Lehman High School and John F. Kennedy HS, Dr. Saraceno, and the Mess of Changing Grades and Progress Reports

The New York City Board of Education has made a huge mess. "They" - the administration , meaning basically Joel Klein, Michael Bloomberg, Candace McClaren (Director, Office of Special Investigations or OSI), Richard Condon, Special Commissioner of Investigations, and the Office of Equal Opportunity - have made it impossible for a principal NOT to cheat on grade reporting.



missing marks November 12, 2009
In Bronx, two high schools’ progress reports are being withheld
by Anna Phillips

Progress reports for the city’s roughly 500 high schools are slated to be released this month, but grades for two Bronx schools will not be among them.

One is Herbert H. Lehman High School, where executive principal Janet Saraceno (pictured above) is under investigation for grade tampering, as I reported last month. The Department of Education also may not release the progress report for John F. Kennedy High School because of missing information and inconsistencies in the data it sent to the department, said DOE spokesman David Cantor.

If the problems with Kennedy’s data are resolved by the time the department releases the reports, the school’s report card will be made public on schedule, Cantor said.

Several other high schools are being examined by the Office of Special Investigations for tampering with students’ Regents scores or inappropriately changing students’ grades after they passed the exam, but their report cards are on track to be released.

“There’s not a template or a rubric for determining this,” Cantor said. “If the allegations are significant enough that they could materially affect the grades of the school, we would hold the progress report back. It doesn’t happen very often.”

Progress reports for high schools assign a letter grade to each school based on students’ credit accumulation and graduation rates, as well as the percentage of students who pass Regents exams.

Current and former teachers at Lehman have charged Saraceno — who was hired with a $25,000 bonus to improve the school’s academics — with giving dozens of students credit for courses they failed or never took. Transcripts given to GothamSchools show that in some instances, a student failed a class, passed the Regents exam by a slim margin, and then had his failing grade overturned. In others, students were given two credits for a class they passed once, or for classes that never appeared on their schedules.

In a memo Saraceno sent to Lehman teachers on October 1, she congratulated the staff on the school’s results from a preliminary progress report. “We made modest gains in the graduation rate, but increased credit accumulation for first-year, second-year, and third-year students by 8-10%,” she wrote.

Though Kennedy is not currently under investigation, the Office of Special Investigations twice scrutinized the schools’ Regents scores following accusations that failing scores had been changed to passing ones. The first investigation found that the school’s principal Anthony Rotunno had the right to change students’ grades. A second inquiry determined that the changes made to 16 students’ transcripts were done according to department guidelines.

UPDATE: A previous version of this post incorrectly suggested that Kennedy High School’s progress report would definitely be withheld when the reports are released later this month. It has been revised to reflect the fact that the school’s report card may be released on time if current data problems are resolved.

Filed under: NewsroomTags: herbert lehman high school, janet saraceno, John Kennedy High School, progress reports Print Share
Posted at 4:07 pm 8 CommentsSubscribe to comments with RSS or TrackBack
Leonie Haimson November 12th, 2009
4:50 pm
check out our NYC public school parent blog “Cheating scandal at Lehman: DOE’s response and echoes of the past” for more on the earlier JFK case.
The fact that the DOE determined that it was fine for the principal to change student test scores shows that their theory is right: principal autonomy does lead to better results.
Linda/Retired Teacher November 12th, 2009
5:39 pm
I’m so glad people are finally becoming aware of the frenzied cheating that is going on in New York and across the country. It started with the “Texas Miracle” and has spread like wildfire because politicians and ambitious educators have realized they could go from an obscure classroom or political position to rock star status by pretending their impoverished students went from the 13th to the 90th percentile on standardized tests. Teachers and parents need to speak up whenever they see cheating or “gaming the system” because these invalid scores are forming the basis for an educational infrastructure that is taking hold across the United States. Of course the losers are our children and the public school system that has enabled so many of us to realize the American Dream.
Teacher November 12th, 2009
6:09 pm
NYC - I was fired (among others) because I would not raise my student’s grades (pass everyone). First, they tortured me everyday - wrote me up, bad mouthed me, told me I was no good, then wrote me up some more, threatened my job, my license.
Then, realizing their illegal actions, offered me my job back if I signed a contract saying I wouldn’t sue anybody for things said and done to me.
Finally, I was excessed.
My principal and local superintendent received $10,000. bonuses for doing such a good job of “boosting” grades.
Jeff S November 12th, 2009
6:27 pm
Ah ha…the last statement in the above comment. Of course Principals are under pressure to raise grades or to raise Regents grades because of the bonuses. This is the big problem people simply don’t understand about using test performances and student achievement in granting tenur, evaluating educators, be they teachers or Principals, or indeed even more importantly in grantnig merit pay. I hope you’re listening Mr. Carrol when you keep harping on instituting merit pay. If only there were a fool proof way to evaluate educators that nobody could argue with.

As a former Assistant Principal, I would hate to think it would be my decision which of my teachers would get a $10,000 bonus. I would also hate to think if would be based on a teacher’s passing percentage. Or on the results on Regents exams. None of these take into account a myriad of factors beyond anybody’s control including the raw materials, namely what the student bring in. You have a school which takes in a lot of over the counter students and the powers that be say just because they’re old enough to be high school 9th graders they have to take algebra (or whateve the first course was)….too bad they haven’t attended school for years or did not have the proper groundwork laid. And when these students can’t do the work, you’re told well you’re not teaching them properly. And then when they are put into a situation where they have to take a Regents exam and they fail, well the school has failed the student. And where there are many such students in a particular school, and the Regents results are terrible, the system responds by branding the school a failure. They issue some ridiculous school report card, they threaten to terminate the Principal and then they close the school and send the staff into the ATR. And when other Principals hear these teachers are from that school, no they must be inompetent.

But nobody wants to hear this. All these educational reform from such know nothings like Mr. Carrol and his articule in today’s Post throw out the same malarkey all the time. Merit pay, accountability as if they have any idea how it can be properly measured. But then again, all this garbage always sounds good.
I noticed that... November 12th, 2009
8:43 pm
Boss Tweed is alive and well in the DoE!

I started teaching my students SATs vocabulary words that would best describe education in NYC. We came up with corruption, intimidation, fraud, duplicity, dishonesty, deceit, scam, ruse, devious, unethical, cunning, treacheous, unrealiable, coercion, oppressive, tyranny, dictatorship, despotism.
Rod Paige had the Texas Miracle. New York City has the Every Child’s Grade Will Be Changed to Promote Bonuses! I think I will let my principal decide who should fail my class. I’m going give her my roster and let her decide which student should fail the class. This way I don’t waste time waiting for her to change my grade behind my back. It’s a win-win. The principal wins because she’ll get her bonus. She wins again because she won’t have to change my original failing grade and won’t need to pressure me to change my grade. The losers - the kids! Congratulations to those at Tweed for pressuring principals to not do the right thing. Boss Tweed your spirit is felt in this great city of totalitarianism!
Michael M. November 12th, 2009
9:04 pm
If we want to see Wall Street take the long view, perhaps we should ask that Tweed do so as well.

How about bonuses for all K-12 teachers and in-school administrators along the way whose kids graduate… college? And an extra few bucks if said student goes on to become… a teacher.

And for kids who end up in remedial classes at CUNY, a few bucks out of the teachers’ bonuses, and the pay of execs in Tweed as well. After all, Tweedies need to be “accountable” too.
Lynne Winderbaum November 13th, 2009
9:32 am
The investigations into the English Regents grade changes at Kennedy HS and the addition of classes to transcripts that students never took and never passed were conducted by the Office of Special Investigations. In the case of the Regents grade changes, only the grades of 60 were affected, raising them to a passing score. In approximately two dozen cases, exam papers were shown to the investigators clearly showing that one individual crossed out the original scores in black ink, initialed it, and unilaterally changed the scores of as many as three of the four essays to achieve the passing grade. The way in which the belated passing of the Regents was kept secret from the department’s teachers was damning. After the January Regents, the failing students were enrolled in after-school and Saturday tutorials. Teachers were paid per-session to help the students. In May, students suddenly started telling their teachers that they no longer needed to attend the tutorials because they had, in fact, PASSED! That’s how the tampering was uncovered. A comparison of the March and May transcripts of that year clearly showed that in those two dozen cases, the English grades had been raised from fail to pass.
In the case of the transcript changes, the same investigators were shown the suspect transcripts by guidance counselors. The counselors were scheduling students for evening school in September so that they could repeat the classes they had failed in summer school and earn the credits they needed to graduate. In several cases, the students returned to their counselors after a visit to the AP of programming and announced that they no longer needed to repeat these classes because they now had graduated! A review of the transcripts clearly showed that classes had been added, with no teacher’s name, and a grade of “P”. In one case, the “P” was actually placed on the transcript prior to the student’s repeating that same class two more times! In another case, a student was graduated in haste with fewer than 44 credits. All of the counselors who testified were subsequently put “in excess” from the school, one with 20 years and one with 22 years of experience.
If this is in accordance with department policy, then Bloomberg/Klein should take care in touting their increase in graduation rates. The goal for our schools should be to educate youngsters–not simply graduate them.
Scrutiny should be drawn to many “credit recovery” programs in our high schools as well. As long as the pressure of school report card grades, job security for principals, monetary bonuses, and the threat of school closings looms over us, our students risk being cheated out of the education that is supposed to accompany the diploma. We should admire the many principals who do not succumb to this temptation in times of such threat to their careers by taking the shortcuts that inflate their statistics at the expense of our children.

Young Adult Borough Center at Herbert H. Lehman HS
"Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending."

