Meet MaryEllen Elia -- Another Meryll Tisch Kindred Spirit in Albany, as new NYS Education Commissioner

Here we go again?

For the recent years in New York State we were subjected to John King, recipient of a speedy Ed.D. degree, along with Merryl Tisch, THE grand doyenne of high stakes tests and the Common Core. King gave the whiny face to the hard sell of the Common Core across New York State. The problem was that he was totally tone-deaf to the people's (students, parents, teachers) pain over the Common Core States Standards Initiative, particularly evident in the 2013 to 2014 academic year.

Now we get MaryEllen Elia from Florida, fired just months ago from Hillsborough, Florida district (which includes Tampa), in a 4-3 vote, as their schools superintendent. Chancellor Tisch dismissed the flap (To her credit she has more classroom and schools leadership experience than King had.)

[Update: Tampa Tribune, September 19, 2013, on how she got an F.]

Yet, she got a unanimous nod from the New York State Board of Regents, from the Chancellor and the Vice Chancellor. As with NYC principals, you can fall on your face, and rise to the top. But for teachers? Once you slip, never forgiven.

The controversy with Elia? This piece today in the Diane Ravitch blog gives important clues, and her points of controversy put her very well in sync with NYSED chancellor Tisch (pro-high stakes tests, pro-Common Core, pro-test-based evaluations of teachers, pro-merit pay of teachers --see this profile by the Washington Post's Valerie Strauss):

Parent activists are wary of Elia because of her past support for high-stakes testing. To win their confidence, she must clarify her views about testing, about the Opt Out movement, about detaching test scores from teacher evaluations, about merit pay, and about Common Core.

And for the anxiety factor: the New York teachers unions are rumored to like her. But who exactly is that (UFT? also NYSUT?) and why do they like her? Ravitch says that Elia was in the rightist Gov. Rick Scott's transition team.

Tisch's puppet? Fall woman for Cuomo?

"I'm Your Puppet":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liKhLNY5GYI

Duncan Crosses Rubicon As He Threatens Opt-Out Districts With Sanctions

*Several Supreme Court decisions could supply bases for opposing Duncan's threats

In his Apr 21 statement that the federal government is obliged to intervene if states fail to address the growing number of students that are boycotting federally mandated annual exams. (Federal law in Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) and No Child Left Behind (NCLB) mandate annulized testing. However, the form of the test is up to respective state authorities. New York has opted for a Common Core State Standards (CCSS) -based test that is outside of the SBAC or the PARCC test consortia.) It is estimated that over 184,000 students opted out of the CCSS based English tests in New York last week. (Essential Update: See also this issue covered at Diane Ravitch's blog, on 4/22/15, "State May Have Power to Withhold Federal Funding to Punish Opt-Outs." Talk about collective punishment!)

U.S. Department of Education Secretary Arne Duncan is taking a disturbingly authoritarian course with his threat of sanctions against school districts that fail to achieve 95 percent compliance with high-stakes tests, as stemming from the ESEA. The hinted punishment by federal or state authorities would be withholding funds, the New York State Allies for Public Education (NYSAPE) denies the claim that districts will lose funding over low participation rates in high-stakes standardized tests.

Orders to be followed without question are in two places: in militaries, and in authoritarian regimes.

Duncan and the U.S. DOE is demanding compliance without question with his new statement.  

Duncan has truly crossed the line with his threat of sanctions for non-compliance. Further disturbing is his expectation that districts directly address the non-compliers. Of course, we must realize what this leads to. If districts must investigate and curtail opt-outing activity, they must find, document and punish non-complying students and their parents. And note below how he is attempting to enlist state authorities in addressing non-compliance this month with the Common Core tests.

A federal education department spokeswoman said last week that the agency could withhold funding from states if some of their districts have too few students take the exams, but that it has not yet done so because states have addressed the issue on their own.

State education department spokesman Jonathan Burman said in an email Tuesday that the “the feds are discussing the possibility of imposing penalties for failing to hit participation rate targets.” He added that the state is also expected to “consider imposing sanctions” on districts that fail to meet the 95 percent threshold, which could include withholding money “in the most egregious cases.” (Opt-out advocates have questioned the state’s interpretation of the testing law, and say that sanctions are only allowed after a district falls below the 95 percent level for three years.)

Duncan, unless he reverses his statements, is handing the 2016 election to Republicans. How could someone expect Democrats to continue to get popular support from liberals? And wouldn't Independents lean closer to Republicans after this threat?

*Supreme Court case precedence would make fighting Duncan easy

Duncan's demands for compliance, echoed by New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, could be easily challenged in federal court. For, Supreme Court precedent maintains that parental rights are held highly, above concerns for other matters such as property rights. For example, see Hodgson v. Minnesota (1990) which notes that parental rights are protected under the Fourteenth Amendment. Parental rights figured in the decision, Wisconsin v. Yoder (1972) which upheld the right of Amish parents not to send their children to public schools past eighth grade. And of course, Duncan's actions over the past six years have been riddled with Tenth Amendment violations.

Consider also the matter of compulsory student signing of silence oaths on state tests, which would seem to violate the First Amendment. Easily, precedential case law could render these mandates unconstitutional. West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette (1943) established that it was unconstitutional to expect students to recite the Pledge of Allegiance; Engel v. Vitale (1962) barred state mandates that students recite prayers in school. Certainly, a lawyer could soundly argue that from these cases it can be argued that children cannot be compelled to sign oaths to be silent about test contents. Additionally, we have seen at least one well-known instance of the disciplining of a New Mexico student over informing other students of opt-out rights.

Easily, litigants could bring case against Duncan, Cuomo and any other government officials seeking to enforce cooperation with state tests and silence oaths on test contents.

