Renewal Schools Give New Job Opportunities To NYC DOE Higher Ups Who Have Proved Their Worth

At the New York City Department of Education, anyone who plays along with the prevalent policy of the day (policies change, and employees hoping to stay employed change with them without question) gets promoted, coddled, rewarded, and benefits+.

The renewal policy will be, I believe, the newest disaster to hit the health, safety and welfare of the children trying to get a good education in NYC public schools. 

 

Similar to the secret intent of the Workshop Model - namely to get rid of teachers - renewal is another name for "ditch the bad". Yes, all readers, it was our very own Carmen Farina who created and pushed the Workshop Model with its ridiculous scripts for teaching on the New York public school system, starting at PS 6 in Manhattan. Luckily, for purposes of having the right to say it doesn't work, I was at PS 6 when the Workshop Model destroyed the learning of the kids and the careers of the teachers.

I wrote an article about my youngest daughter's distress over TERC math, the fuzzy anti-learning policy also implemented also so that teachers and students could fail in higher order thinking in math concepts.

At PS6, what a group of parents and I did was to take the homework, work with our children to do the math in the traditional way, then put the hats over the numbers and scribble "work" onto the page that looked like we were getting the answers from literally fuzzifying the process. Our kids learned math the traditional way, but handed in fuzzy work to please the teachers, all of whom were told by Carmen Farina to punish any child not doing the homework the fuzzy way. (source will not be disclosed) Carmen ended the Gifted and Talented program at PS 6 because "all kids can learn" and a level 2 or 3 is fine.

At Stuyvesant High School, a separate curriculum was established for the kids who took fuzzy math in District 2, because they had no grasp of the traditional math concepts and had to be on a separate track.

We have posted before that the words "bad" or good", "properly" or "improperly", etc., are subjective opinions. When you hear the word “incompetent”, look at the person who is writing or saying it. The word itself is situation specific. For example, if a teacher is tenured and teaches chemistry for 10 years and then the Principal assigns this person to teach high school English literature, most people would say that perhaps this person would be “incompetent” to teach that subject. When you find out that a teacher was placed in a Senior calculus class but actually is certified in teaching global history, you know something is wrong. When you hear that a teacher is “incompetent”, the very next question should be “at what?”

But the UFT ignores the contract when a teacher is placed in a classroom outside of his/her licensed content area and then is observed and given "U" and/or discontinuance.

Shame on them.

Betsy Combier, Editor

Executive Director of Renewal Schools

Tracking Code

11232

Job Description

Please Note:  Position only open to internal NYC Department of Education employees. The filling of all positions is subject to budget availability.

Position Summary: The New York City school system is the largest in the country, composed of approximately 1.1 million students and 75,000+ teachers in over 1,800 schools. The school renewal program is a top-to-bottom evaluation to improve struggling schools. Renewal Schools receive supports such as transformation into a Community School, expanded learning opportunities, and increased professional development. 94 Renewal Schools have been identified; elementary, middle, and high schools in need of support based on criteria including low academic achievement (test scores and graduation rates) and low ratings on the DOE’s Quality Review.

The Executive Director of School Renewal will work intensively with each Renewal School community over the next three years, setting clear goals, and with support from central, hold each school community accountable for rapid improvement. The Executive Director oversees all existing and new Renewal Schools in New York City, serves as an advisor to the Chancellor, Executive Superintendent of Renewal Schools and DOE senior leadership, and liaises with internal and external partners to ensure that the Chancellor’s vision for Renewal Schools is realized. Performs related work.

Reports to: Executive Superintendent for Renewal Schools

Direct Reports: Director of Program Planning and Evaluation, Director of Data, Analytics and Renewal Accountability, Director of Programming, Director of Communication Strategy, Director of Operations and HR, Director for Renewal High Schools, Senior Coaches for Renewal Schools, School Renewal Program Director for High Schools

 Key Relationships: Superintendents, Executive Director of Community Schools, Directors of School Renewal, Principals, school staff, School Leadership Teams, DOE Central staff and Deputy Chancellors’ Offices

 Responsibilities

 ·         Provides direction, counsel, and support in a broad range of instructional, strategic, logistical, and  

          administrative areas to Renewal Schools.

·         Coordinates with Executive Director of Community Schools to deepen support for renewal schools within the community.

·         Oversees school needs assessments for renewal schools across all six elements of the Framework for Great Schools.

·         Manages the Renewal Team in building capacity for cross-functional roles by designing, implementing and providing tools and resources for professional development.

·         Identifies issues facing renewal schools, addresses road blocks, and ensures that issues are seen through to resolution.

·         Serves as an advisor to the Chancellor, Executive Superintendent and DOE senior leadership on Renewal Schools to set policy for renewal schools.