--Carl Bard

The Young Adult Borough Center (YABC) at Herbert H. Lehman HS is an evening academic program which is in session Monday through Thursday from 4:00 pm – 9:00 pm.
LINK

YABC at Lehman HS is designed specifically to meet the needs of high school students who might be considering dropping out because they are behind or because they have adult responsibilities that make attending school in the daytime difficult. Eligible students are at least 17.5 years old, have been in school for four or more years, and have 17 or more credits. In partnership with FEGS (Federation Employment Guidance Service) a community-based organization, students are given the opportunity to get placed in paid internships. Through the CBO, students participate in workshops and get support that helps them prepare for college, employment, healthy relationships, and most importantly, life after graduation. Students graduate with a diploma from their home school after they have earned all of their required credits and passed all of the required Regents exams while attending YABC @ Lehman HS.

Letter From Joel Klein To All Staff The Day After Bloomberg Won a Third Term

This letter was sent to all staff through the DOE email system.
Subject: FW: A letter from Chancellor Klein

(see the picture above? Isn't hugging against NYC BOE policy??)

________________________________
From: Klein Joel I.
Sent: Wed 11/4/2009 12:01 PM To: &All Employees
Subject: A letter from Chancellor Klein

Dear Colleagues,

Yesterday, voters reelected Mayor Bloomberg to a third term in
office. In an election where education was a major focus, the outcome is
truly a testament to your hard work and accomplishments-and what they have
meant for our students. Over the past year especially, you brought about
historic achievement gains despite the worst economic climate since the
Great Depression. And you kept your focus even as our schools and our
students' progress were challenged during the loud debate over mayoral
control and then, of course, the long campaign.

This third term provides us with an unprecedented opportunity to
build on our success and take it to the next level. Many of you remember
how things used to be. For decades, our schools were characterized by a
revolving door of leadership and reforms that never had the support to
produce any sustained results. That all changed in 2002. By the end of
this four-year term, the city will have experienced 12 years of consistent
and bold educational vision. Mayor Bloomberg's continuity of
leadership has led to historic achievement gains and what I hope is a
permanent culture shift-creating a school system that puts the interests
of students above all else. Today, our students have many more good school
options from which to choose. Our teaching force is more highly qualified.
And principals have more authority than ever to make decisions that best
meet the needs of their schools. But as proud as I am of what we've
accomplished-raising our graduation rate by 15 points (to 61 percent), for
example-so far we are still a school system capable of graduating just six
out of ten students in four years. We must do better than that for our
kids and frankly, for the future of this city.

We'll get there by building on what we know works and by being
prepared to innovate. We will continue to be guided by the pillars of
leadership, empowerment, and accountability. The best decision we made was
to focus our reforms on individual schools and the talents of those who
lead them. As you know, we demand more than ever from our schools-and that
will not change. We must continually set higher standards to ensure our
children are prepared to tackle real-world challenges. That's why I
support more rigorous assessments and graduation requirements for our
students. To help you meet and exceed these expectations, we've given you
more information than ever to help your students achieve. Tools like ARIS
and inquiry teams, for example, help identify students' strengths and
weaknesses so you can better target instruction, and we will continue to
expand these resources.

But it's also time to take a fresh look at how we organize our
schools and deliver instruction: for too long, public education has been
immune to innovation and that cannot continue. We already are piloting
several models that reorganize our classrooms, redistribute our teacher
talent, and take advantage of technology. Several other ideas are in the
planning stages, and we need even more of them. We're redefining Career
and Technical Education so that our curriculum is tied to college
standards and prepares students for jobs that are currently in demand.
Indeed, for the first time, working with CUNY, we've created an integrated
9-14 CTE school where students get a high school diploma and an
Associate's Degree. And Mayor Bloomberg has vowed to open 100 more charter
schools if Albany raises-or lifts altogether-the current cap on their
creation. As always, I encourage you to e-mail me with your ideas and share
your experiences.

With school improvement both a local and, now, a national
priority, there has never been a more exciting time to be working in
public education. The expectations for this third term are high and the
debates will be noisy, but after more than seven years, we're used to
that. I'm confident New York City will once again lead the way.

Sincerely,
Joel I. Klein

And Now The Buy-Outs...OOPS, Pay-Offs, Begin

Whatever you want to call it, Bloomberg is giving money to people who need to work with him for another four years. Makes life a little bit easier, perhaps.



Bloomberg holds out $850G olive branch to de Blasio for office budget
By Frank Lombardi, DAILY NEWS CITY HALL BUREAU, November 6th 2009
LINK

Bill de Blasio hasn't taken over as public advocate yet, but his new office just got a budget increase.

In a peace gesture to the public advocate-elect, Mayor Bloomberg promised to pump an additional $850,000 into the office's budget to offset severe cuts.

De Blasio, who was elected Tuesday, will take over the office in January, but most of the office's skimpy $1.7 million annual budget already has been used up under Betsy Gotbaum.


The funds will help overcome an immediate budget crunch for de Blasio, who was sharply critical of the mayor during his election campaign and had said he would run a more assertive advocate's office than Gotbaum, who did not seek reelection to a third term.







Gotbaum's $2.8 million budget was cut by $1.1 million by Bloomberg and Council Speaker Christine Quinn during last year's budget process.

Former Mayor Ed Koch is Angry That Newly Elected John Liu Cant Meet Bloomberg

Every once in a while I get struck by a ridiculous headline. The article below about Ed Koch captured my eye...I mean, with the economy hurting just about everyone, and wars going on, do we really care that Ed is angry that John Liu could not put Mike Bloomberg on his calendar?

Is this a "Thank you" note from the Bloomberg campaign for Koch's help?

C'mon, NY Magazine, let's talk about real people doing something relevant to our lives that we should know about.

Betsy Combier


Ed Koch Doesn’t Appreciate John Liu’s Snubbing of Mayor Bloomberg
LINK

Just a day after his less-than-spectacular victory over Bill Thompson, Mayor Bloomberg has already begun reaching out to two of his fiercest critics — public advocate Bill de Blasio and comptroller John Liu. Bloomberg grabbed a very public cup of coffee with De Blasio earlier this morning, but Liu, apparently, isn't ready to make nice just yet. As the Times reported today, "when the mayor tried to meet with John C. Liu, the Democratic comptroller-elect, Mr. Liu said he could not find time on his schedule, a highly unusual slight." Hizzoner is taking the snub in stride, though, telling reporters later this morning, "Well, he’s been very busy, but we’ll get together. You can rest assured that we will all work together." Less forgiving was the last man to serve three terms as mayor, Ed Koch. "His effort to embarrass the mayor is outrageous," Koch told us. "I don't know if there is any way he can be held accountable except for the public to denounce him. The rudeness is incredible, and it's a harbinger of his unwillingness to work with the mayor on the problems confronting the city." When asked if he'd relay his thoughts directly to Liu, Koch told us, "The people who should be writing him letters are the people who voted for him."
By: Jacob Gershman and Dan Amira



Bill Thompson has no regrets about failed campaign; warns Mayor Bloomberg win was no 'mandate'
BY Adam Lisberg, DAILY NEWS CITY HALL BUREAU CHIEF, Thursday, November 5th 2009
LINK

William Thompson Jr. sat down with the Daily News for his first interview after losing the race for mayor.

Mayor Bloomberg should see his slim victory Tuesday night as a call for change from a worried city, Controller William Thompson told the Daily News.

"It was definitely not a mandate," Thompson said Thursday, referring to Bloomberg's 50.6% win.



"It was the people of New York saying and speaking loudly, 'We want to go in a different direction.' And I think he should pay attention to that."

In his first newspaper interview since his narrow 4.6-point loss, Thompson said his campaign gave voice to New Yorkers who believe the city is going in the wrong direction - and Bloomberg should listen.

"It wasn't just the term limit issue. You talk about the affordability issue in the city of New York and people not being able to afford to stay and live here," Thompson said.

"He should listen to what the voters said on Tuesday night."

Bloomberg claimed after his win that it was a mandate from a majority of voters, and said Thursday that he plans no changes in his approach to governing.

"In terms of myself, you know, I am what I am," Bloomberg said. "I want to make sure that we keep reaching out, making sure people have the ability to give us input and to listen to that input and to improve the city."

Thompson said he plans to deliver that message directly to Bloomberg if they sit down to talk next week, as the mayor said they would in their election night phone call.

Thompson tried to strike a magnanimous tone, and said he wouldn't complain about the negative ads and mailers that Bloomberg's campaign produced all year, even as the mayor said Thompson did a good job as the city's chief banker.

"The distortions? The lies? Those little things?" Thompson said. "While I can be angry about it, the mayor - he's the one who has to live with, you know, how negative his campaign was."

Thompson said he had no regrets about his run, which brought him far closer to victory than most expected.

For a few tantalizing moments as the votes were tallied Tuesday night, Thompson was just 2,000 votes behind an incumbent mayor who had outspent him more than 13 to 1, buried him in an avalanche of negative ads and cultivated an aura of inevitability.

As the results turned decisively against him that night, Thompson said he ran through some what-ifs - what he could have done with more money, more prominent endorsements and more professional staff instead of volunteers - but dropped that line of thought quickly.

"I just stopped that. That's not helpful," Thompson said. "When I woke up Wednesday, I would have liked to have woken up having won. But I was proud of the campign."

Thompson insisted he has not thought about his own future next, even as he has to start packing up to leave the office he has occupied for almost eight years. Earlier Thursday, he said, he met with Controller-Elect John Liu to start planning their transition.