How would Duncan achieve his goal of identifying and reprimanding opponents and opposition leaders? Existing staff would take on new investigative and police powers. 

This would give people an ugly taste in their mouth when hearing “Democrat.” If Hillary Clinton or other presidential contender of any political party have any sense of savvy they would run in the other direction from Duncan and Cuomo and their talk of sanctions over opt-outs.

NYS Anti-Teacher Law Section Concedes Student Mental and Physical Health Importance

 *NYS Legislature law S2006 requires wrap-around social services for "failing" schools placed in receivership. *Clause could open role for charter schools.

Progressive education activists and organizations, such as New York City's Movement of Rank and File Educators (MORE) have been recognizing that there is a need for wrap-around mental and physical health services at the schools.
And some activists take this a step further, recognizing that students' socioeconomic conditions factor into performance. Class, home language and race matters.
As some have said, "Our students' living conditions are their learning conditions."

It is highly ironic that tagged into Governor Cuomo and the New York State Legislature's breathtaking attack on teachers last week, in the teacher evaluation law, coupled with new procedures for state takeover of schools via receivership placement in the budget bill, S2006B / A3006B, was a lengthy statement that stipulated the implementation of several important social services. Why would these services be included? They would be included because many students do not have these on their own outside of school and they vitally need those services, and their lacking these services would negatively impact their scholastic performance.
And it is bitterly ironic that once the school goes into the status the State Education Department deems "failing," and that only then the school gets these services.

Here is what the new law says about receivership and its power.

RECEIVERSHIP

-adds a new section, section 211-f, to the education law regarding the takeover and restructuring of failing schools by external receivers. It allows the Commissioner, under given circumstances, to place a school into receivership where a receiver will manage and operate the school, subject to annual review by the Commissioner, until such time as the school has improved sufficiently.

-allows for the state takeover in schools;

-27 “priority” schools that have been struggling for more than 10 years would have only one year to dramatically turnaround,

and -other “priority” schools would have two years to turn around, until an outside receiver is appointed to control the school.

-New priority schools in 2016-17 are automatically eligible for receivership.

Charter role?

Note that the law has a vague aspect "non-profit" as potential taking the receivership role. Note that the charter school industry makes hefty use of the "non-profit" mantle.

Appointment of a Receiver:

Upon determination by the Commissioner that the school will be placed in receivership, the school district shall appoint an independent receiver, subject to approval of the Commissioner.

The receiver will manage and operate all aspects of the school and develop and implement a school intervention plan, considering recommendations of a community engagement team.

The receiver may be a non-profit, another school district, or an individual.

The receiver will have the power to supersede any decision, policy or regulation of the district that conflicts with the school intervention plan.

The receiver will have authority to review proposed school district budgets and modify them to conform to the school intervention plan.

The receiver will contract with the Commissioner and be paid by SED, unless there is an open administrative staffing line at the district and the receiver will be taking on the responsibilities of that position, in which case the receiver will be paid by the district.

Yet, under the School Improvement Plan we see that the state is clearly calling for attention to serving unmet health needs of students.
Why is it that the state inherently recognizes the worth of these needs, yet it will only attend to those needs once a school falls into "failing" status?

School Intervention Plan:

Consultation:
The receiver will create a school intervention plan. Before developing plan, the receive shall “consult with” local stakeholders including the board of education, the superintendent, the principal, teachers assigned to the school and their collective bargaining representation, administrators assigned to the school and their collective bargaining representative, parents, social service and mental health agencies, students as appropriate, career and workforce development programs as appropriate, pre-k programs as appropriate, representatives of local higher ed as appropriate and the “school takeover team.”

Considerations:
 In creating the plan, the receiver shall consider the recommendations of the “community enragement team,” include provisions intended to maximize the rapid academic achievement of students at the school, ensure the plan addresses school leadership and capacity, school leader practices and decisions, curriculum development and support, teacher practices and decisions, student social and emotional developmental health, and family and community engagement. The receiver shall base the plan on the findings of any recent diagnostic review or assessment and student outcome data including, student achievement growth data based on state measures, other measures of student achievements, student promotion and graduation rates, achievement and growth data for subgroups, and long-term and short-term suspension rates.

Elements:
 The receiver must include the following in the plan: measures to address social service, health and mental health needs of students in the school and their families in order to help students arrive and remain at school ready to learn, provided that this may include mental health and substance abuse screening; measures to improve or expand access to child welfare services and, as appropriate, services in the school community to promote a safe and secure learning environment; measures to provide greater access to career and technical education and workforce development services provided to students in the school and their families, in order to provide students and families with meaningful employment skills and opportunities; measures to address achievement gaps for English language learners, students with disabilities and economically disadvantaged students; measures to address school climate and positive behavior support, including mentoring and other youth development programs; and a budget for the school intervention plan.
  .   .   .

Goals:
 The plan must include measurable annual goals with respect to student attendance, student discipline including short-term and long-term suspension, student safety, student promotion and graduation and drop-out rates, student achievement and growth on state measures, progress in areas of academic underperformance, progress among subgroups, reduction of achievement gaps, development of college and career readiness, parent and family engagement, building a culture of academic success among students, building a culture of student support and success among faculty and staff, using developmentally appropriate child assessments from Pre-K to 3, and measures of student learning.
The receiver “shall” convert schools to “community schools” to provide expanded health, mental health and other services to the students.

So, in closing, it is very interesting and disturbing that the state will recognize the importance of, and take action to provide for these needs, only when a school falls into "failing" status. Until that point, the state will use the schools and their children and staff as political footballs.

*April 1 typo by the legislature? Note in the paragraph under "Considerations," the law calls for creation of a "community enragement team." Did the bill's authors mean "engagement"?

Blogger Lays Out How New York State Democrats Betrayed Teachers

Read here at CURMUDGUCATION blog on how the New York State legislature Democrats betrayed the teachers of the state.

