Update on Senate bill, Pearson’s lost testing contract, our SLT lawsuit, and borough hearings on class size
July 10, 2015
This impossible goal has allowed Arne Duncan to impose “NCLB waivers” based upon forcing states to tie teacher evaluation to test scores and/or adopt the Common Core. For why I support the ECAA, and think it’s an important step forward, please see my post on Diane Ravitch’s blog here. For a good summary that dispels some of the myths that have arisen about ECAA, see this Senate fact sheet .
2. Speaking of testing, it was announced yesterday that Pearson finally lost its contract to produce the NY state exams in grades 3-8 to a company called Questar – though strangely, there is a year overlap between the contracts when the state will be paying both companies for a single set of exams. As you are probably aware, Pearson produced the worst possible tests, full of errors, confusing passages, and product placements. We first broke the news about the Pearson Pineapple passage on our blog in 2012 the day the test was given. Later, the story went viral and became a symbol of the incompetence & lack of accountability of Pearson and the other testing companies. You can check our first Pineapple expose here;http://tinyurl.com/cdwa44f & follow-up stories about Pearson’s many flaws here:http://tinyurl.com/p2kp9c4.
Let’s hope Questar is minimally competent, and Commissioner Elia means it when she says that the new exams will be created in close collaboration with classroom teachers. Of course, much else has to be done to return our classrooms to sanity, including eliminating the high-stakes associated with these exams and totally revamping the Common Core standards and curriculum. If the current Senate bill passes into law, and the federal stranglehold is eased, that will be possible to do.
3. For NYC parents, I wanted to update you on our battle for transparency and to ensure that School Leadership Team meetings are open to the public. As you may remember, in April, Class Size Matters along with the Public Advocate won a great decision in the State Supreme Court that these meetings must be kept open the public, but sadly, the DOE is appealing this decision and in the meantime, has ordered that these meetings stay closed to anyone other than school staff and parents. Yesterday, our attorneys filed papers in the Appellate court, urging the court to order DOE to keep these meetings open until they can hear and decide on the case. More on this, including our attorney’s compelling arguments are here.
4. Finally, the DOE is holding annual borough hearings on their 2015-2016 Contracts for Excellence (C4E) plan, as required by state law, starting July 15 in Manhattan. The C4E program established in response to the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit, provides targeted state funds that since 2007 were supposed to be used to reduce class size and other approved goals in NYC and other low-performing districts. Instead, the DOE has failed to follow the law, and class sizes have increased substantially since then.
Contract for Excellence borough hearings
Manhattan: July 15, 2015 – Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis High School (120 West 46 Street, New York, NY 10036)
Brooklyn: July 21, 2015 – Wingate Campus (600 Kensington Avenue, Brooklyn, NY)
Bronx: July 22, 2015 – Mott Haven Campus (730 Concourse Village West, Bronx, NY 10451)
Staten Island: July 23, 2015 – The Michael J. Petrides School (715 Ocean Terrace, Staten Island, NY 10301)
Queens: July 28, 2015 – Frank Sinatra School of the Arts High School (35-12 35th Avenue, Queens, NY 11106)
All hearings are scheduled to begin at 7:00PM.The deadline for submitting comments is August 15. Comments can be submitted at the hearings or by sending e-mails to [email protected].
Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters
124 Waverly Pl.
New York, NY 10011
212-529-3539
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