And Thompson would not fan any flames by discussing any private-sector job offers, running on a statewide ticket next year or running again for mayor in 2013.

alisberg@nydailynews.com
With Frank Lombardi

Of course, we, the "general public" can never know ALL that goes on behind closed doors:



Real Estate Races For Mayoral Graces
By Eliot Brown, New York Observer, January 22, 2008
LINK

At the midtown Hilton last Thursday, an absolute who’s who of New York City real estate descended upon the building’s grand ballroom to nibble on crab cakes, rub elbows with competitors and chow down a big hunk of steak at the Real Estate Board of New York’s annual awards gala. Milling among the tuxedo-clad crowd—with seats alongside REBNY’s executive board, no less—were three individuals who have been getting to know the real estate industry rather well recently, the leading potential Democratic mayoral candidates, City Comptroller William Thompson Jr., U.S. Representative Anthony Weiner and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn.

For the first time in over a decade, the real estate industry is flexing its muscle in the early stages of a mayoral race, with developers and landlords dumping dollars into the campaigns of the three leading contenders.

Mr. Weiner, Ms. Quinn and Mr. Thompson have together raised at least $2 million from the real estate industry, more than one-fifth of the total $8.76 million raised this cycle by the trio as of Jan. 15, according to campaign finance records examined by The Observer. (Ms. Quinn and Mr. Thompson have not officially filed to run for mayor in the 2009 election.) This is about twice the amount raised by the three leading Democratic candidates at the same point in the 2001 race, the last time when there was no incumbent running and the leading Republican candidate, Michael Bloomberg, was self-financed.

The dollars seem to speak to the industry’s desire to have its voice heard in the corridors of City Hall at the very time when a confluence of forces that could work against real estate appears to be descending upon the city. The crisis in the credit markets is crimping the ability of would-be buyers and developers to find the needed cash to make deals; a possible national recession could lead to cuts in the financial services sector, decreasing the demand for office space; and a fatigue of large-scale development seems to be gripping many neighborhoods in the city, especially outside of Manhattan. It’s probably safe to assume that any political obstacles, such as added zoning restrictions or new regulations on landlords, for instance, would be especially unwelcome today.

And so it goes that developers, landlords, brokers and contractors have found a desire to donate, hoping that maybe when they phone over to City Hall in two years, the call might just be returned. If not, perhaps in the least the mayor will understand and look sympathetically upon the wants and needs of the mighty real estate industry.

A candidate could indeed win without the support of the industry, said former Mayor Ed Koch, citing his successful bid in 1977 as a prime example; but it’s not unusual that those in the industry offer large donations to all viable candidates.

“They don’t really care who wins so long as they think that they will have access,” Mr. Koch said.

With the city having a billionaire mayor the past six years, it’s been quite some time since real estate has had a chance to gain mayoral friends through donations.

“This is really the first time in a while that there’s been an opportunity for real estate to weigh in,” said Kenneth Fisher, a former Brooklyn city councilman and now a real estate attorney.

Mr. Bloomberg, whose views are often in line with those of the industry, did not accept any contributions in either of his campaigns; and the more pro-development Democratic candidates in 2001, Alan Hevesi and Peter Vallone, were seen as less viable, Mr. Fisher said. The industry gave less to the third leading Democratic candidate—and eventual nominee—Mark Green.

Now the industry seems ready to jump at the opening, lest candidates form antidevelopment platforms based on citywide woes about affordable housing and overdevelopment.

“You’ve got a different dynamic than New York has had at any time since parts of the 80’s, where there is a pushback against development,” Mr. Fisher said. “I think that’s what’s causing the real estate industry to mobilize.”

Furthermore, a change in the city’s campaign finance law has led those who do any business with the city to rush in with contributions, as starting next month their donations to mayoral candidates would be capped at $400, a pittance compared with the $4,950 allowed now. The law, which was pushed through the Council last year by the mayor and Ms. Quinn, applies to lobbyists and those that have pending zoning changes and other contracts with the city.

Surely aware of the coming restrictions, many developers poured money into campaigns citywide in the past six months, bringing their total donated to all campaigns far past the same point in previous elections.

“I think it’s the pressure of the campaign financing law, and the candidates, not just for mayor, are asking for money earlier than before,” the president of REBNY, Steven Spinola, said. “The dollars are going earlier because the candidates are pushing for it earlier.”

Employees of the Related Companies, for example, one of the city’s most active developers, led by REBNY’s chairman, Stephen Ross, donated more than $60,000 total to Ms. Quinn and Mr. Weiner, part of the $143,000 they gave to candidates citywide. Eight years earlier, in the 2001 election, Related employees contributed almost one-third of that, $53,950, to all citywide candidates.

But grabbing the crown for the most in contributions was Rudin Management, the longtime family-run firm led by Association for a Better New York chairman William Rudin. The firm, which gave $84,150 total to all three potential mayoral candidates and $194,000 citywide, is vying to build a 650,000-square-foot residential development as part of a new medical building at St. Vincent Medical Center in the Village (part of Ms. Quinn’s district).

Whatever the reasons, candidates are raising a tremendous amount from the real estate industry, with Ms. Quinn and Mr. Weiner each taking in about one-fourth of their donations from those in the real estate and construction industries. A tally of their donations, which lists donors’ employers, shows that Ms. Quinn raised at least $680,000 of her total $2.47 million from the industry; Mr. Weiner took in at least $915,000 of his $3.6 million. Mr. Thompson, who’s looked more to the financial industry than his potential rivals have, took in at least $400,000 from the real estate industry, about 14 percent of his total raised this cycle. (Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, exploring a mayoral candidacy, also has relied heavily on the real estate industry for the $850,000 he’s raised.)

And in raising such money, old feuds seem to be put to rest. Listed as an intermediary—or bundler—for Ms. Quinn was Jay Kriegel, the executive director of NYC2012. Now at Related, the onetime booster of the city’s failed Olympics bid brought in $27,595 for the onetime opponent of the West Side stadium that was central to the bid. Related is vying for numerous projects that would go before the City Council and mayor, including the redevelopment of Pier 40 and the West Side rail yards, both in Ms. Quinn’s district. Ms. Quinn has rejected money from lobbyists, though she accepts donations from those who do business with the city.

In a statement, Stefan Friedman, a consultant for Ms. Quinn, said they were proud that “nearly 2,000 donors support Chris from all industries and all walks of life.”

Messrs. Thompson and Weiner did not respond to requests for comment.

Federal Government Says That States Are Lowering Their Academic Proficiency Standards

October 30, 2009
Federal Researchers Find Lower Standards in Schools
By SAM DILLON, NY TIMES
LINK

A new federal study shows that nearly a third of the states lowered their academic proficiency standards in recent years, a step that helps schools stay ahead of sanctions under the No Child Left Behind law. But lowering standards also confuses parents about how children’s achievement compares with those in other states and countries.

The study, released Thursday, was the first by the federal Department of Education’s research arm to use a statistical comparison between federal and state tests to analyze whether states had changed their testing standards.

It found that 15 states lowered their proficiency standards in fourth- or eighth-grade reading or math from 2005 to 2007. Three states, Maine, Oklahoma and Wyoming, lowered standards in both subjects at both grade levels, the study said.

Eight states increased the rigor of their standards in one or both subjects and grades. Some states raised standards in one subject but lowered them in another, including New York, which raised the rigor of its fourth-grade-math standard but lowered the standard in eighth-grade reading, the study said.

“Over all, standards were more likely to be lower than higher,” in 2007, compared with the earlier year, said Peggy G. Carr, an associate commissioner at the department.

Under the No Child law, signed in 2002, all schools must bring 100 percent of students to the proficient level on states’ reading and math tests by 2014, and schools that fall short of rising annual targets face sanctions. In California, for instance, elementary schools must raise the percentage of students scoring above the proficient level by 11 percentage points every year from now through 2014.

Facing this challenge, the study found that some states had been redefining proficiency down, allowing a lower score on a state test to qualify as proficient.

“At a time when we should be raising standards to compete in the global economy, more states are lowering the bar than raising it,” Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said in a statement. “We’re lying to our children.”

The 15 states that lowered one or more standards were Delaware, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming. Eight that raised one or more standards were Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Missouri, Montana, New York, North Carolina, and Virginia.

Louis Fabrizio, a director at the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, said that under the No Child law, states face a dilemma. “When you set standards, do you want to show success under N.C.L.B. by having higher percentages of students at proficiency, in which case you’ll set lower standards?” Mr. Fabrizio asked. “Or do you want to do the right thing for kids, by setting them higher so they’re comparable with our global competitors?”

In the study, researchers compared the results of state tests and the National Assessment of Educational Progress in 2005 and 2007, identifying a score on the national assessment that was equivalent to each state’s definition of proficiency.

The study found wide variation among states, with standards highest in Massachusetts and South Carolina. Georgia, Oklahoma and Tennessee had standards that were among the lowest.

Forty-eight states are working cooperatively to create common academic standards. Authorities in Texas and Alaska declined to join the effort.

Russ Whitehurst, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said it was unlikely that the effort would soon produce a nationwide system that would allow parents and employers to easily compare test results from state to state, partly, he said, because “states would still have to agree on a common test.”

“And that’s heavy lifting,” Mr. Whitehurst said.

Mike Bloomberg's House of Cards

NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg and His House of Cards
Parentadvocates.org
LINK

New York City is overcome by corruption. Bloomberg LP is sued by women who have become pregnant while working there and who have been insulted and harassed because of their pregnancies. Then, this lawsuit disappears from PACER, the Federal Court online information resource. At least, I cant find it. In New York City, Mayor Bloomberg gets away with not being scarred by the Deutsche Bank fire, the falling cranes, African-American men shot by NYC police for no apparent probable cause, etc. And the press covers all of this up.

I think if your add up all the events of the past eight years in order to assess the job that Mayor Bloomberg has done in New York City, one thing you cannot fail to notice: in the press, Mike Bloomberg is a man of great leadership who has brought New York through bad times better than everyone who has preceded him and anyone who may become Mayor after him.

I just dont think so.