--Linked here at Diane Ravitch's blog: "Peter Greene on Cuomo's Destruction of the Teaching Profession and the Democrats Who Helped Him."

 A very careful examination of the bill is at Daniel Katz's blog.  The key introduction to Greene's blog:

This has truly been the most bizarre thing I have ever seen. An unpopular proposal that guts teaching as a profession and kicks public education in the teeth, sails through the NY legislature.

Yes, "sails through." There's nothing else to call a budget that is approved 92-54. 

NY Democrats tried to make it look like less of a total victory-in-a-walk for public education opponent Andrew Cuomo by making sad pouty faces and issuing various meaningless mouth noises while going ahead and voting for the damn thing. "Ohh, woes and sadderations," they cried as they took turns walking to the podium to give Cuomo exactly the tools he wanted for helping to put an end to teaching as a profession in New York state.

I am not sure what Democrats hoped to accomplish by taking to the podium and twitter to say how deeply, tragically burdened they were. I mean, I guess you'd like to know that people who club baby seals feel a little bit bad about it, but it really doesn't make a lot of difference to the baby seal, who is in fact still dead.

Maybe the lesson here is that the craziest person in the room controls the conversation. The person who's willing to ram the car right into the sheer rock face gets to navigate the trip, and Cuomo has displayed repeatedly that he really doesn't care what has to be smashed up. If the world isn't going to go on his way, it doesn't need to go on for anybody.

But if teachers needed reason #2,416 to understand that Democrats simply aren't friends to public education, there it was, biting its quivering lip and sniffling, "I feel really bad about this" as it tied up education and fired it out of a canon so that it could land directly under a bus that had been dropped off the Empire State Building.

Read the remainder of the article here.

NYS Repeats Ugly Historical Dictatorship History with Moral Character Provision in New Teacher Law

“Those who fail to learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.”—George Santayana

And so, Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State legislature take one more ugly step degrading our republic.

Along with the budget and teacher evaluation changes the legislature passed (in  S2006B/A3006B) included this insulting provision, that puts teachers into a class like that of sex offenders:

Certificate holders shall notify the department of any change of name or mailing address within thirty days of such change. Willful failure to register or provide such notice within one hundred eighty days of such change may constitute grounds for moral character review under subdivision seven of section three hundred five of this chapter.

This follows an item that the Perdido Street blogger charges is aimed at eliminating senior teachers. He wrote:

"We've already found that permanent certificate holders have lost the "permanent" status of their teaching certification since they now have to "register" every five years for their certification or risk losing their licenses."

To skeptics about this provision: yes, teachers and other professionals have had to register address changes with the state of New York, but this one newly charges teachers with a "Moral Character Review" if they fail to comply.

Where is the UFT in this attack? United Federation of Teachers president Michael Mulgrew declared the bill a victory --days before it was finished and voted on!

See reaction and analysis at this PSS blog post:
http://perdidostreetschool.blogspot.com/2015/04/nysed-can-do-moral-character-review-if.html

And analysis and reaction at this Diane Ravitch piece:
http://dianeravitch.net/2015/04/04/perdido-street-if-you-change-your-address-without-informing-big-brother-bad-things-will-happen/comment-page-1/

NYS' Racially Segregated Schools - The Scourge the NY Times Can See, But Cuomo Cannot

New York State's schools are the most segregated in the nation, as reported by a University of California-Los Angeles study last year. New York City's are the third most segregated in the nation, after those in Chicago and Dallas, as discussed in 2012. See also, this article, from Al Jazeera, on the resegregation of United States schools, from last May, on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education decision.

Lost in the New York education news of the last few weeks was this January 9, 2015 editorial by the New York Times calling attention to the school segregation.
Still very disappointing: the article mentions "the Chancellor," but not Dr. Merryl Tisch by name. Likewise, Governor Andrew Cuomo is only mentioned in the last paragraph. For all their righteousness, why do not Tisch or Cuomo heed attention to this issue?

Racial Isolation in Public Schools

New York City and its Segregation

As many note, the key thing is to achieve neighborhood integration. New York, like some other core metropole cities such as Chicago or Atlanta, is segregated despite its diversity. And several cities from ex-Confederate states, Texas, North Carolina and Virginia, ironically, did better in city integration than New York City. NYC ranks 19th of the 45 cities over 400,000.

 How NYC Apartheid/Caste schooling impairs the education and health of students in the lower half of the city's high schoolers

As high school teachers in the lower Social Economic schools will tell you, large percentage of the students are not from the neighborhood. Their travel commutes span across one or two borough lines, and run for 1 1/2 to 2 hours in one direction. Pediatricians recommend that school starting times are too early for teens in general. However, those teens making long commutes must wake even earlier than the population that the pediatricians have in mind. Those not waking early enough for punctual arrival end up arriving to school late or missing school entirely. (This blog has previously written on the segregation of the NYC schools, and how the schools in the subaltern direction lack diversity in courses and other amenities.)

School closures (far) disproportionately impact students of color

See this report at National Opportunity to Learn Campaign. Keep in mind that this graphic comes from a page published, April, 2013. The number depicts just closures from 2013.

Cuomo and his allies are duplicitous in their adopting the civil rights mantle for their education policies. The pattern of the school closures is one that disproportionately impacts African-American and low income communities. Gone are the neighborhood schools and their institutional memory of richly varied curricula.

The New York Times was right to criticize Cuomo on segregation. The case needs to be made more broadly: with the segregation comes lower resources, such poor curricula choices, poorer technology, less access to libraries, fewer after-school activities.

[For a suggested strategy on resisting Cuomo's endgame, see, "What is to Be Done About Cuomo's War on Teachers  . . ."

