The key factor that enabled us to take back our streets was the
CompStat program, in which crime data is collected from all parts
of the City and results used to determine how to deploy our police
officers. It’s a simple principle: gather accurate data, and use
that information to better address the needs of the City. If the
statistics show increasing crime in a certain area, we are able
to address the situation quickly. It’s all about accountability
– with information analyzed on a regular basis, it’s hard to ignore
problems.
CompStat has proven so successful that we’ve decided to apply
the same approach throughout City government. I unveiled the Citywide
Accountability Program – known as CapStat. Just like CompStat,
this system will require that agencies provide up-to-date statistics
that they need to determine whether current tactics and strategies
are actually working. The seventeen agencies adopting the CapStat
model range from the Parks to Fire Departments.
However, one agency in the City has so far declined to apply the
lessons of CompStat — the Board of Education. I’ve encouraged
the Board to adopt its own version of CapStat to improve the management
of the school system. To give students and teachers the best chance
to succeed, we need to restore the principle of accountability
to the classroom, but to date the Board of Education has resisted
this effort.
Some people believe that nothing can improve our schools. But
many people also believed that nothing could be done to make our
City safer. This belief helped to perpetuate the myth that our
City was ungovernable, but we’ve shown that a new philosophy of
management can transform an entire culture. CompStat has led to
an unprecedented drop in crime, with overall crime declining by
over 57% from 1993 to 2000 and murder declining 65% in that same
period.
There are also those who say that while the CompStat model may
work well for a highly regimented agency such as the Police Department,
it has no place in other areas of City government. Nothing could
be further from the truth. We’ve successfully enrolled 140,000
children and adults into health care through an initiative known
as HealthStat. The Administration for Children’s Services has
become the model child welfare agency in the country by carefully
measuring the performance of caseworkers and supervisors, and
by holding them accountable. As a result, the foster care population
has been reduced dramatically, and we have more than doubled our
child-support collections, with a record $446.9 million collected
this year.
CompStat programs have reinvented the way that our City agencies
work, and have helped to improve the lives of millions of New
Yorkers. The overwhelming success of these programs in a variety
of different agencies and contexts indicates that our education
system would also benefit greatly from a policy of strict accountability
based on the CompStat model.
A CapStat program would sift through the bureaucracy of our school
system and expose its failures. The Chancellor and the Board of
Education could regularly meet with principals and superintendents
to assess the latest statistics regarding student performance
and attendance. If results continue to indicate that a certain
school is not effectively educating our children, then an explanation
and a solution would be required. Instead of letting poor results
and mismanagement continue throughout another school year, educators
would be forced to swiftly remedy the situation and show improvement
over the course of subsequent CompStat meetings. Such accountability
meetings are a staple of the Police Department under CompStat,
and there is no reason why similar sessions could not be used
by school administrators to improve our schools.
ýn addition, by posting these CapStat results on the Internet
– as we do with all other City Agencies – parents could log on
to the Board of Education’s website and compare the performance
of their local public school with other schools in the area as
well as schools citywide.
The proven success of CompStat provides an excellent example for
our education system to follow. This kind of true accountability
would greatly improve the quality of education our children receive.
This is an opportunity that our school system cannot afford to
pass up. Our teachers – and our children – deserve no less.