Betsy Combier


The Mayor's Press Pass
The unexamined world of Mike Bloomberg
By Tom Robbins, The Village Voice, October 27th 2009 at 1:51pm
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One reason for the remarkably charmed life of Mike Bloomberg's administration as he sails toward re-election has been the waning of the city's news business. This is an odd blessing for a man who made his fortune as a media mogul. But just ask Rudy Giuliani, or David Dinkins, or Ed Koch, and they'll painfully explain.

When this city enjoyed four fat daily newspapers, editors clamored for strong, tough copy to fill them. Whenever scandal hit—make that even a mini-scandal—each one scrambled after the story. Local TV news, which gets its morning bearings from the dailies, gleefully joined the hunt as well. This happy combination produced many full-strength media pile-ons and visible shivers in City Hall.

There was a keen reminder of this changed world when a man named Raymond Harding put himself back in the news this month by pleading guilty to fraud at the state's pension fund. Back in 1997, Harding, the boss of something called the Liberal Party, was the city's top lobbyist, his law firm raking in millions from clients seeking favors from Giuliani's City Hall. These were easy for Harding to arrange since he had personally invented Giuliani as a political player.

It took a while for the dailies to catch on to this scheme, but when they did, the effect was viral: They became a four-man tag team, taking turns serving up tales of greed and insider trading. Giuliani was then at the top of his game and delighted in telling off reporters. But he knew disaster when he saw it. Claiming ignorance that his mentor was making a fortune off his administration, he publicly chided his aides and ordered his pal to lay low.

These days, the papers are onion-skin thin, and exposés are catch as catch can. Newsday, which once gave rival editors panic attacks every morning, doesn't even have a city edition anymore. When Dinkins was in office, the Long Island tabloid investigated even the type of fertilizer he used on the Gracie Mansion lawn. Nowadays, to fill their meager space, editors prefer colorful yarns to investigations. Until this month, one newspaper carried an entire column about empty rooms. We have the Web, with all of its many hardworking blogs, but most of these spend their energies keeping political scorecards with all the obsession of fantasy baseball addicts: Who's on first, and what coaches are in the dugout? The business of government and its many failings goes largely unexamined.

Poor Ed Koch: He was trashed as a miserable miser in multiple front-page stories because he had some 2,000 homeless families sleeping in shelters. Mike Bloomberg has five times as many, and no one even knows about it.

It's not that there's no investigative spadework being done. What's missing is critical mass. Last week, the Daily News's Juan González delivered some excellent fodder for a full-scale media assault in City Hall's Blue Room. He reported that the mayor's billion-dollar plan to relocate the city's emergency 911 call system has become a fiasco. Not only has Bloomberg's team blown its budget and deadlines, but it has also ignored the findings of its own consultant, which found the project was mired in mismanagement. Rather than dump its lead contractor, as the consultant recommended, Bloomberg's top aides insisted that the plan go ahead as is—defects be damned.

This type of project is supposed to be smack in the mayor's sweet spot since it involves computers and communications, the business that made him the city's richest man. It should also be one of those instances where he runs rings around old-school politicians because of his keen business acumen. Instead, here he is, tripped up by the same cost overruns and bureaucrats that plague ordinary humans. Another mayor in another time might have suffered many tough questions the day after such information surfaced. Instead, only the News chased its own story.

The same thing happened this summer, when the Voice reported a scandal at the city's NYC-TV operation, where the top executive was fired and his deputy arrested ("Inside the Mayor's Studio: NYC-TV's Secrets of New York," August 4). Unlike the perennially tainted buildings department that has plagued every mayor, the problems at NYC-TV came from Bloomberg's own supporters. He had repeatedly hailed the station as an example of his innovative approach to government. But instead of minding the store, his aides had traipsed around the world, making their own private movie. This tale also failed to trip the press alarm that scrambles the media into action.



The big story late last week was the stunning court ruling on the illegal Stuyvesant Town rent hikes. But you'd never know from the coverage that Bloomberg had praised the original deal cut by landlord Tishman-Speyer (headed by one of his strongest allies). Or that his top aides had scotched a plan to keep Stuy Town affordable. Or that a hefty chunk of the financing for the deal came from Merrill Lynch, the late investment firm that was a top Bloomberg LP client and which the mayor was barred from dealing with under a Conflicts of Interest Board ruling. That story—told here in detail by Wayne Barrett just last month—also died an orphan.

Bloomberg's biggest claim to mayoral fame as he grabs for the third term that he used to insist he would never seek is his success at the business of education. This is a debate worth having. But Bloomberg consistently wins by default because the other side never fully shows up. As the legislature was considering the renewal of Bloomberg's mayoral control law this year, Brooklyn Assemblyman Jim Brennan issued six lengthy reports on the law's impact on the schools. They were detailed and thoughtful critiques on student achievement, school organization, and contracting. Asked recently how much press he received about them, Brennan paused. "I'm not sure there was any," he said.

There have been scattered stories about instances of grade inflation and test-score manipulations (again, with the News in the lead). The startlingly poor results of national student tests this month prompted even the Post, whose news pages have steadily cheered Bloomberg's education policies, to suggest that fraud was afoot somewhere. But the big picture still escapes us, along with whatever role was played by the education bureaucrats at the Tweed Courthouse.

At the mayor's annual Gracie Mansion Christmas party for the press last year, those in attendance report that Bloomberg took the stage to offer his idea of a joke. "I see that my three best friends in the media—Mort, Rupert, and Arthur—aren't here," he quipped. Then he walked out, right past the grunts who cover him all year.

Actually, the joke's on us. Even as newspaper fortunes sank in recent years, Bloomberg diligently courted media barons like Zuckerman, Murdoch, and Sulzberger, who he understood could make his life difficult if they so chose. Minus their support, as Joyce Purnick's new Bloomberg biography proves, he would have never risked his end run around term limits. But he knew he had little to fear. As Purnick's book also tells us, even his weekend disappearing act to go to his mansion in Bermuda has gone unchallenged.

"He does his radio show Friday morning," a former aide told her. "At 11:05, the latest, he's in his car. At 11:30 he is at the airport. His plane is in the air at 11:40, he's in Bermuda at 2:10. He's on the golf course by 2:30. . . . Almost every weekend, spring and fall."

There's a photo op that's been even more closely guarded than military caskets arriving at Dover Air Force Base: Mayor Mike, golf bags over his shoulder, striding across the tarmac toward Air Bloomberg.

trobbins@villagevoice.com



NYC's mismanaged plan to upgrade emergency system 2 years late, $700M over budget
Juan Gonzalez, NY Daily News, October 21st 2009, 8:38 AM
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EMS operators, who were to move into 11 MetroTech in March, have not done so because of bugs in Verizon's phone system, Skyler said.

Is it worth $2 billion if it saves lives in the future?
Yes, no cost can be put and no deadline set to to this project right.
No, the system is an out-of-control cash cow that will not help down the road.
Cost isn't an issue. What's taking so long?

Mayor Bloomberg's $1.3 billion plan to modernize the city's 911 system is two years late, plagued by poor management and bad equipment, and has ballooned in cost to more than $2 billion, the Daily News has learned.

Launched in the summer of 2005, the Emergency Communications Transformation Project was supposed to centralize call-and-dispatch operations for police, fire and emergency medical services into a single state-of-the-art computerized system.

Deputy Mayor Ed Skyler, who oversees the project, has called it one of the Bloomberg administration's top initiatives.

"We are taking the city's archaic 911 system into the 21st century," Skyler said.

But a host of problems dogged the project from the start - none of which s have been publicly acknowledged. Among them:

# Renovation of a single floor at 11 MetroTech in downtown Brooklyn, primary location of the new 911 operation, skyrocketed from $80 million to $166 million.

# Construction and outfitting of a second 911 center in the Bronx doubled to $1 billion. The site, to be done by 2013, will be the city's backup emergency communications center in case the Brooklyn site is destroyed. City Hall kept the price down by scrapping floors earmarked for a second emergency center.

# NYPD operators, who were to move into the Brooklyn 911 center March 1, 2008, will not relocate there until next March, Skyler said. That's because subcontractor Motorola failed to give the NYPD an adequate computer software dispatch system. The city recouped $32 million from that and got another vendor.

# EMS operators, who were to move into 11 MetroTech in March, have not done so because of bugs in Verizon's phone system, Skyler said.

Only fire dispatchers from Brooklyn, Staten Island and Manhattan have relocated into the new 911 center.

"Each of the agencies - fire, police and EMS - keeps resisting the merger and making new demands," said a city official who has been on the project for years.

Because of historic conflicts between the three departments, City Hall gave the projects to the techies at the Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications.

DoITT's commissioner at the time, Gino Menchini, gave Hewlett-Packard a $380 million contract to oversee a consortium of vendors that would design and erect the new system. Those vendors included Northrop Grumman, Verizon and Motorola.

Within months, virtually every aspect of the project was experiencing delays. Costs started to mushroom, with scores of computer consultants coming on board, many at annual salaries of $300,000 to $500,000.

Things fell so far behind schedule the city asked its quality control consultant, Gartner Group, to find out what was happening.

Gartner's report, issued to top officials in March 2007, said the city was "losing $2 million a month," from mismanagement.

It called the ballooning costs of a new "logging and recording system" for the NYPD "ludicrous."

A few weeks later, DoITT Commissioner Paul Cosgrave urged Skyler in a secret memo to dump Hewlett-Packard.

"DoITT has recommended and our partners at NYPD and FDNY have concurred that we should put the ECTP contract up for rebid," Cosgrave wrote.

In an April 13, 2007, memo, Skyler overruled Cosgrave and ordered that all major components of the project be completed or underway "by the end of 2009," which happened to be the end of Bloomberg's second term in office. That was before the mayor decided to overturn term limits and run again.

"Achieving these goals will make it very difficult for a future administration to cancel this project and, conversely, not achieving them will put this vital public-safety initiative at risk," Skyler wrote.