From Clemsy's Corner blog:

Cuomo's Endgame for Breaking the Teachers Union and Dismantling New York State's Public School System

This is how to fight back. Today, I received an email from one of our guidance counselors. It is a forward from his sister, a teacher, who received it from Eric DeCarlo, president of the Scotia-Glenville Teachers Association, who gave me permission to share it. He received, and adapted it, from Mike Mosal, president of the Burnt Hills Teachers Association. The president of my local, Clint Wagner of The Gloversville Teachers Association, forwarded it to everyone in the district.

You need to do the same. This is it in black and white. This is Cuomo's endgame and the careers of every educator in this state, especially those in FOCUS school districts, are at stake. Our public school system is at stake. Our children's education is at stake.

This is it. This is the moment of truth.

Please read, memorize and share, share, share.

Then DO something.

Recently, the Governor’s office and Regents Chancellor Tisch exchanged letters about the future of education in New York. The links to these letters was sent out in an email last week to the Association. You can read the full letters at those links.  The conversation between these two can be broken down into the following “reforms” that could be implemented this spring.

1.    40% of teacher evaluation should be tied to growth scores. The local 20% achievement (SLO) should be eliminated.

2.    Any teacher deemed “ineffective” on the new 40% state score would be deemed ineffective overall(no matter their scores on the local observation 60%).

3.    Any teacher who receives two consecutive ineffective ratings would not be allowed back into the classroom (apparently without a 3020-A hearing or due process. Additionally, all of the current 3020-A hearing officers would be replaced with “state employees”. The Regents seek to replace the last gatekeepers of due process with their own appointees.

4.    No student could be scheduled to have an “ineffective” teacher two years in a row (by proposed changes to state education law).  This would likely require disclosure of which teachers are “ineffective” for scheduling purposes (and possibly to parents). This is a massive invasion of privacy that was already legislated. Such information is currently not shared outside of the administration and impacted teacher. Parents can only gain this information through a district determined process and, even then, the parents can only know where their student’s teacher falls on the “HEDI” range.

5.    Merit pay would be established and, apparently, would not be collectively bargained. Districts would be empowered to “design innovative compensation models based on educator performance”. According to Chancellor Tisch’s letter, our Association would not be privy to the process for how this “compensation” would be doled out and what the criteria would be for merit pay.

6.    Teachers would be required to wait five years before they could be granted tenure. Additionally, teacher certification tests would become vastly more challenging.

7.    Schools who do not meet the Governor and Chancellor Tisch’s performance expectations, would be closed and replaced with “institutions that are up to the task” which would likely be for-profit charter schools.  Additionally, Chancellor Tisch is effectively asking the state legislature for unfettered authority to open and close schools based on metrics (state test scores) that she controls. The Regents and the State Education Department can raise or lower cut scores, and therefore “achievement” gains or losses, at a whim. We have seen this over the past two years as the Common Core assessments become integrated into the APPR. This is, without question, unlimited power for Tisch, the Regents, and the enemies of public education. Furthermore, Tisch seeks to uncap the limit on for-profit charter schools.

These changes are not speculative or “what if’s”.  Read the letters linked above, read what NYSUT is saying.  This is our FUTURE!!!!

In 2010, all of us (NYSUT included) were caught off guard at the scope and scale of Race to the Top, the Common Core standards, and the APPR law 3012-c. These initiatives completely changed education as we know it. These changes, with very few exceptions, were wholly negative for teachers and bad for children.

Here we are, four years later, with two of the most important figures in state politics and education having an open discussion about how to unequivocally destroy public education in the state of New York. They have become our enemies and our students enemies. They are brash, unencumbered, and openly declaring war on our profession. They seek to eliminate collective bargaining’s impact in the areas of evaluation. They ignore mandatory subjects of negotiation, like compensation.  They have so little respect for teachers, and the institutions that represent us, that they openly write about changing due process tenure. This would have been unthinkable five years ago. They do not care about what’s best for kids, teachers, or schools; only headlines and perception. There is no subterfuge here. Governor Cuomo and Chancellor Tisch seek to end public education as we know it. They want to break the back of NYSUT. They want to make our loca irrelevant. If we do not act now, all will be lost.

Simply put, we are at war!

I say to you now, we must become part of the solution. We must take up this cause as we never have before. We cannot be blind to what is about to occur in this state budget cycle.

The first step is to pay very close attention to Wednesday's (1/21/15) State of the State address (held at 1:30).  This is an important speech. Governor Cuomo will unveil his budgetary agenda and we will have a clearer picture of what we are facing. Please make every effort to learn about what type of proposals involving education he makes today.

If we do not act now, we accept these changes with our passivity.  There will be no one to complain to about “what has happened to education” if you sit on the sidelines now. We are all busy. We are all exhausted. I have three children (one of which is currently in the hospital) and there is not a week that goes by when I do not ask myself, “is leading this Association worth the sacrifices my family makes?” I say, we say, that it is. I love teaching and seeing the impact that I have on my students. I have seen some of the most dedicated professionals I have ever met here in our district That is worth protecting. We are facing unprecedented threats. You must be part of our local’s response to this new threat or you become part of the problem.

In  Unity,

Ric

Ric DeCarlo, President

Scotia-Glenville Teachers Association

As that guidance counselor's sister has done, so must you do. Send this to friends and colleagues in other districts, or if you are a parent send this to all of your friends.

We need to be informed and we need to act. Now.

There is no later.

~Clemsy 

UCLA’s Civil Rights Project: Most Segregated Schools in the Nation: NY

Report: New York State's schools are the most segregated in the nation. As I noted a year and a half back, the Chicago school system is the most segregated big city schools system. New York City's, according to the cited New York Times report, were the third most segregated urban school system.
What are Gov. Andrew Cuomo and mayor Bill de Blasio going to do about it?

