds to hire about 3,700 additional teachers to lower class size, with the goal of no more than 20 students per class in grades K-3; 23 in grades […]
You can access this summary here or below. Important to note that the brief Parent Bill of Rights offered by the state and posted by DOE omits many of the most important rights of parents under State Law 2D. “
July 9, 2025 Below and here is our detailed critique of the DOE’s draft Class Size Reduction Plan for the 2025-2026 school year, along with a list of signers including many parent leaders, and an appendix with charts backing up these figures. These figures are also posted here. Thanks to those of you who signed […]
July 2, 2025 Public comments are due on DOE’s draft Class Size Reduction Plan for the 2025-2026 school no later than July 8, next Tuesday, by emailing ContractsForExcellence@schools.nyc.gov. You can also sign onto our comments, by entering your information here no later than Monday June 7 at midnight. An appendix with charts backing up these […]
July 2, 2025 The appendix to our comments with charts on the DOE draft class size plan for 2025-2026 is here and below. “
June 7, 2025 Here is our briefing at the Parent Action Conference on June 7, on the class size situation in NYC public schools and the deficiencies in the DOE’s plan to comply with the class size law, passed in 2022, requiring smaller classes in all grades to be phased in by Sept. 2028.
Our June 7 Parent Action Conference was a great success, with terrific speeches from former principal and Congressman Jamaal Bowman and NYC Council Education Chair Rita Joseph, as well as informative presentations, thought-provoking discussions and a call to action. If your CEC or community group would like a similar presentation on any of the topics […]
Sign the petition asking for a moratorium on the use of AI until rigorous safeguards are established to protect student privacy, learning and the environment.
Click to see our presentation!
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, Daniel Alicea and Kaliris Salas Ramirez interview guests and discuss issues affecting public schools in NYC, the state level and nationally. You can stream or subscribe to the podcast here at Simplecast; or at iTunes, Spotify or Google.
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.
