Welcome to a new school & concerns about school construction, class size & curriculums

Sept. 5, 2024

Welcome back to a new school year! This is the second year of the legally required phase-in of smaller classes in NYC public schools, and though the Chancellor and others claim that they will meet the goal of 40% classes compliant with the class size limits, this is still uncertain, especially as class sizes have increased over the last two years and may increase yet again. It is even more uncertain that given the lack of a real four-year plan, DOE will be able to meet the benchmarks of 60%-100% of classes meeting the goals in the years to come.

Yesterday morning, there were dueling press conferences. First, in the Bronx, the Mayor, the Chancellor, the President of the School Construction Authority, and various public officials celebrated the completion of 24 new schools and 11,000 school seats. Unmentioned at the presser were the following facts: 1- There really are not 24 “new schools” as was reported, as 10 are additions to existing schools and one is an annex. 2- In any case, this new construction was planned, funded and begun during the previous administration of Mayor de Blasio, not by Mayor Adams. 3- Adams himself instead cut funding for new schools by $2.5B shortly after he took office. 4- As a result, there will be a sharply declining number of new seats over the next three years, just when more space will be needed for smaller classes. 5- Finally, though the presser was held in the Bronx and there were many Bronx electeds present, not a single new school is specified for the entire borough of the Bronx in the newly adopted five-year plan – as pointed out later in the Daily News.

Nor was there any mention at this presser that the SCA has been operating without a legally constituted board for the past year, according to a bombshell article in Saturday’s NY Post. I discovered this by perusing the SCA Board’s minutes, where I also discovered there was no discussion at any board meeting of the class size law or the need to build enough schools to comply. More on this and why it matters here.

2. Even earlier in the morning, the UFT along with several state and city elected officials heralded how IS 145 in Queens has now lowered class size in their sixth grade to 23 students per class, and explained how important these smaller classes will be in helping its students to succeed. Truly, this is a model that could and should be emulated in all schools, if only the DOE was willing to provide sufficient funding and space. I commented on the need for a more aggressive capital plan and enrollment adjustments on Pix 11 news last night. Chalkbeat linked to our petition to the DOE, signed onto by more than 570 parents, advocates and educators, pointing out how there is still no real multi-year plan to create enough space or provide enough teachers. Chalkbeat also revealed that fewer new teachers were actually hired this year than last.

All this brings me to my request to all of you: Teachers, please let me know what size your classes are this year, especially if they are excessive, and if they violate the contractual limits, whether you plan to grieve them. Parents, please let me know your children’s class sizes as well. If they are in elementary school you can check out the class list; if they are in middle or high school, ask them to count how many other students are in their classes. I have already received distressing texts about classes of 30 or more in too many schools.

2. On another subject: Over the last few months, I have hosted three Talk out of School WBAI radio shows on the scripted curriculums that DOE has now mandated in most schools. None of them have any research backing, and each has been faulted by teachers for being problematic in various ways and far too rigidly applied, with little or no teacher discretion to meet the individual needs of their students. Please take a listen: here is the podcast on the new reading curriculum, here’s one on math, and here’s the show that just aired on the 3K and PreK curriculum. There are also links to articles and other information about them in the resource section of each of the podcast pages. If you have suggestions for other topics we should cover or guests we should invite on the show, please let me know!

Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters
124 Waverly Pl.
New York, NY 10011
phone: 917-435-9329
[email protected]