Most Segregated Schools in the Nation: NY John Kucsera March 26, 2014 Civil Rights Project   Public school students in the state are increasingly isolated by race and class as the proportion of minority and poor students continues to grow.
	This Day in History: On Feb. 3, 1964, 464,000 New York City school children — almost half of the city’s student body — skipped school as part of a protest against segregation within their school system. , Brooklyn Daily Eagle,
	LOS ANGELES--A report released today by UCLA’s Civil Rights Project finds that public school students in New York continue to be severely segregated. Public school students in the state are increasingly isolated by race and class as the proportion of minority and poor students continues to grow, according to the CRP report, “New York State’s Extreme School Segregation: Inequality, Inaction and a Damaged Future.” The study explores trends in enrollment and school segregation patterns from 1989 to 2010 at the state and regional levels, including the New York City metropolitan areas of Long Island and the New York City District, and the upstate metropolitan areas of Albany, Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse.   The report also documents the history of school desegregation in the state and across its geographic regions, including key desegregation cases and remedies in Yonkers, Rochester, and Buffalo. In New York City, in particular, the report highlights both historical and current practices and policies perpetuating racial imbalance and educational inequity across schools, and challenged by parents and community organizations.   Educational problems linked to racially segregated schools, which are often intensified by poverty concentration, include a less-experienced and less-qualified teacher workforce, high levels of teacher turnover, inadequate facilities and learning materials, high dropout rates, and less stable enrollments. Conversely, desegregated schools are linked to profound benefits for all students.  “This report runs the geographic gamut: from the upstate metros dealing with transforming demographics and an urban-suburban divide, to Long Island, one of the most segregated and fragmented suburban rings in the country, and New York City, the largest school district in the country,” said John Kucsera, lead author of the report. Specific findings at Various Geographic Levels Statewide: At the state level, the proportion of Latino and Asian students has nearly doubled from 1989 to 2010, as the exposure of these groups to white students has decreased. Concentration levels have increased for black students in intensely segregated minority schools (where less than 10% of the student body is white), and there has been a simultaneous and dramatic increase in black exposure to Latino students over the last 20 years. In terms of poverty concentration, statewide patterns show that schools become more low-income as their enrollment becomes majority minority. Nearly 50% of public school students were low-income in 2010, but the typical black or Latino student attended a school where close to 70% of classmates were low-income. Conversely, the typical white student attended school where less than 30% of classmates were low-income. Upstate Metropolitan Areas: In Buffalo, the typical white student attended a school with 30% of poor students compared to 73% for the typical black student, two and one half times more. Black and Latino students experienced a substantial increase in the percentage concentrated in intensely segregated schools (those with less than 10% white students) since 1989. In the Syracuse metropolitan area, the proportion of black students grew by 4%, but black isolation rates skyrocketed. The average black student attended school in 1989 with a third of students from their own race; twenty years later, the typical black student attended schools with nearly half black students. The majority of school districts in upstate New York remain predominantly white.  In the Rochester metro, however, near a quarter of school districts are drastically changing, with most substantially integrating nonwhite students. In the Albany metro, 97% of the metro’s multigroup segregation – measured by the distribution of racial groups in schools across the metro – occurred between rather than within districts.  A total of 59 out of 65 districts in 2010 were predominantly white or nonwhite. New York City: Across the 32 Community School Districts (CSDs) in New York City, 19 had 10% or less white students in 2010, which included all districts in the Bronx, two-thirds of the districts in Brooklyn (central to north districts), half of the districts in Manhattan (northern districts), and only two-fifths of the districts in Queens (southeast districts). 73% of charters across New York City were considered apartheid schools (less than 1% white enrollment) and 90% percent were intensely segregated (less than 10% white enrollment) schools in 2010. Only 8% of charter schools were multiracial  and with over a 14.5% white enrollment (the New York City average). Magnet schools across the New York City district had the highest proportion of multiracial schools (47%) and the lowest proportion of segregated schools (56%) in 2010.  However, 17% of magnets had less than 1% white enrollment and 7% had greater than 50% white enrollment, with PS 100 Coney Island having a white proportion of 81%. New York Metropolitan Area: For the New York City metro in 2010, the five boroughs represented nearly 60% of the state’s total black students, two-thirds of the total Asian and Latino students, but only 10% of white students. In Bronx, Brooklyn, and Manhattan, where charter schools consist of around 10% of all public schools, nearly all charters were intensely segregated in 2010, with less than 10% white student enrollment. 100% of the Bronx charters, 90% of those in Brooklyn, and 97% of the Manhattan charters were intensely segregated. Author Kucsera states, “Many of these areas, particularly suburban ones, have experienced dramatic demographic transformation coupled with a lack of diversity-focused policies, and this inevitably leads to problematic segregation patterns.” With the help of various New York-based community groups, researchers, and civil rights organizations, the report provides a host of recommendations and actions to help create and maintain integrated schools from the federal level down to local communities and schools.  These include altering school choice plans to ensure they promote diversity, supporting communities that are experiencing racial change by helping them create voluntary desegregation plans, and creating regional or interdistrict programs in urban/suburban areas. “In the 30 years I have been researching schools, New York State has consistently been one of the most segregated states in the nation--no Southern state comes close to New York,” commented CRP Co-Director Gary Orfield. “Decades of reforms ignoring this issue produced strategies that have not succeeded in making segregated schools equal.  It is time to adopt creative school choice strategies to give more New York children an opportunity to prepare to live and work effectively in a highly multiracial state.” Read the report and see a complete breakdown of the data. This report is the fifth in a series of 12 reports on East Coast school segregation trends.

