Friday, June 01, 2018

The DOE Refuses To Fund 41 Schools So They Can Hire A Full Time Guidance Counselor.



























The DOE has a 25.5 billion dollar budget, yet they refuse to spend $5.2 million dollars to fill the vacant spots for a Guidance Counselor or Social Worker for 41 schools in the public school system.  This is the very same DOE that has for years had  the motto "children first" but for 41 schools the DOE refuses to allow the schools to hire a full time guidance counselor or  social workers to provide critical services to the students.  Just think, the DOE uses 24% of their budget on administrative overhead when the national average is 11%.  Can't the DOE streamline the bloated Central Bureaucracy and provide the extra funds for these 41 Public Schools?  Apparently, the answer is no

Chancellor Carranza must step in and take action to rid the bloated Central Bureaucracy of the Bloomberg/Klein ideology that shortchanges public schools with near recession budgets (90% of their fair funding) while even the City Comptroller has questioned why the DOE spends 24% of their budget on administrative functions?

In these 41 public schools, many students need social services that only a certified Guidance Counselor or Social Worker can provide.  Not having a full-time Guidance Counselor or Social Worker is almost criminal.  Yet the Bloomberg era administrators that allocate funds and make policy believe that if a school cannot provide professional services with their tight budget then it's the school's problem and not the DOE's.

I hope that Chancellor Carranza does what Carmen Farina did not do and that is to "clean house".  Otherwise, schools will continue to be starved for funds while the DOE, flush with cash, will continue to spend money on their administrative overhead.  "Children Last"....Always..

20 comments:

Anonymous said...

A lot of the budget is spent on lawyers and Field Supervisors going after older teachers.

Anonymous said...

Children last, always!

https://writepaperfor.me/ said...

I love reading your articles. Thank you very much. Write more.

Anonymous said...

Over 300 guidance counselors in the ATR pool. Why can't the DOE use these people?? What the heck is going on at TWEED?? Are you for real? The DOE is run like the NY Mets. They always seem to fuk up and everything is a secret.

Michael Fiorillo said...

Go After Teachers First, Always.

The children? We'll get around to them later, maybe...

Anonymous said...

I’m watching 3 ATR guidance counselors playing Candy Crush in this large broken up campus. The kids have no counselors and many of them are very disturbed, if not outright dangerous. The city doesn’t care about students or kids.

Anonymous said...

Schools also use school based organizations (SBO) which are outside agencies (non-DOE staff) to fill the gap where there are no DOE social workers or guidance counselors. These people do not have the training that DOE staff have yet they are in the schools.

What about the schools that have no working library and librarians???? How can this be???

Where are the rules and regulations that are supposed to insure a quality public education for our children???

Feels like the "Wild West"!!!! Anything goes!!!!

Anonymous said...

Eric....more in depth coverage of the Guidance Counselor debacle is needed. Teacher ATRs are bad enough, but Guidance Counselors?

Anonymous said...

What does an Atr counselor do? I am asking because I will be one in September.

Anonymous said...

ATR GCs do whatever the school needs! It is hard because we could be rotated at will. We work with students, parents, and staff but could be gone the next week.

Some schools welcome the extra help and some schools treat you like you are invisible! Each school is different and you have to flexible!

Try not to take things to heart (which is hard) because most of the schools are in chaos! It is about helping students! Keep this in mind and keep positive!

Being an ATR is challenging to say the very least!

Anonymous said...

8:56 Why are you becoming ATR? Is it a closing school, low enrollment, budget, vindictive?

People do not realize that anyone can become an ATR at anytime!

We need to change excessing rules now! This should be in contract negotiations!

Our rights are severely weakened with ATR pool!





Anonymous said...

We have an ATR counselor at the school because the school is underfunded and the principal chose to have a useless body in her office who doesn't help children but earns top salary instead of hiring a counselor.
The ATR counselor plays a huge role in working with some out of control kids but more importantly he's used by the principal for ass-covering and reporting on teachers.

Anonymous said...

Yet my puny little school (approx. 650 enrollment) has a principal and two APs. Talk about administrative bloat.

Anonymous said...

Yes 8:47.

That happens often! Why are principles allowed to get away with not hiring the proper staff for the students?

Instead of getting qualified staff they have ATR teachers, counselors, and social workers who are rotated whenever!

No stability for school or students! MINDLESS!!!!

ATR APs stay in a school for a year! They are useless!!!

UFT WHERE ARE YOU???

Anonymous said...

They are expensive for the budget.

Anonymous said...

We had an ATR guidance counselor a couple of years ago. She did an awesome job, but she was not offered a job because she doesn't speak Spanish and all of our students and parents do.

Who would have thought this would be America today?

Anonymous said...

@9:52, that is pretty standard. 3 administrators for 600 kids, I used to work in a school that had 4 with a similar enrollment, and they were all utterly useless.

Anonymous said...

And when you include the useless body that most principals have in their office ( a teacher who does the principals work and usually called a reading coach but never works with children) your talking about at least $500,000. Makes you sick!

Unknown said...

Im a ATR counselor and I really like the new school I am in. I am treated apart of the staff and was even assigned to work with the whole entire 6th grade. The school only has 300 students so having two counselors wouldn’t make sense. I hope they find money in the budget to hire. Or hope I can stay until June

Emma Brown said...

Free Essays For Students
Use these essays as examples to write your paper

Writing an essay is not a simple task. Even today, when students have an opportunity to find an answer to any issue on the Internet, writing an essay still remains one of the biggest challenges for many. On the web, one can find limitless guides and tips on how to write a paper. However, sometimes it is better to read a good essay sample then spend time on endless tips.

To help students understand how to write an assignment, we have made a large database of free college essays. Here, you will find samples of various essay types, such as argumentative, persuasive, narrative, informative, and many others. For each type we found the most diverse essay examples so that you could find the one which is close to the paper you have to write.https://samples.essaytopicsmasters.com/