"NYPD will move into the new [Public Safety Answering Center] 1 by March 1, 2008," Skyler wrote. "FDNY and EMS will move in by March 1, 2009," and he ordered groundbreaking on the Bronx site by July 1, 2009.

Of all deadlines, only the Fire Department has even come close.

"There have been challenges that we've overcome," Skyler said. "It's an ambitious project. We are trying to bring together the different demands or requirements from agencies that never worked together in this area.

"Would we like it to be faster and less expensive? Yes, but we are making progress."

jgonzalez@nydailynews.com



FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PR- 200-09
May 6, 2009

MAYOR BLOOMBERG ANNOUNCES MAJOR PROGRESS IN TRANSFORMATION OF 911 EMERGENCY SYSTEM
LINK

Streamlined Call-taking Process Will Reduce the Time to Dispatch Emergency Units

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg today announced that the first phase of integrated call taking operations between the Police and Fire Departments have been successfully implemented in the City’s 911 centers. Unified Call Taking streamlines the call taking process to reduce call handling time for fire calls and allow first responders to reach New Yorkers in an emergency more quickly. This change will affect over 180,000 911 calls per year. Unified Call Taking is the most significant accomplishment to-date of the City’s Emergency Communications Transformation Program (ECTP), which is designed to centralize and integrate the call taking and dispatch operations among the NYPD, FDNY, and FDNY EMS.

“Now when you call 911 to report a fire, you will speak to only to one call taker, and give the address and nature of your emergency only one time,” said Mayor Bloomberg. “By cutting out the middle-man in the process, we will shorten the time it takes for the Fire Department to begin its response to emergencies, which could save lives. I want to thank the inter-agency team whose hard work and cooperation made these improvements possible.”

“Police Communications Technicians– already trained to field different types of police emergencies – are now equipped to begin the dispatch process for emergency situations that require FDNY response,” said Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly. “Last year they handled 11.3 million 911 calls, so eliminating mere seconds means more New Yorkers can get help sooner, and ultimately translates into lives saved.”

“Seconds count in an emergency, and this new procedure will save seconds, and ultimately save lives,” said Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta. “By streamlining the call-taking process, we can dispatch our first responders more quickly and improve the vital life-saving service they provide to New Yorkers.”

“The true promise of technology is realized when it is used to improve lives for the better, and Unified Call Taking is among the City’s most transformative IT projects in this regard,” said Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications Commissioner Paul Cosgrave. “This initiative is a critical step in putting world-class emergency call taking and dispatch tools in the hands of our first responders as they serve and protect New Yorkers.”

Under the old system, when an emergency caller phoned 911, the call was answered by an NYPD call taker who collected caller and incident information. If the caller was reporting a fire, the police call taker would initiate a conference call with an FDNY call taker and repeat the process. The FDNY Call Taker would collect similar FDNY-related information from the caller and forward that information to a third person, an FDNY Dispatcher, to trigger the appropriate response.

Under Unified Call Taking, improved technology and training allow the police call taker to collect both NYPD and FDNY incident information and then electronically share and coordinate the appropriate emergency response with dispatchers from either agency, which allows the caller to give the information one time to one call taker, rather than multiple times to multiple call takers. This elimination of a redundant step for FDNY calls saves time in processing the caller’s critical information and will reduce the overall response to the call.

The implementation of Unified Call Taking is the first major milestone of the Emergency Communications Transformation Program (ECTP) , a multi-year initiative to enhance call taking and dispatch operations for NYPD, FDNY and FDNY EMS. Under the program, each agency will benefit from upgraded computer dispatch systems, improved integration and data sharing between agencies, new 911 telephony networks and software, and other significant improvements.

“This project is an innovative collaboration between the NYPD and FDNY and is a testament to the vision, professionalism and effective cooperation of our public safety agencies in supporting the needs of New Yorkers,” said Deputy Mayor for Operations Edward Skyler. “Unified Call Taking is a major step forward in our Emergency Communications Transformation Program, and it is a tremendous accomplishment.”

In 2006, Mayor Bloomberg asked Deputy Mayor Edward Skyler to chair an Emergency Communications Transformation Project working group to set goals, speed-up decision-making, and monitor the progress of this important public safety initiative. The working group is staffed by the Police, Fire, Citywide Administrative Services, Information Technology & Telecommunications, and Design and Construction departments as well as the Offices of Management and Budget and Labor Relations. The working group deals with all aspects of the project, from site and technology acquisition, interagency protocols and facility management.

After Unified Call Taking, the next major milestone in the Emergency Communications Transformation Program is the creation of the first Public Safety Answering Center (PSAC 1) in Brooklyn. That facility, which combines the call-taking and dispatching operations of the Police and Fire Departments, will be fully staffed by the fall.

A second, backup, Public Safety Answering Center (PSAC 2) will be built in the Bronx. Each PSAC facility will have the capacity to support the entirety of the City’s 911 operations in the event of an emergency. Construction on the Bronx site is expected to begin later this year.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Stu Loeser/Jason Post (212) 788-2958

Mike Bloomberg's Plans For New York City Dont Always Work Out

Developers knocked down a shopping mall to make way for the grand City Point development: new apartments, a retail boulevard, a tower of commercial space. It has yet to materialize.

October 29, 2009
Engine of Bloomberg’s Plan Stalled
By RUSS BUETTNER and RAY RIVERA, NY TIMES

Over the past seven years, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has presided over a historic re-envisioning of New York City, one that loosened the reins on development across the boroughs and pushed more than 100 rezoning measures through a City Council that stamped them all into law.

His administration poured $16 billion into financing to foster commercial development and affordable housing and created quasi-local organizations to promote its initiatives and blunt neighborhood opposition.

And when the economy was burning white hot, as it did for several years, the mayor’s plan appeared to be bold and forward-looking, a prescient decision to remake portions of the city in order to lure companies, create jobs and increase economic vitality.

But that vitality is missing in some sections of New York today, where developments spurred in part by easy credit and in part by city initiatives are now stalled or in danger of collapse.

No question, the upheaval in the real estate world was primarily caused by a recession that Mr. Bloomberg had no role in starting and no power to stop. But Mr. Bloomberg has campaigned as a business visionary, better suited than most to lead in tough times, and any review of his term needs to confront his embrace of development as a stimulus tool.

Administration officials say their development initiatives created jobs and housing and revitalized moribund areas, like downtown Jamaica, Queens. Across the city, residential construction doubled under Mr. Bloomberg, to more than 30,000 units a year from 2004 through 2008, before slowing this year.

Construction spending has also doubled since he took office, reaching a high of $32 billion in 2008, according to the New York City Building Congress. The organization projects a 20 percent drop this year.

And if the skyline seems little changed despite the rezoning of some 8,400 blocks, the impact can be seen in old, outlying factory neighborhoods where new housing has risen, or in places like Flushing, Queens, and the Bronx, where signature new baseball stadiums were built.

But things have not gone according to plan in neighborhoods like Downtown Brooklyn, which was rezoned to foster development of new office towers to compete with New Jersey. None have gone up, and other projects, like City Point, a commercial, retail and apartment complex on Fulton Street, have stalled.

Daniel L. Doctoroff, who served as Mr. Bloomberg’s deputy mayor for economic development, said it was naïve to view the initiatives in the short term.



“It’s always tempting to sit there and say, ‘Here we are, we’re at the depth of a recession, and therefore, look at all this stuff, it didn’t make sense,’ ” he said. “That is the kind of thinking that has proven time and time again to be completely fallacious when you look at New York City history.”

Ron Shiffman, a former city planning commissioner, said a flaw in the mayor’s approach was its failure to do enough to reap public benefits from a real estate industry he had so readily fostered.

“He didn’t steer the boom,” Mr. Shiffman said. “He did not direct it in such a way that it benefited a more diverse set of populations in the city of New York, and more diverse income groups. It was basically developer-driven.”

Remapping the Future

The administration’s economic development policies started with a simple concept: New York must grow to compete with other cities.

Development became the means toward that end. Create new opportunities for developers, the wisdom held, and good things will happen for New York as a whole. Companies will rush to glorious new towers in reinvented neighborhoods, diversifying the city’s economy in the process.

Many mayors have favored the real estate industry, whose campaign contributions are often generous. Mr. Bloomberg lobbied forcefully for developers even though he did not need their money.

“I think a mistake that mayors have made,” said Seth W. Pinsky, president of the city’s Economic Development Corporation, “is that they’ve really only been willing to push projects where they would be around to cut the ribbon to open the project, and what this mayor has done is to take the long-term view.”

The first obstacle to remaking the city was the lack of available parcels for large-scale development. Rezoning became the solution, Mr. Doctoroff said. He had headed the committee that sought to bring the Olympics to the city and had become familiar with largely undeveloped tracts outside the Manhattan core, like sites along the Brooklyn waterfront.

“That sort of became the genesis for the effort,” he said in a 2007 interview.

The effort became the most extensive rezoning in modern city history. Sections in all the boroughs were rezoned to boost their development potential. Fallow factory sites were recast as places for housing or office towers as the city confronted the idea that it was no longer a manufacturing center. At the same time, the city reduced allowable densities in many neighborhoods that were troubled by illegal or unpopular development.

The City Council adopted every rezoning without major revision. So far, one-fifth of the city has been rezoned.

The development zeal was driven by a projection that the city’s population would grow by one million by 2030.

The city hired two consulting firms at a cost of more than $1.5 million to explore how the extra people could be accommodated. Drawing from that work, the administration created its vision for the future, known as PlaNYC, which was released by the mayor on Earth Day 2007 and included a host of environmental initiatives, like planting a million trees.