·         Manages a variety of special projects that require a high degree of research and analysis; evaluates results and presents recommendations to Executive Superintendent to be used as a basis for policy decisions.

·         Supports the Superintendents and principals and ensures that best practices are utilized in a seamless and coordinated fashion throughout the Renewal Schools. 

·         Oversees the design, delivery and implementation of workshops and professional development related to accountability, special education, operations, instruction, data, assessment, teacher quality and strategies that accelerate student achievement in Renewal Schools. 

·         Supports Principals capacity-building efforts around resource optimization, strategic staffing, and effective operational practices that impact and accelerate student achievement.

·         Support Superintendents in recruiting and selecting new principals/leadership.

·         Provides guidance and support to Renewal Team regarding management of their teams and meeting their goals and targets.

·         Works collaboratively across central offices to ensure consistent and effective application of best practices, developing key relationships to ensure the smooth flow of information and work processes for Renewal Schools

 Qualification Requirements:

Minimum

Must currently possess a New York State Certification as a School District Administrator (SDA) or School District Leader (SDL).

Plus

·         Prior successful school leadership experience in a diverse urban setting.

Preferred

·         Successful central policy making experience in managing a multifaceted complex organization.

·         Experience in supporting organizational change and school turnaround.

·         Excellent and effective communication skills, including the ability to organize facts and present information and figures in a clear, concise and logical manner, both orally and in writing.

·         Strong leadership, teamwork and influencing skills, with experience in managing project teams at all levels in a cross-functional, diverse and changing environment.

·         Experience in effective program design, development and implementation.

·         Strong ability to evaluate and provide feedback to ensure the alignment of program goals and DOE instructional priorities.

Salary: $144,315+

Please be sure application includes cover letter and your 6-digit file number

Applications will be accepted through August 12, 2015 at 3:00PM.

Please Note:  Position only open to internal NYC Department of Education employees. The filling of all positions is subject to budget availability.

 

AN EQUAL OPPORTUNITY EMPLOYER

It is the policy of the Department of Education of the City of New York to provide educational and employment opportunities without regard to race, color, religion, creed, ethnicity, national origin, alienage, citizenship status, age, marital status, partnership status, disability, sexual orientation, gender (sex), military status, prior record of arrest or conviction (except as permitted by law), predisposing genetic characteristics, or status as a victim of domestic violence, sexual offenses and stalking, and to maintain an environment free of harassment on any of the above-noted grounds, including sexual harassment or retaliation.  Inquiries regarding compliance with this equal opportunity policy may be directed to: Office of Equal Opportunity, 65 Court Street, Room 1102, Brooklyn, New York 11201, or visit the OEO website at http://schools.nyc.gov/OEO

Job Location

NEW YORK, New York, United States

Position Type
Full-Time/Regular
New Posting
Yes
Readvertisement
No
Recanvass
No
District
N/A

School Renewal Program

 The New York City Department of Education (NYCDOE) is partnering with school leaders, staff, families and community partners across the city to transform 94 schools through the School Renewal Program.

The School Renewal Program is a call to action. The NYCDOE will work intensively with each Renewal  School community over the next three years, setting clear goals and —with support from Central—holding each school community accountable for rapid improvement. The NYCDOE has selected as Renewal Schools those schools that met all three of the following criteria and four that were added per the Chancellor’s discretion:

1. Were Identified as Priority or Focus Schools by the State Department of Education
   Priority: The bottom 5% lowest-performing schools statewide
   Focus: The bottom 10% of progress in a subgroup
2. Demonstrated low academic achievement for each of the three prior years (2012-2014):
   Elementary and middle schools in the bottom 25% in Math and ELA scores
   High schools in the bottom 25% in four-year graduation rate
3. Scored “Proficient” or below on their most recent quality review

Building on the Chancellor’s vision, the NYCDOE is looking beyond test scores to determine where schools need to improve.

Key elements of the plan include:

1. Transforming Renewal Schools into Community Schools, with deepened support from and for families and community partners. Partnerships with community-based organizations will enable these schools to offer tailored whole-student supports, including mental health services and after-school programs.
2. Creating extended learning time – an extra hour added to the school day to give all students additional instructional time.
3. Supplying resources and supports to ensure effective school leadership and rigorous instruction with collaborative teachers.
4. Performing school needs assessments across all six elements of the Framework for Great Schools (rigorous instruction, collaborative teachers, supportive environment, effective school leadership, strong family-community ties, and trust) to identify key areas for additional resources.
5. Bringing increased oversight and accountability including strict goals and clear consequences for schools that do not meet them.

Here are the key next steps:

A needs assessment will be completed in each Renewal School by spring 2015 to identify specific focus elements from the the Framework for Great Schools and to develop goals for improvement.

Each School Leadership Team will work in partnership with NYCDOE leadership to create a School Renewal Plan and a road map for success.