And in the Manchester Guardian, 

New York has most segregated public schools in the US, study finds

With less than 1% white enrolment in most of its charter schools, New York City's school system ranks among the least diverse:

In New York City, the largest school system in the US with 1.1 million pupils, the study notes that many of the charter schools created over the last dozen years are among the least diverse of all, with less than 1% white enrollment at 73% of charter schools.

"To create a whole new system that's even worse than what you've got really takes some effort," said Gary Orfield, co-director of the Civil Rights Project and an author of the report.

 . . . .

Besides the Baudy Silliness, Why NYSED's 'S**y B***h' Link Raises Serious Issues for King, Cuomo and Mulgrew --the inBloom Factor

*NYSED couldn't protect its own site *Can you trust its choice for housing your child's data?
*S**y B***h hack = a scandal of poor site security, John King's BridgeGate-sized Epic Fail
*Update: Syracuse teachers president endorses Iannuzzi's no confidence call vs. King

As broken by a parent's blog, Schools of Thought and its "Commissioner King Endorses “Sexy Bitch” Quizzes as Fun Test Prep For NY Students!," the New York State Education Department's site linked for much of a day this week to a salacious site called S**y B***h. Clearly, this demonstrated the NYSED's site hackability.

This incident, plus the Target massive security breach now up to 100 million customers' card data, plus the recently reported Nieman Marcus breach, plus the Sachem district, Suffolk, Long Island, breach of 15,000 students' records, dramatically demonstrates ONCE AND FOR ALL that sites can be hacked. More to the point, the NYSED's site's hackability is of looming significance because one would expect any site associated with NYSED should have iron-clad security, but this has been broken obviously. This bodes badly for the inBloom student data system. Yes, it will be run privately. But if NYSED cannot protect its own site, how can it vouch for inBloom's security. [As of blog press time, the NYSED is still down.] If Target and Nieman Marcus, who rests on credit or debit card use, cannot guarantee system security, how can parents have faith in inBloom?

NYSED's sites plug Common Core --this is a central objective for the sites at this point. This scandal of lax site security cannot help but steer more attention to Common Core and its flaws.  King, Cuomo and Mulgrew must be breathing sighs of relief as the New Jersey Governor Chris Christie BridgeGate scandal roils on and on and on, devouring media attention, and preventing more attention to present New York State scandals, as opposed to past New Jersey scandalous acts.
Toward the end of the parent blog breaking the story the parent adds:
King’s Sexy Bitch Quizzes are to NY what Christie’s Traffic Problems are to NJ!
"Damned straight" we can say to that!

No voters chose John King; Regents did. Maybe that's why he acts like a king.

I bring in NYSED Commissioner John King in first, as Common Core and inBloom are his pet projects. And as he in desperate moments falls into "besides federal law" requires CC and student data tracking, repeating Gatesean myths.

No Common Core, no need for souped up NYSED sites. No CCSS-linked tests and data collection, no need for inBloom. Make no mistake, this is the central project for John King and Merry Tisch.

Just as this week has been the epic fail for Chris Christie with his widely panned press conference performance, this site hack has been bad news for ed deform cheerleaders and NYS.

Now to New York Governor Andrew Cuomo: he cannot smell the coffee: parents hate Common Core; they loathe John King for his haughtiness. King must go. Yet Cuomo doesn't get the urgency. Parents noticing the NYSED site hack will no doubt spread the word as another collossal blunder by Cuomo, and implicit demonstration of his failure to tackle the human representation of the Common Core cancer, John King.

Remember it's not just his obnoxious aloofness to parental concerns at the Common Core town meetings. King:
*Repeatedly threatened to remove control of the Buffalo School District from elected representatives, his most recent threat here; and ally Cuomo's bullying rhetoric here, alleging that the District and the union's APPR restrictions were an "ethical and legal fraud"
*Blanket-characterized Common Core opponents as Tea Partiers

Next, Michael Mulgrew, UFT president. In a week in which NYSUT president Dick Iannuzzi boldly called vote no confidence move against John King, from Mulgrew, silence, crickets-only silence. Iannuzzi's proposal goes before the state union's 80 member board of directors on January 24 to 25, and then to a larger membership vote if the proposal passes the first stage.
Breaking: Syracuse Teachers Association President Kevin Ahern backs Iannuzzi's no confidence measure against King. Will UFT's Mulgrew join him?

Make no mistake, teachers will notice.  Some hard questions for Cuomo and Mulgrew
And questions: let's give up for a moment asking why JK is into CCSS.
Why is Cuomo so committed to John King? Passing the buck to the Regents or the legislature doesn't cut it. Cuomo is supposed to be the political leader of New York State. Sounds a little like Chris Christie: blame lots of allies; but assume no accountability yourself.
Why is Mulgrew so committed to Common Core? (And mere gripes for a better curriculum don't suffice.)
Why won't he absolutely draw a line in the sand against the inBloom program?
Why on earth is Mulgrew probably the most enthusiastic labor backer of Cuomo?
Why cannot Mulgrew get it that teachers in New York City --not to mention NYS for that matter-- are not happy with John King or Common Core?
So Mulgrew is trying to steal the MORE caucus' motto, Our working conditions are our students learning conditions? He should heed notice that Common Core is part of kids' learning package and he is part and parcel part of the hell for a learning experience that King and Tisch have imposed on young minds in NYS.
But note that when the Common Core Gospel of Faith traveling show came to Manhattan, it was only MORE caucus supporters (not Mulgrew-allied Unity caucus reps) among UFT members that spoke out against the Common Core. And remember that the tour was supposed to come to Queens and Staten Island. Could the delay against scheduling be that those boroughs are a little bit more "suburban"?

(Remember: the Common Core - student data linkage is essential, according to main architect, David Coleman. Read the article, "David Coleman Lauds the Use of Student Data.")