“Let’s face up to the fact that our population growth is putting our city on a collision course with the environment, which itself is growing more unstable and uncertain,” Mr. Bloomberg said at the time. “To accommodate nearly a million more New Yorkers, we are going to have to create hundreds of thousands of new homes.”

Seeding Progress

New York City has frequently used money to spur development. Under Mr. Bloomberg, the city drastically increased the low-cost financing it made available to developers, in part because Mr. Doctoroff, a former investment banker, recognized the unrealized potential in some of the city’s balance sheets.

Most of the infusion cost little or nothing to taxpayers. It came in the form of low-interest loans to developers, with money raised by issuing bonds.

The Housing Development Corporation, for example, a public benefit corporation intended to foster affordable-housing construction, has issued $8.1 billion in bonds to support development under Mr. Bloomberg, more than triple the total issued during the administration of Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani.

Another quasi-public agency, the Industrial Development Agency, has authorized more than $6.1 billion in new debt since Mr. Bloomberg took office — about 50 percent more than during Mr. Giuliani’s tenure. The largest pieces of that package helped finance new baseball stadiums for the Yankees and the Mets.

The figures for both agencies do not include Liberty Bonds, which were part of the 9/11 federal aid package.

Legally, the city is not responsible for debt incurred by its public benefit corporations, even in the unlikely event that the underlying projects and other financial institutions involved in the bond transactions collapsed. But officials said the city could feel compelled to help bondholders so as to protect the ratings on its other bonds.

“For all practical purposes, if H.D.C. went belly-up, there would be some expectation of the city making good on it,” said Doug Turetsky, a spokesman for the city’s nonpartisan Independent Budget Office.

At times, urban planners have questioned whether the Bloomberg administration has gone overboard in offering incentives to developers. The Hudson Yards on the West Side of Manhattan have been looked at successively as a potential Olympic venue, a football stadium and now an urban village. And the city, through a specially created authority, has issued $2.1 billion in debt to pay for the extension of the No. 7 subway line to the area.

The debt is supposed to be paid from taxes generated by the new development, but if no development occurs, the city could be on the hook for $100 million a year in payments.

A 2007 report by the New York City Bar Association said the Hudson Yards financing scheme “bears an eerie resemblance to the development of Battery Park City,” which nearly defaulted and helped plunge the city into a fiscal crisis in the 1970s. And, it asked, if development of the West Side is inevitable, “why should costly artificial economic incentives be offered to encourage that development?”

Mr. Bloomberg’s Democratic challenger in next Tuesday’s election, Comptroller William C. Thompson, has said the mayor focuses too much on large developments that go to favored builders who receive wasteful subsidies.

When the new Yankee Stadium came up in Tuesday night’s debate, he said: “This is just another example of a giveaway, of the mayor’s giveaway to another one of his developer friends in the city,”

Bloomberg officials say that much of their lending was done to build or preserve 165,000 units of what the administration considers to be affordable housing, an ambitious plan for which the mayor has received many accolades. They point to vastly reinvented areas outside Manhattan’s wealthy core, like the Melrose section of the Bronx, where city financing underwrote new housing developments.

But some of the housing has been for families earning more than $100,000 a year, and some of the income limits expire after 15 years. The Housing Development Corporation has also provided hundreds of millions of dollars in financing that, in the view of advocates for moderately priced housing, subsidized market-rate apartments because the developers enjoyed outsize savings in exchange for a small number of lower-income units.

Marc Jahr, president of the corporation, said that nearly half of the 43,000 apartments it has financed through the mayor’s affordable housing program had been for people who earned 60 percent or less of the area’s median income, or about $46,000 a year for a family of four.

“We think that’s a good, balanced housing plan,” he said, “and one that’s important to the neighborhoods and important to the city to sustain over time.”

Some housing advocates say the gain in moderately priced housing units has been offset by the loss of 200,000 apartments that switched back to market rates under state rent-regulation laws that they say Mr. Bloomberg did not push Albany to change.

“Everyone will admit that New York City can’t build its way out of its affordable housing crisis,” said Mario Mazzoni, lead organizer at the Metropolitan Council on Housing, a tenants’ rights organization. “If you are talking about building affordable housing, the way they conceive of it is as a massive subsidy to developers.”

Grass Roots

Redevelopment can look easy on paper, but there are always neighborhood concerns, even in a place like Willets Point, a 62-acre industrial shanty town of body shops and scrap yards near the Mets’ stadium in Queens. The administration viewed it as an area ripe for economic development if the 225 existing businesses could be cleared.

But such ambitions had flummoxed city planners for decades. No less a builder than Robert Moses had been unable to make room in the area for the 1964 World’s Fair.

Mr. Doctoroff was determined to do better, through a local business group, the Flushing-Willets Point Local Development Corporation, which received half its money from the city. But about half the group’s money was spent doing something not allowed under state law: lobbying city officials. The group’s lobbying, has led to an investigation by the attorney general’s office.

That investigation has expanded into the activities of the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, which the city helped create in 2006 to help push through development plans following a broad rezoning of the area.

The city awarded the group a $6 million three-year no-bid contract. The group raised another $1.1 million in private donations, tax records show. And Mr. Doctoroff installed a top aide, Joe Chan, to run it. The partnership has become a key voice for the development of Downtown Brooklyn, inserting itself, critics say, into the debate over a plan to build a Nets area and high-rises at the Atlantic Yards. It has spent some $200,000 on lobbying expenses. Councilman Lewis A. Fidler complained last year that the partnership was using public funds to promote Bloomberg’s congestion-pricing plan.

Citing the investigation, city officials declined to discuss the Brooklyn group’s lobbying, as did Mr. Chan.

A Dream Falls Short

For years, Downtown Brooklyn resembled the textbook definition of back-office space. Class B. Schleppy. No buzz.

Even after the MetroTech development began to emerge in the 1980s, and with it came major corporations like Chase and KeySpan, the core commercial district excited few people.

In 2004, sparked by a push from local business leaders, the city rezoned 22 blocks. The new zoning anticipated 4.5 million square feet of office and commercial space that might keep businesses from moving to New Jersey, as well as 1,000 new apartments. There were hopes for 18,500 new office jobs and 8,000 construction jobs.

Today, much of this future remains unrealized. There are no new office towers. Luxury apartment buildings went up, but many units remain unsold and retail space is unrented, victims of the downturn and a construction glut.

“It seems like in a lot of places, the attitude has been like a field of dreams: If you zone it, they will come,” said Robert Perris, district manager of Brooklyn Community Board 2, which includes the downtown area. “It’s been kind of a mixed bag here.”

Indeed, companies like Bear Stearns have disappeared. Others, like JPMorgan Chase & Company, have downsized their Brooklyn operations. New condo buildings are cutting prices. Several planned projects are stalled as empty lots. Across the city, officials say, the recession has contributed to the stopping of work at about 450 projects.

James Whelan, the former head of the Downtown Brooklyn Council, which created the rezoning plan, sees the new residential development, especially along Flatbush Avenue, which developers once ignored, as an early sign of success. “Is there a commercial office tower built as part of the Downtown Brooklyn plan as we sit here today?” Mr. Whelan said. “No. When is it going to be built? It’s not clear. But as history shows, development is a long-term issue in New York City.”

A similar predicament is evident in Greenpoint and Williamsburg, two old, industrial waterfront neighborhoods in Brooklyn. A 2005 rezoning set off speculation that sent land prices rising to Manhattan levels. Gleaming glass-and-steel structures went up. Now many of them are nearly empty. Other projects foundered on shaky financing.

Now the administration is working to rescue struggling projects. The long-stalled City Point development is to get $20 million in recovery bonds.

In July, when scores of other new condominiums were not selling, and developers risked default, Mr. Bloomberg and the Council stepped in to announce a $20 million pilot program to buy the empty units and use them as affordable housing.

“Private developments that sit vacant or unfinished could have a destabilizing effect on our neighborhoods, but we’re not about to let that happen,” said Mr. Bloomberg.

Actually, Mr. Bloomberg most likely fostered some of the real estate speculation with policies that invited development. But even those who say the mayor’s development record is mixed credit him for taking a long view.

“For good or bad, the rezonings will probably be his most significant development legacy,” said Jonathan Bowles, director of the Center for an Urban Future, an independent research group. “They’ve never got as much attention as the large-scale development projects he was pushing, like the Olympic stadium, but the rezonings are what will ultimately transform a large chunk of the city. Developers will be rebuilding on these for years to come.”

Charles V. Bagli and Jo Craven McGinty contributed reporting.

March 26, 2008
Ex-Official Cleared to Continue Work on Big City Projects
By PATRICK McGEEHAN and RAY RIVERA, NY TIMES

The city’s Conflicts of Interest Board cleared the way Tuesday for Daniel L. Doctoroff, who left City Hall for a private position two months ago, to remain involved in a range of city projects that were begun while he was deputy mayor for economic development.

In response to a request from the Bloomberg administration, the board gave its approval for Mr. Doctoroff to remain on the boards of the Hudson River Park Trust and the Governors Island Preservation and Education Corporation, and to serve as an unpaid adviser on the proposed Moynihan Station and Queens West projects.

The board, whose five members are mayoral appointees, also approved Mr. Doctoroff’s participation in the mayor’s sweeping environmental initiatives collectively known as PlaNYC, which includes his congestion pricing plan.

The board’s decision underscores a reality that has often been noted in the city’s development community: Mr. Doctoroff may have left City Hall, but he remains a participant in — and has a big influence over — what is going to be built.

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg made it clear that he would continue to rely on Mr. Doctoroff’s expertise on development issues when he announced in December that Mr. Doctoroff was stepping down from his city position to take over as president of Bloomberg L.P., the financial and media giant the mayor founded. Mr. Doctoroff’s last day in office was Jan. 11.