NYCDOE leadership, school leadership, educators, families and the community must come together to support and accelerate improvement for students and staff of each Renewal School.

The NYCDOE is committed to working collaboratively as we strive to provide all of our students a high quality education to get them ready for college, careers and independent living.

List of Renewal Schools

P.S. 015 Roberto Clemente Henry Street School for International Studies P.S. 149 Sojourner Truth Wadleigh Secondary School for the Performing & Visual Arts P.S. 050 Vito Marcantonio Renaissance School of the Arts Coalition School for Social Change P.S. 123 Mahalia Jackson P.S. 194 Countee Cullen P.S. 132 Juan Pablo Duarte High School for Health Careers and Sciences I.S. 528 Bea Fuller Rodgers School P.S. 154 Jonathan D. Hyatt J.H.S. 162 Lola Rodriguez De Tio Foreign Language Academy of Global Studies New Explorers High School J.H.S. 123 James M. Kieran M.S. 301 Paul L. Dunbar Holcombe L. Rucker School of Community Research Urban Assembly Academy of Civic Engagement The Bronx Mathematics Preparatory School Herbert H. Lehman High School The Hunts Point School Banana Kelly High School J.H.S. 022 Jordan L. Mott I.S. 117 Joseph H. Wade J.H.S. 145 Arturo Toscanini I.S. 219 New Venture School Bronx Collegiate Academy Leadership Institute I.S. 313 School of Leadership Development Bronx Early College Academy for Teaching & Learning Urban Science Academy New Millennium Business Academy Middle School DreamYard Preparatory School I.S. 339 Bronx High School of Business J.H.S. 080 The Mosholu Parkway P.S. 085 Great Expectations The Bronx School of Young Leaders Academy for Personal Leadership and Excellence The Angelo Patri Middle School Fordham Leadership Academy for Business and Technology DeWitt Clinton High School P.S. 112 Bronxwood Globe School for Environmental Research The Young Scholars Academy of The Bronx

School of Diplomacy P.S. 092 Bronx School of Performing Arts Peace and Diversity Academy Fannie Lou Hamer Middle School Entrada Academy Urban Scholars Community School Monroe Academy for Visual Arts & Design P.S. 067 Charles A. Dorsey Satellite East Middle School MS 596 Peace Academy J.H.S. 050 John D. Wells Juan Morel Campos Secondary School Foundations Academy Automotive High School Frederick Douglass Academy IV Secondary School Boys and Girls High School Upper School @ P.S. 25 M.S. 584 Middle School for Academic and Social Excellence Ebbets Field Middle School Brooklyn Generation School East Flatbush Community Research School P.S. 306 Ethan Allen Essence School P.S. 328 Phyllis Wheatley Multicultural High School Cypress Hills Collegiate Preparatory School P.S. 165 Ida Posner P.S. 284 Lew Wallace P.S. 298 Dr. Betty Shabazz Brooklyn Collegiate: A College Board School Pan American International High School Flushing High School Martin Van Buren High School P.S./M.S 042 R. Vernam M.S. 053 Brian Piccolo P.S. 197 The Ocean School August Martin High School Richmond Hill High School John Adams High School J.H.S. 008 Richard S. Grossley P.S. 111 Jacob Blackwell Long Island City High School J.H.S. 291 Roland Hayes I.S. 349 Math, Science & Tech. Academy of Urban Planning

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Common Core Mystifies Parents

Math Under Common Core Has Even Parents Stumbling

NY TIMES June 29, 2014
LINK
GREENWELL SPRINGS, La. — Rebekah and Kevin Nelams (pictured above) moved to their modest brick home in this suburb of Baton Rouge seven years ago because it has one of the top-performing public school districts in the state. But starting this fall, Ms. Nelams plans to home-school the couple’s four elementary-age children.

The main reason: the methods that are being used for teaching math under the Common Core, a set of academic standards adopted by more than 40 states.

Ms. Nelams said she did not recognize the approaches her children, ages 7 to 10, were being asked to use on math work sheets. They were frustrated by the pictures, dots and sheer number of steps needed to solve some problems. Her husband, who is a pipe designer for petroleum products at an engineering firm, once had to watch a YouTube video before he could help their fifth-grade son with his division homework.

“They say this is rigorous because it teaches them higher thinking,” Ms. Nelams said. “But it just looks tedious.”

A second-grade math work sheet.

Across the country, parents who once conceded that their homework expertise petered out by high school trigonometry are now feeling helpless when confronted with first-grade work sheets. Stoked by viral postings online that ridicule math homework in which students are asked to critique a phantom child’s thinking or engage in numerous steps, along with mockery from comedians including Louis C. K. and Stephen Colbert, these parents are adding to an increasingly fierce political debate about whether the Common Core is another way in which Washington is taking over people’s lives.

