I read the Beth Fertig schoolbook article on how small themed schools try to get the most interesting applicants to their school and have some real issues about how naive Beth Fertig is, considering how experienced she is on New York City education issues.
First, she bought the kool-ade that small themed schools should be allowed to "screen" the applicant list to only select the "interested student". Despite the fact that all schools must take a lower third student population. Gone are the days when the Bloomberg administration allowed the small schools to exclude the lower third academically challenged student to ensure that the school succeeds while dumping the rest into the schools he wanted to close and did.
Second, these principals of the themed small schools would be happy to exclude "high needs" students, like Special Education, English Language Learners, and behaviorally challenged students if given the chance. Yet, Beth Fertig seemed not to understand that's what these principals were really requesting.
Finally, Beth Fertig should have asked the obvious question to these principals from the small themed schools, What then happens to the students who cannot meet the school's threshold criteria? The answer is also quite obvious, you dump them in the academically struggling schools and make it their problem.
Of course, the reason the small themed schools want only "interested students" is because these are the students that most likely have good academic skills, parents who went to school fairs or made a school visit, and best of all will have the best chance to graduate high school. Remember, the DOE still uses the graduation rate as the main focus of a school's success or failure and the first thing parents look at is the school's graduation rate. Given the chance, these themed small schools would "game the system" and could not care what happens to those "high needs" students, as long as they can reject them for their school.
To read a more detailed analysis of Beth Fertig's article please read the Ed the Apple blog.
Focus on obtaining complete demographic data for the ATR pool.
ReplyDeleteThe DOE and UFT are colluding in a racially and age biased scheme.
Hey then there is also the flip side like my small themed school were they take 30 percent sped kids and the money that comes with then which they then use for something else depriving the kids of required services.
ReplyDeleteNever seen anything like these co-located small schools sharing a campus. The principals despise one another and sabatouge each other regularly. Then do not assist one another and enjoy showing off especially when the other school doesn't have a particular program. It's like 9 gangs inside a prison on the Stevenson Campus in the Bronx. Kids wearing certain colors and cannot go to specific floors, etc. The DOE has created space wars where kids are caught in middle and for what. This article states that there are roughly 700 high schools in NYC. Why? Shouldn't there be neighborhood schools that house kids from the community? Shouldn't all schools offer the same or similar things? Isn't that what common schools do or common core related schools do? The same across the board, remember that? I guess a parent would say, well I live in ________ and I don't want to send my kids to _________ HS. Well, why does _________ HS have to be bad? Why can't that school offer great things and have a great leadership team? Why is it labeled a bad school? Kids are attending the school now so are we saying we gave up on whoever a there now? It's such a shame that the DOE actually thinks co-located schools in an unzoned setting works. My kids go to our zoned school and we talk with the community parents and meet neighborhood moms and dads at the local supermarket, etc. It's a beautiful scenario that actually works. The city is really playing the politically correct card with the zoning. All kids should go to any school of choice no matter the zip code. So you're basically telling that kid that his neighborhood sucks and he should get out and go somewhere else because he lives in a crap zip code. Why not make the damn schools in all zip codes great? Why do you need boutique schools with fancy names with the words Academy, Leadership, or Collegiate in them? You're not fooling anyone with the names! It's still the same kids who can't read. The only difference is that now they go to a fancy titled school and get a sweatshirt with a tiger on it. So they now belong to one of the gangs (schools) in the correctional facility (campus).
ReplyDeleteThese broken up schools are just as horrible as the ones they were created from. The only thing that has changed is the DOE got the senior staff ousted and turned into babysitters. The DOE has also at minimum quadrupled the costs for each campus school. So it's not because of money that we are out, it's because of institutional memory and contractual rights.
ReplyDeleteIf Donald Trump wins the election it won't matter what the DOE does anymore. The DOEs incompetent ways will ultimately be the destruction of itself as the US Dept of Education will no longer be funding our public schools. So what does this all mean? Well all the goons and bozos in the system whether you worked for a school or the DOE, whether you work as administrator or principal, teacher or social worker, secretary or counselor it won't matter people. This is a lesson for all. Forget about the ATR situation because ALL personal in public schools will now be looking at the abyss. The constant dysfunction of the mother ship - the DOE - will ultimately destroy itself in the form of president Trump. None of us can disagree with this post. So whether you are a principal or the dick bag who posts on this site from his moms basement, if Trump wins the party will be over for ALL and the people in the system who walked around like they were really somebody will realize now that they are nobody. Especially all the leadership academy principals who will be ups shits creek as they use to say back in the day. Chow folks vote for hillary without huma.
ReplyDeleteFertig is not naive, she's a conduit for so-called reform propaganda.
ReplyDeleteSaying that small schools try to get "the most interesting students" is just a painfully euphemistic way of saying they try to cream and curate their student populations.
Her "reporting" should be ignored, except when it's used as an example of how mainstream media continues to give the so-called reformers a free pass.