It is not unprecedented for former city officials to be involved with public projects, but in the case of Mr. Doctoroff, the city’s longest-serving deputy mayor for economic development, the list is so long and varied that city officials and even some who serve on boards with him have expressed confusion about his roles. In response, City Hall circulated a memo in January advising city employees how to interact with him.

For a year after leaving public service, former officials are strictly prohibited from appearing before any city agency within the branch of government where they served; the ban is even longer if the subject is one in which the official was directly involved. The prohibitions do not apply, however, if the official is appearing on behalf of the mayor or another government agency.

Some questions about Mr. Doctoroff’s future role remain unanswered.

The board’s 10-page opinion did not address his participation in development decisions about the West Side railyards, known as Hudson Yards, although the city had asked for a ruling on the matter.

John Gallagher, a spokesman for the mayor’s office, said the board did not address that issue after Mr. Doctoroff decided against seeking to remain chairman of the Hudson Yards Development Corporation, the public benefit corporation working on the project with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Rather than retain the mayorally appointed position, he decided to seek to stay on as an adviser. The development corporation has asked the conflicts board for a ruling on that as well, a decision that is pending, Mr. Gallagher said.

Mr. Doctoroff has been a key negotiator in the selection of a developer on the Hudson Yards project. Mr. Gallagher said that because Mr. Doctoroff served on the transportation authority’s selection panel as a private citizen, he did not need a waiver from the conflicts board. But he was appointed to that panel by the Hudson Yards Development Corporation when he was its chairman, and he held the chairmanship through his office as deputy mayor.

On Wednesday, the transportation authority is expected to grant development rights over the railyards, a 26-acre slice of Manhattan overlooking the Hudson River, to Tishman Speyer, one of Manhattan’s largest real estate operators.

Mr. Doctoroff met during the week of March 10 with the teams of developers competing for the billion-dollar project, according to members of the teams, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they did not want to offend Mr. Doctoroff.

Even after he left later on a business trip to Asia, Mr. Doctoroff remained in constant contact with the selection committee throughout the deliberations.

A spokeswoman for Bloomberg L.P. said Mr. Doctoroff was still in Asia on Tuesday and declined to make him available for comment. In an interview last month, however, Mr. Doctoroff dismissed the notion that there might be a conflict of interest between his continuing work for the city and his new role at Bloomberg.

“Certainly, if I felt it was going to create conflict that I thought was going to be harmful to the company, I wouldn’t do it, and I’d be the same way with the city,” he said. “If there was a conflict, I just wouldn’t do it.”

At the time of that Feb. 22 interview, Mr. Doctoroff also insisted that his involvement with the city had been limited since leaving office. He said he had spent just eight hours in meetings about city matters, including congestion pricing and Moynihan Station. That did not include the recent railyard negotiations.

“I care deeply about these projects, I care deeply about the city, despite the fact I don’t work there anymore,” Mr. Doctoroff said in the interview. “I have, in some cases, spent six years on some of these things, and so you know if I’m needed, I’m going to help.”

The opinion issued on Tuesday limits the role he can play in matters involving Vornado Realty, which owns the building housing the Bloomberg L.P. headquarters. The company is negotiating with Vornado for additional space.

The board said that given Mr. Doctoroff’s knowledge, it was best for the city for Mr. Doctoroff to continue his involvement with the Moynihan Station plans. Vornado is a developer of the station project and was one of the companies vying to develop the railyards with whom Mr. Doctoroff met earlier this month. On March 12, Mr. Doctoroff met with the Vornado chairman, Steven Roth, and the M.T.A. selection panel, and last Friday with David Greenbaum, a top Vornado executive.

The opinion advises Mr. Doctoroff to recuse himself from any discussions between Bloomberg L.P. and Vornado for one year from the date of the conclusion of the Moynihan Station negotiations, and from all dealings involving Vornado or Bloomberg L.P. in any of the other projects addressed in the ruling.

Gene Russianoff, a senior lawyer for the New York Public Interest Research Group, said he agreed with much of the ruling but was troubled by the absence of the railyards and the station exception.

“I can see recusing himself from landlord-tenant matters with Vornado, but is Vornado going to say, ‘O.K., we’re going to jack up the rent when we’re trying to make some kind of deal over Moynihan,’ ” Mr. Russianoff said.

Charles V. Bagli contributed reporting.

Holding Mayor Bloomberg Accountable by Brian D'Agostino, PH.D

Brian D'Agostino is a social scientist, author, and educator. He was a New York City public school teacher for eleven years and served as a United Federation of Teachers chapter leader. Brian is currently an independent statistical and policy analyst; visit him at Brian D'Agostino, PH.D

Michael Bloomberg claims to have revolutionized and brought accountability to a vast, dysfunctional public school system. The Obama administration believes him, and promotes his education reforms as a model for the country. But the billionaire mayor’s Democratic challenger Bill Thompson and other critics with insider knowledge are contesting these claims. Thompson was president of the city’s Board of Education the six years before Bloomberg was first elected in 2001, and served as city Comptroller for the last eight.

Bloomberg’s campaign has produced three glossy mailings that favorably compare his eight years of school reform with Thompson’s record as Board president. The mayor claims that he “eliminated wasteful bureaucracy that was doing nothing to educate our kids” and attacks Thompson for supporting “a plan to create more bureaucracy in the schools,” citing several New York Times articles from December 1996. But the plan described in these articles simply gave the chancellor some hiring and firing authority over 32 district superintendents, who had previously reported solely to their local school boards. Bloomberg knows very well this was a necessary corrective for local corruption and patronage politics. Referring to the plan, the Times’ editors wrote: “For the first time in years, New York City can have real hope about its public school system.”

While Thompson helped lay this foundation for further improvement, what Bloomberg added to it was, well, bureaucracy. The 2002 legislation establishing mayoral control had retained the local school districts and simply gave the mayor authority to hire the chancellor and a majority of the Board of Education. Not content to share power with local communities, as required under the legislation, Bloomberg and his chancellor Joel Klein dismantled the 32 district offices and created a centralized bureaucracy with ten regional superintendents, about a hundred “local instructional supervisors” under them, and an army of math and literacy “coaches” to enforce the new top-down instructional mandates in all the schools.

The “wasteful bureaucracy” that Bloomberg claimed to have eliminated was in the 32 district offices, which had provided administrative services to schools and gave parents and local communities access to power when problems could not be solved at the school level. The services for the most part were not provided by the new bureaucracy, and were either added to the workload of school staff or contracted out to private vendors paid out of school budgets. Meanwhile, the new “parent coordinator” in each school was no substitute for being able to voice concerns to a local school superintendent having authority over principals and curriculum.

And what happened to the $100 million saved from dismantling the “bureaucracy” in the districts? According to The New York Times (5/9/03), it was used to pay for a new bureaucracy, including the coaches and parent coordinators who reported up the chain of command to City Hall. Klein and Bloomberg say the money was “put into the classroom,” but it was not used to reduce class sizes or purchase needed materials; the role of the coaches and parent coordinators was to extend mayoral power into the schools.

Measuring School Performance



Bloomberg, of course, presents all of this as a bold and needed makeover of a system that was failing to deliver quality instruction. His ads claim that he holds students, teachers and principals accountable for progress, while Bill Thompson was, according to the New York Observer, “asleep on the job” as president of the Board of Ed. But the Observer comment referred to a lapse by Thompson in monitoring the school construction budget. That failure, and Bloomberg’s separate allegation that his rival “wasted over $4 billion in taxpayer money,” were almost certainly exceeded by the mayor’s billions of dollars in misallocated school funds and no-bid contracts.

As for elementary and middle school performance, Bloomberg claims that math and reading scores went up on his watch (the latter by 27.5 percentage points) while Thompson allegedly saw a 2.2 point drop in reading scores, and no improvement in math. These figures were cherry picked for purposes of the Bloomberg campaign, taken out of context, and calculated using misleading or incorrect assumptions.



By contrast, James F. Brennan, senior member of the New York State Assembly Education Committee, made an impartial and comprehensive comparison of school performance before and after the mayor’s reforms (in NYC Schools Under Bloomberg and Klein, 2009). Brennan examined New York City math and reading scores, both fourth and eighth grade, from 1998 (the first year New York State collected the data) through 2008. He found that New York City fourth graders showed more improvement on these state tests during the period under Thompson, while the city’s eighth graders showed more improvement under Bloomberg. But that is not the whole story.

It is well known that the state tests have been subject to grade inflation. A much more reliable measure, according to experts, is the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). Brennan notes that the NAEP results confirm the gains that occurred under Thompson, but not those under Bloomberg. In fact, out of ten urban districts, New York’s eighth graders dropped from second place to sixth on the NAEP reading tests during the first four years of Bloomberg’s reforms.

According to education expert Diane Ravitch, Klein should have concluded from the NAEP results that the curriculum he imposed on the entire city wasn’t working and that he needed to reduce class sizes. But Klein’s response was to disregard the data, and instead make the discredited state tests the centerpiece of his new accountability system for students, teachers, and schools. When scores on these tests spiked in 2009, Klein awarded “A” and “B” grades to 97% of the city’s elementary and middle schools. As in the past, the state’s NAEP scores released less than six weeks later shattered these illusions.

And what about the high schools? In July 2009, a Comptroller Office’s report called into question the improved graduation rate cited by Bloomberg. For 10% of student records audited, schools failed to properly document completion of all graduation requirements. In addition, schools routinely awarded students redundant credits for passing the same course more than once and were often lax in their procedures for reversing failing course grades. In comments on these findings, Comptroller Thompson said, “The mayor’s managerial style has created an incentive for schools to graduate students whether or not they have met the necessary requirements,” and he called Bloomberg’s Education Department “the Enron of American Education.”