Buffalo teachers, parents picket Regent’s home in protest over state standards, tests

From The Buffalo News:

BTF, parents picket Regent’s home in protest over state standards, tests

Bennett is focus of protest over state standards, tests

http://www.buffalonews.com/city-region/schools/btf-parents-picket-regents-home-in-protest-over-state-standards-tests-20131209

By Denise Jewell Gee | News Staff Reporter | @DeniseJewellGee | Google+ , Mary Pasciak | News Education Reporter | @MaryPasciak | Google+ December 9, 2013

Link for video of protest: http://bcove.me/2y9zapsa

About two dozen teachers and parents marched outside the Town of Tonawanda home of Regent Robert M. Bennett on Monday to show their displeasure with the way the state has implemented new learning standards and tests designed to measure them.

The Buffalo Teachers Federation protest lasted only 35 minutes, but the teachers hoped to send a strong message by choosing to picket on the sidewalk outside the home of a state education official.

“What I want is for Mr. Bennett, and all of the Board of Regents, to be aware that teachers and parents alike are not happy with the implementation, are not happy with the amount of testing,” said Joanie Cavanaugh, a teacher at Hutchinson-Central Technical High School who was among the protesters.

The residential location was an unusual one during a national “Day of Action” that featured rallies and news conferences organized by teachers unions, educators and community groups across the state. The events also included a panel discussion on education in West Seneca. The BTF picketing of Bennett’s house appeared to be the only event in the state that was staged at the home of a public official.

“This is not just about teacher evaluations. This is about what we’re doing to our kids,” BTF President Phil Rumore said, pointing to the Common Core standards being pushed by State Education Commissioner John B. King Jr. “The Regents are the ones who have allowed Commissioner King to take these steps that are detrimental to our students.”

Bennett, who has represented Western New York on the state’s Board of Regents since 1995 and is now chancellor emeritus, said he was disturbed by the tactic of picketing his home.

“It’s disappointing, to say the least,” Bennett said before the protest. “A phone call would have sufficed. If Phil wanted to talk to me or yell at me, he could have just picked up the phone.”

Bennett was not at the house during the protest. The pickets walked quietly on the sidewalk, carrying signs that read, “Our students are not a test score.” They ended the event by chanting, “Hey, hey, ho, ho, Emeritus Bennett has got to go.”

Seven years ago, the BTF joined other unions in the city in picketing the homes of members of Buffalo’s state-appointed financial control board. But Monday’s protest was the first time in Rumore’s more than 30 years as BTF president that the union picketed the home of an education official.

New York State United Teachers is calling for increased funding for public schools, a de-emphasis of standardized testing and a three-year moratorium on high-stakes consequences tied to those tests.

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo last year tied school districts’ increases in state aid to their implementation of teacher evaluations, with 20 percent of teacher ratings based on student performance on state tests. Districts had the option of using state tests, locally developed or selected tests, or methods other than tests to measure teacher effectiveness for another 20 percent of each teacher’s rating.

NYSUT spokesman Carl Korn said he was not aware of the BTF’s plans to picket Bennett’s house.

The Buffalo District Parent Coordinating Council said while it shares the BTF’s concerns with how Common Core standards have been implemented and “excessive use of assessments,” it does not support protesting outside “anyone’s private residence.”

“For the sake of our children,” a statement from the group read, “it is imperative that we work TOGETHER to get this right!

Educators in West Seneca took a different approach to mark the day. Panelists in an education forum in the West Seneca Central School District touched on a wide range of issues – including high-stakes testing and the creation of a new statewide system for student information that uses a nonprofit education group, inBloom, to process and store data.

“The point was to make it clear that those who have expressed their opposition to high-stakes testing and to inBloom do not represent a vocal minority,” said West Seneca Superintendent Mark J. Crawford. “There are lots of people who are concerned, and the concern, I think, is increasing throughout the state.”

New York is one of 45 states to adopt Common Core, which establishes learning standards that are intended to better prepare students for college and the workforce. The pace at which New York State has implemented Common Core has been widely criticized by parents and teachers.

New York, along with Kentucky, was the first state to implement tests aligned with Common Core. Last year, students in third through eighth grades took state tests based on the Common Core. This year, high school tests will start to be aligned with the Common Core.

Many teachers and local school officials across the state have complained that the state did not provide schools with adequate support to implement the upgraded instructional standards.

Crawford said speakers at the West Seneca event did not oppose the Common Core standards but raised concerns about the way they have been implemented.

“There are a lot of things that myself and others feel are useful and desirable in the Common Core,” Crawford said. “The problem has been that it was not completely developed, and it wasn’t given to teachers completely, and then our students are tested on material they haven’t had.”

The West Seneca event was not planned in connection with the BTF protest.

While Rumore complained that schools are “testing our kids to death,” Bennett said the amount of state-required testing has remained relatively constant for many years.

“The fact is, the state tests have not increased at all in 10 years,” Bennett said.

“That’s a mischaracterization,” Rumore said. “The state has made it a requirement for teacher evaluations that students be tested. I know it’s a local option, but they’re the ones that have been pushing this testing from the beginning.”

Rumore said his greater concern, more than the amount of testing, is what he referred to as the “premature implementation of Common Core.”

Bennett said the Common Core is designed to make students competitive. The state establishes learning standards; each district decides what curriculum to use.