In Louisiana, the dispute intensified this month when Gov. Bobby Jindal said he wanted to withdraw the state from the Common Core, although others questioned his authority to do so. Already, the legislatures in Indiana, Oklahoma and South Carolina have repealed the Common Core standards, and for many candidates running for political office, their views on the standards have become crucial election issues.

The new instructional approach in math seeks to help children understand and use it as a problem-solving tool instead of teaching them merely to repeat formulas over and over. They are also being asked to apply concepts to real-life situations and explain their reasoning.

This is partly because employers are increasingly asking for workers who can think critically and partly because traditional ways of teaching math have yielded lackluster results. In global tests, American students lag behindchildren in several Asian countries and some European nations, and the proportion of students achieving advanced levels is low. Common Core slims down curriculums so that students can spend more time grasping specific mathematical concepts.

The guidelines are based on research that shows that students taught conceptually retain the math they learn.And many longtime math teachers, including those in organizations like the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and the National Council of Supervisors of Mathematics, have championed the standards.Continue reading the main story


“I taught math very much like the Common Core for many years,” said Linda M. Gojak, president of the National Council of Teachers of Math. “When parents would question it, my response was ‘Just hang in there with me,’ and at the end of the year they would come and say this was the best year their kids had in math.”

But for parents, the transition has been hard. Moreover, textbooks and other materials have not yet caught up with the new standards, and educators unaccustomed to learning or teaching more conceptually are sometimes getting tongue-tied when explaining new methodologies.

“It is incredibly easy for these new instructional approaches to look good on paper or to work well in pilot classrooms in the hands of highly skilled experts,” said Frederick M. Hess, the director of education policy studies for the American Enterprise Institute, “and then to turn into mushy, lazy confusing goop as it spreads out to classrooms and textbooks.”

Even supporters of the Common Core say changes are being pushed too quickly. Rushing to institute a new math curriculum does not make sense if you are “planning to get the job done in a rational way,” said Phil Daro, one of three principal writers of the Common Core math standards.

Tensions over the Common Core have been heightened because the standards are tied to new standardized tests being introduced in many states. Teachers are fretting that their performance ratings will increasingly depend on how their students perform on these tests.

While several states have postponed the consequences of test results on teacher evaluations, many educators feel the pressure.

“Imagine, if you will, if the state government came down to Detroit and said in six weeks you have to be 100 percent metric,” said Jonathan Marceau, a fourth-grade teacher in Shelby Township, Mich., a northern suburb of Detroit, who is worried that some algebraic and geometric concepts are now being introduced too early for children to absorb.




“Detroit says, ‘Great, we can do that, but we have to retool, retrain and make sure people have gone through the growth curve on this thing, and it will probably take more than six weeks,’ ” he said. “The government says, ‘Tough, we’re not going to give you any manual or tools for this transition, but if anybody makes a car with a defect, they are going to get fired.’ ”

Some educators said that with the Common Core’s focus on questioning lines of reasoning and explaining answers, the new methods were particularly challenging for students with learning disabilities, or those who struggle orally or with writing.

“To make a student feel like they’re not good at math because they can’t explain something that to them seems incredibly obvious clearly isn’t good for the student,” said W. Stephen Wilson, a math professor at Johns Hopkins University.

Some parents of children who have typically excelled at math find the curriculum laboriously slow.

In Slidell, an affluent suburb of New Orleans, Jane Stenstrom is concerned that her daughter, who was assigned to a class for gifted students as a third grader last year, did not progress quickly enough. “For the advanced classes, it’s restricting them from being able to move forward,” Ms. Stenstrom said one recent afternoon.

Her daughter, Anna Grace, 9, said she grew frustrated “having to draw all those little tiny dots.”

“Sometimes I had to draw 42 or 32 little dots, sometimes more,” she said, adding that being asked to provide multiple solutions to a problem could be confusing. “I wanted to know which way was right and which way was wrong.”

Math experts say learning different approaches helps students develop problem-solving skills beyond math. Employers “want a generation of people who can think and reason and can construct an argument,” said Steven Leinwand, a researcher for the American Institutes of Research.

In Louisiana, John White, state superintendent of education, said that politics aside, applying the Common Core math standards would take time.

"This is a shift for an entire society,” he said. “No one should be under any illusion that it’s going to take just a year or two to rethink the way that we teach mathematics, because it is really challenging.” The State Education Department has said it will not use scores from Common Core tests in teacher evaluations for the next two years.

Laci Maniscalco, a third-grade teacher in Lafayette, La., who said that sometimes her students cried during the past year when working on problems under the new curriculum, said she had seen genuine progress in their understanding — and in her own, as well.

“I have told my students countless times that I wish I had been taught the way you are having the opportunity to learn,” she said.