Thompson’s report may have caused the Bloomberg campaign to omit the city’s graduation rate and instead to provide in their mailings only the dropout rate, which they claim declined by 6.5 percentage points between the classes of 2006 and 2007, while increasing 4 points under Thompson. But the Comptroller’s audit also calls into question Bloomberg’s official dropout rate; at least 6% of students sampled should have been counted as dropouts in the class of 2007 and were not.

Nor is it clear what the increased dropout rate under Thompson really means. The Daily News (9/19/09) said it reflected the introduction of more rigorous graduation policies during the same time period. This is ironic in light of the mayor’s claim that Thompson “did nothing to end social promotion.”

Finally, the mayor’s mailings say school crime went down 44% under his watch while “School Violence Soared” under Thompson. But neither of the sources cited—the New York Post (6/19/09) on Bloomberg’s record and the Daily News (9/18/95) on Thompson’s—support these claims. I searched the entire Post issue and could not find a single reference to school crime. And the News editorial on school violence appeared ten months before Thompson became president of the Board of Education. It is interesting that both these bloopers pertain to the Bloomberg campaign’s most emotionally charged school issue: public safety. More on that later.

School Reform: Image and Reality

The unsubstantiated, misleading, or false claims in these mailings are part of a larger pattern. The mayor and his chancellor preside over a formidable propaganda machine. Since taking office, Joel Klein has at least quadrupled his public relations staff, which has access to the DOE’s vast information resources. He also chairs the Fund for Public Schools, a non-profit group that has spent millions on subway, bus, radio, and TV ads promoting his record. Supportive media elites include Daily News publisher Mort Zuckerman—a vice chair of the Fund—and New York Post publisher Rupert Murdoch, whose wife Wendi serves on its board. Klein’s Tweed Courthouse headquarters produces a continuous flow of supposedly objective information that dominates mainstream media and opinion, from the streets of New York to White House policymakers.

Tweed Courthouse

But a growing body of literature challenges the Bloomberg/Klein brand and its image of New York City as the world’s epicenter of successful school reform. One book of eye-opening articles is NYC Schools Under Bloomberg and Klein: What Parents, Teachers, and Policymakers Need to Know (2009), available as a free download from Lulu Press. The racial achievement gap, policing of the schools, class size, and Bloomberg’s initiatives regarding small schools and accountability are just few of the chapters.

In July 2008, addressing the U.S. House Committee on Education and Labor, Bloomberg and Klein reported dramatic progress in closing the racial achievement gap. The Jennings and Pallas article in NYC Schools shows that these claims, based on proficiency data, are misleading. A proficiency rate only measures the percentage of students who meet an arbitrary “cut score.” This percentage is unaffected by the performance of students who already exceed the score or fail to meet it. Using proficiency rates to measure performance gives teachers an incentive to work with students just below the cut score at the expense of the majority. Proficiency rates will then improve, even if overall school performance deteriorates.

Based on proficiency rates, Bloomberg and Klein made the misleading claim that they decreased the racial achievement gap in math and reading scores for 4th and 8th graders, including a 50% gap reduction in 8th grade reading scores. But average scale scores, which measure the performance of all students, show that the gap actually widened (by as much as 22%) in all categories except 8th grade reading. There the gap reduction was 6%, not 50% as advertised. And that was little cause for celebration, since the city’s 8th graders as a whole lost ground on the more rigorous NAEP reading test. Black and Hispanic students simply lost less ground than their white and Asian classmates.

The same administration that produced these outcomes put policies into place that continue to adversely affect minority students. Civil rights activist and NAACP official Hazel Dukes has an article in NYC Schools that addresses some of these policies. One of them involved admissions criteria for gifted and talented programs. Research has shown that multiple criteria provide a better guide to future student performance than test scores alone. Disregarding this research, the chancellor required local school districts to discontinue multiple criteria, beginning in October 2007, and to exclusively use high stakes tests with uniform cut scores. Experts had warned Klein to no avail that this policy would particularly hurt minority applicants.

As predicted, in Fall 2008, there was a sharp decline in black and Hispanic admissions—with the percentage of black students admitted to gifted and talented programs falling from 31% to 13%. Five predominantly minority school districts lost their programs altogether. Klein pursued similar policies with similar results at the high school level, requiring Staten Island Technical High School and smaller, newer magnet schools to adopt high stakes testing as their sole admissions criterion. He also presided over a 26% decrease in enrollment between 2006 and 2008 in after school and Saturday programs to help high-needs students wanting to apply to magnet schools.

With Black and Hispanic students losing academic ground, conditions in predominantly minority schools are deteriorating. Failing to proactively address the needs of students, the administration relies instead on a heavy police presence to maintain public safety. Although student enrollment has declined under Bloomberg, the number of security officers—employees of the NYPD—increased to 5,200, giving the school system the nation’s 5th largest police force. More police are deployed for New York City’s one million students than for the entire 2.2 million population of Houston.

An article by civil liberties advocate Udi Offer describes the result: the criminalizing of children, especially minorities and those with special needs. In separate incidents in 2007, two students were arrested and handcuffed, one of them a 13 year old for writing on a desk. The next year, a five year old was handcuffed and taken to a psychiatric ward for throwing a tantrum. Police frequently undermine principals in matters of discipline, in one case even arresting a principal who tried to prevent one of his students from being hauled off in handcuffs. Students, parents, and community leaders have repeatedly approached the administration with alternative approaches to school safety, but the mayor, according to Offer, refuses to participate in a dialogue.

Finally, while committed to policies that have failed low income and minority communities, Bloomberg and Klein neglected one of the most effective policies known to improve academic performance—reducing class size. In 1999, the city began to receive $90 million per year from New York State, and another $90 million in federal funds to reduce class sizes. As Leonie Haimson noted in NYC Schools, this produced significant improvement as long as the funds were actually used to reduce class size. In 2006, however, the city decreased its own funding for smaller class sizes, canceling the effects of these state and federal funds. The next year, New York received an additional $400 million from the state to reduce class size. The city did not allocate the money for that purpose, however, and in September 2008 class sizes actually increased.

Admitting Failure

Although unreported in the mainstream media, the mayor and chancellor have in effect admitted the failure of their education policies. Their current long term strategy is to abandon the public school system they are supposed to be managing in favor of a network of privatized charter schools. Not coincidentally, most of these new schools are not unionized.

The chancellor is reallocating scarce resources and classroom space in support of this new policy, often creating bitter conflicts between public and charter schools housed in the same building. The city’s 78 charter schools enroll a smaller proportion of English language learners and special needs students than their public counterparts, and are permitted in practice to expel low achieving students. All these hard-to-teach students are then dumped into the public schools, which, unlike the charters, have larger class sizes and are not permitted to cap their enrollments. The administration then compares the public schools unfavorably to the charters, even though research shows mixed results—notwithstanding all the advantages conferred on the charters. Klein envisions these publicly funded yet privately managed entities as the future of “public” education. See Grassroots Education Movement and Sarah Knopp.

The purported advantages of charters—human scale, better instruction, autonomous governance—had already existed in some public schools since the 1970s, a little known fact discussed in the article by educator Deborah Meier. Compared to today’s charters, however, these experiments had a more public and democratic nature. They were governed by the faculty, with the support of principals and input from parents and students. Operating under the same resource constraints and union as other public schools, and drawing from the same student population, they tailored instruction to the learning needs of students, not the requirements of standardized tests.

At first, Klein tried to replicate this success. While lauding small school innovation, however, he undermined it by assessing performance in conventional ways. Nor could quality, autonomous schools be mass produced from his Tweed headquarters. Notwithstanding $100 million in supplemental funding from Bill Gates, the administration’s program foundered, and Gates stopped supporting it in 2008. By then, charter schools had emerged as Bloomberg’s and Klein’s new paradigm.

Along with this move to privatization, the administration’s admission of failure was its quiet demolition in 2006 of the very bureaucracy it had created with so much fanfare only three years earlier. The only thing more remarkable than this reversal was its failure to elicit critical commentary and analysis in the mainstream media; Bloomberg and Klein were permitted to declare victory and move on. Having brought “accountability” to the system, they said, the “reforms” were now entering a new phase.

Instead of being told what and how to teach through a bureaucratic chain of command, teachers are now subjected to management-by-numbers. Their performance is measured using “value added assessment,” where student scores on standardized tests at the end of the school year are compared with their scores at the beginning—the difference being attributable to the teacher. With merit pay or job loss at stake, teachers and principals now have test preparation as their primary task. That is driving authentic educators to look elsewhere for work.

Needless to say, this is no way to get kids excited about school, especially those who are disadvantaged and already alienated from mainstream institutions. In fact, it eradicates the love of learning that many students bring to the table. Test preparation cannot cultivate the critical thinking skills and independent judgment needed to be a responsible citizen, an intelligent user of the internet, or even a savvy consumer. Nor can it cultivate the creativity and capacity for innovation that the best 21st century jobs require.

This is the kind of school system that corporate elites, politicians, and lawyers create when they don’t care to collaborate with educators and want an easily quantified and user friendly tool for controlling them. It is a system for creating a large supply of minimally-skilled, diligent and disciplined service workers who will follow instructions without asking questions. And it trains the populace in mindless conformity, making the entire country susceptible to authoritarian rule.

Joyce Purnick’s biography of Michael Bloomberg came out this year. She wrote about a man intoxicated with power—more than most leaders—and who still can’t get enough. To be sure, he also cares about the city’s people, and wants to serve them well. But he imagines he is vastly smarter and more competent than all the city’s teachers, principals, and other public servants, and can forge a better government by concentrating power in City Hall. He has convinced millions, both inside and outside the city, that this is so. But Bloomberg’s record running the New York City public school system shatters this illusion. Isn’t it time for this mayor—whose mantra is accountability—to be finally held accountable for his own performance?

Brian D'Agostino
New York, NY
October 22, 2009

link to Brian's website