“The Common Core are learning standards and not a curriculum,” Bennett said. “They were developed in 2008 and 2009 by a national council. They’re not new.”

email: mpasciak@buffnews.com and djgee@buffnews.com

Related story, Buffalo News, December 12, 2013:

King rejects argument that Common Core standards are too difficult

‘It’s the right thing for students,’ state education chief says, rejecting the argument that controversial new standards are too difficult

John King Continues His Threats Against Buffalo Schools; Are Charter School Franchises Poised to Extent Predations Beyond NYC?; a New Kind of Takeover in Rochester, 5th poorest city in US

*45-50 percent of the children are in poverty in the largest cities west of Albany  --the real, hidden story behind education turmoil in NYS

New York State Education Department (NYSED) Commissioner John King must feel emboldened: in Brooklyn this week Astroturfers turned out and mouthed the mantras for Common Core. They or similar "activists" reprised their canned speech performances on Wednesday in Lower Manhattan. So,it's no surprise that the news at the close of the week is that King is repeating his threats against Buffalo Public Schools, threatening a state takeover. This would be the first state takeover of a district in New York State since the state took over the Roosevelt school district. The Buffalo News reported, "he still lacks confidence the Buffalo school district is capable of turning around it’s struggling schools. What’s more, King said he may take more direct action to intervene if schools do not improve."
(Remember that it was toward this school system that New York governor Andrew Cuomo directed his infamous "death penalty" for "failing" schools comment this summer.)

King, at a disadvantage in upstate New York cities, as the media are not wholly compliant as the NYC media are, had to make his case through meeting with the Buffalo News staff.  He repeated his threat to assume direct powers over the cities schools if the statistics do not improve as he expects, at a pace he insists upon. This summer he already assumed some powers by dictating that Lafayette and East High Schools partner with Erie 1 BOCES.

Buffalo News readers offered some comments that gave a greater insight into what's happening in Buffalo:

If King had first visited the schools met the students, teachers and administrators allowed for them to work out a plan to prepare students to take advantage of the opportunity it would have helped or tried first as a pilot program offered to all secondary school students with the skill-set to succeed in the programs offered at BOCES.

King has to come down from his ivory tower spend some time in the schools he remains troubled about since they are non-criteria have to accept any student sent many of them too old to complete a high school diploma within the legally required time span in NYS education regulations. Or try to provide a high school education to students that are not only limited in the English language but whose formal education ended at 6th grade or never had any formal education in their own language to begin to understand the challenges these schools face.

And since the Buffalo Public Schools seemed to have unlimited funds these days going on a hiring spree offering jobs to Teach For America recruits paying $5000 fee for each one of the 30 they plan to hire fresh out of college with only an undergraduate degree surely the district should have the financial wherewithal to provide the supports King is so troubled about at the schools he commented in this story.

and:

I wish you could see the tests the NYS Department of Education has inflicted on the schools. You can't of course, because the company that the state has contracted with to prepare them considers them "proprietary." Teachers have to sign confidentiality agreements to not discuss the contents of the test even after the tests have been given. They are long, confusing and full of errors. In the state of Rhode Island, a common core math test was given to 50 accomplished adults - people who were successful professionals with college degrees - and 60% of them failed! In the word of one of the state legislators in Rhode Island who took the test, "My eyes have been opened." I hope more people get their eyes opened.

But the truly significant story is that which arises from analysis of the 2010 US census, the scandalously high level of poverty in New York State's big cities and in numerous instances, adjacent suburbs. For more, see below.

# # #

With charter schools on the outs with in-coming New York City mayor Bill deBlasio, we can image that the various franchises, such as in Eva Moskowitz' Success Academies, Geoffrey Canada's Harlem Children's Zone or other charter school chains will search out additional locales to yield over chunks of their school systems.

# # #

One new trend upstate: Bolden Vargas, superintendent in Rochester, is pursuing the idea of letting colleges manage some of the city's "struggling schools." We would wonder how parental participation and fair contracts for school employees would fare under such a system. So far, the Rochester Teachers Association publicly seems alright with the proposal. But RTA president Adam Urbanski said that teacher and parent involvement would be critical for the plan to work.

Significantly high levels of poverty in New York State cities
Incidentally, according to a new report by the Rochester Area Community Foundation and ACT Rochester Rochester is the fifth poorest city in the United States among the 75 largest metropolitan areas. 46.6 percent of the city's children live under the poverty line. The same city is ranked third for concentrations of extreme poverty among the top 100 metropolitan areas. Buffalo ranks number six among among the top 75 metropolitan areas.

A new report by New York State Community Action Association (NYSCC) indicated that in Rochester the child poverty rate was 50.4 percent.  In other New York State cities north of the Tappan Zee Bridge, aside from Albany, about 40-50% of children are in poverty, in declining order of city general population size rank: Buffalo, 46.6%, Syracuse, 49.0%, Schenectady, 39.3%, Utica, 44.2%, Troy, 47.8% and Binghamton, 49.2% of the children live below the poverty line. South of the Tappan Zee our most troubled areas fare relatively better: the Bronx's child poverty rate: 41.1%, Brooklyn, 33.0%, Yonkers, 22.9%, Mt. Vernon, 21.6%.

Gripping poverty across New York State is the story that we should really pay attention to. The United States poverty rate is 14.4%; the New York State rate is 15.1%. Before we can expect students in poor communities to perform at a level comparable to those in the tony towns of Westchester or Nassau Counties we should seriously tackle poverty and its impact on families and child development.

For discussion of the interaction of poverty and school performance, see for example, my blog entry this July, "More Stats Illustrate: U.S. Student Test Score Gap is Reflection of Class and Poverty," Stephen Krashen, Poverty is the problem that must be solved... Our Schools Are Not Broken or "High Stakes Test Protest Press Release Points to Poverty Factor in Education" on Change the Stakes' press release before a Tweed protest.
Book lovers, see Chapter 10, "How Poverty Affects Academic Achievement," of Diane Ravitch's instant classic on the current neo-liberal education corporatization trend, Reign of Error: The Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America's Public Schools.

Great job, Governor Cuomo --Ineffective on education, Ineffective on economic development. May you face serious political challenges in 2014, especially in the elections, lest you get a sudden awakening of conscience.