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JUNE 2007

Seeking a Balance in Education

By Randi Weingarten

Lots of people have been asking why, if the schools were doing so well, would the system need a third major reorganization in five years? Many questions were raised; some in public rallies and town meetings and some in print. The mayor listened and that’s why a coalition of parents, teachers and community groups recently reached an agreement with the city that addressed some of our key reservations.

Although things are constantly changing, this is what the agreement did:

On the plus side, Mayor Michael Bloomberg agreed to change the new school budget formula to ensure that schools that do well will not lose funds for at least the next two years—and schools with large numbers of poor or special-needs children will receive additional resources.

A particularly big plus is that class sizes should start to shrink, helped largely by an infusion of resources from the settlement of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity court case. This is something New York City public schools have needed for a long time and it is heartening to see that Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s administration recognizes this need.

Also, in response to coalition complaints about parents and educators being excluded from the decision-making process, the Department of Education has created committees that should allow parents and other stakeholders to offer views on crucial policy matters such as class size reduction and school funding. In addition, parents, educators and students are completing a system-wide survey of their own schools.

Other benefits include an agreement to create a pilot program focusing attention and resources on middle schools, a parent engagement committee to bolster school leadership teams and a commitment from the chancellor to maintain teacher tenure standards.

These changes are significant improvements in the original proposed reorganization.

Yet, we are still concerned that too much responsibility has been shifted to the principals from the central bureaucracy and that federal and state regulations still require excessive testing. Students must take math, English and science tests in third- through eighth-grade—and Regents exams in high school. This has been augmented by the new system-wide report card. As a result, teachers must commit huge amounts of time to paperwork involving student assessments.

A new survey by the United Federation of Teachers shows educators spend nearly five hours and 15 minutes of class time a week—equal to 11⁄4 days of classroom instruction—on mandated paperwork involving student assessments. Some 89% of those surveyed said they had more assessment-related paperwork than before.

Preparing students to take so many high-stakes tests consumes a great deal of classroom instruction time. In both elementary and secondary schools, 89% of teachers said their schools devote significant class time to test preparation activities. Elementary school teachers said they begin preparing for high-stakes reading and math tests about 7 1⁄2 weeks, on average, before the tests. During that time they spend close to eight hours per week —almost a third of their weekly teaching time—on test preparation, taking time away from core subjects like social studies, the arts and physical education.

Middle and high school teachers said they begin preparing for tests almost seven weeks ahead of time and 70% said they spend at least half of each teaching period on test preparation. With so much time devoted to test prep, teaching and learning in the classroom can’t help but suffer.

So the reorganization is indeed a mixed bag, but parents can rest assured that we in the coalition will do our best to make it work for the sake of our children.

The partnership formed by educators, parents and the community around this issue might be the strongest in New York’s history. Given that the coalition members share the goal of providing our kids with the best education possible, we hope to build on our momentum and be a public force on behalf of our schools and our students.#

Randi Weingarten is the President of the United Federation of Teachers in NYC.

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