We have had 20 years of mayoral control of NYC schools. It is up for renewal with the State Legislature this week. My position is to just let it sunset and revert to the 1996 school governance law that had a seven-member Board of Education. Two of the seven were appointed by the mayor and five by the borough presidents. The 1996 law took hiring power away from the community school boards.
This should be an interim governing body until a task force can make recommendations for a permanent governance system that puts the public back into public education. We need more accountability than a mayoral election every four years.
Mayor Eric Adams and Chancellor David Banks cannot even get a 2022-23 school calendar out in a timely way. Their main argument for holding onto power is their identity.
Tom Sheppard is a parent member of the Panel for Educational Policy. He took to Twitter to call mayoral control a failure:
I believe the 1996 law and maybe the current one require school funding to be at least the same percentage of the city budget as the last three years. Let's all look at the old Stavisky Goodman law. Killing mayoral control will not lead to huge education budget cuts unless everything else is slashed.
I have emailed my Senator, John Liu, twice and called his office to lobby against mayoral control. No reply.
26 comments:
Mr. Sheppard is not alone in his doubts concerning mayoral control. He is also not alone in receiving no responses from Sen. Liu nor Assemblyman Benedetto.
Well, duh, it is very obvious that mayoral control has been a complete abysmal failure.
But of course, delusional democrat politicians will hold on to this valuable tool for their grasping political control.
Sadly, education in any real sense is not part of their democratic agenda.
For them, coerced progressive indoctrination and political manipulation are the main benefits of mayoral control.
THE NY CITY SCHOOLS FAIL TO EDUCATE OUR CHILDREN PRECISELY BECAUSE OF MAYORAL CONTROL.
Nothing is working right now. I got an informal observation by my principal, Jason Wagner, or Pelham Lab HS on the Lehman HS campus with zero students in the class! Not joking. This is beyond Kafka.
Mayoral control has led to bad outcomes for public school education.
More mayoral control guarantees more bad outcomes.
Those who continue to advocate for Mayoral Control are racists pretending to be anti-racist.
Mayoral control is fake.
Anon 2323, I would post your comment if you pull the part that has absolutely nothing to do with mayoral control and is not at all relevant here. You are up to one of your old tricks of starting on topic and then pivoting to your own agenda. I have been very open in the comment section but keep it close to the topic, please.
Are mayoral control and our calender/schedule part of our contract negotiations? Does anyone have specifics?
I did not receive a response from my State Senator, Mr. Liu, either, but thought it was just a blip. Apparently not...And I heartily agree with the parent.
Calendar for next year doesn't have anything to do with negotiations for a new contract but the calendar does have to abide by current collective bargaining agreements. Mayoral control is a state issue. Future calendars could be a negotiating issue when the contract is up in September.
Mayoral Control has led to spending more and more and getting less and less education for our kids.
We are spending more on wasteful DOE legal staffing, wasteful spending on OEO staffing, wasteful spending at DOE central administration... etc. etc. Administrative (non-classroom) spending has ballooned under mayoral control benefiting the Tweed political machine at the expense of NY city taxpayers. At the same time, children of color have been harmed by the bad educational policies of Michael R Bloomberg and Bill de Blasio.
They are the neo-racists pretending to be anti-racists. Their unenlightened elitist education policies have been most harmful to African American children and Latino children. Their twin obsessions with control and patronage have hurt NY City, period.
Under mayoral control, the DOE and Tweed has become a democrat party patronage mill, par excellence.
Can someone answer this? If your supervisor hasn't given you a written observation report by now 5/31, can they rate you no lower than effective? I haven't gotten a written observation report all year.
Mayoral control or no mayoral control? Does it really matter when attendance and enrollment has been declining over past few years. Apparently, Adams needs the control of the school to show some positive educational political statement in 3 years when he runs for reelection—such as ‘ I kept the schools open and safe and happy for the parents of our nearly 900,000 students.’
And of course he will fudge or give misleading statements/charts about graduation rates etc. And if anything bad—should happen he will blame the teachers and other politicians.
To give Mayoral control to a mayor who can't even control crime, the platform he ran on, is just plain irresponsible.
I do not know whose little pawn adams is, but with his "naked king" ambitions he can destroy many more lives with these powers.
Those who support his attempts to keep the control of the schools will bear responsibility for the damage.
Not giving Adams control of the schools for at least 4 years—he will cry ‘foul’—because mayoral control was given to his predecessors—and he deserves that same opportunity too. Unfortunately for the UFT—he supports a longer day, school year and charters—and Bloomberg has his ear—something that never happened with DeBlasio.
If Adams wants total accountability for education—let’s just not hope it doesn’t turn into the same thing as his promise on crime.
Adams is unworthy of mayoral control. de Blasio and Bloomberg were also unworthy of mayoral control.
They lacked the wisdom, sensitivity to education and race, and sound judgment to run the schools with a view to the future of our democracy.
They were unworthy and Adams is unworthy because their selfishness, narcissism and many moral failures.
Adams inability to control crime in NY city is a moral stain on his
track record as mayor.
Adams can’t control anything, including the schools. He should step down if he’s not up the job - too many people are getting killed.
speaking of calendars the DOE calendar says JUNE27 last day of school for students When is last day for teachers?
Q: Why black boys still can't read?
A: Mayoral Control
8:19: June 28th but supposedly it's on-line and is asynchronous so interpret it the way you want.
Regarding the June 28th question, this is from Principal's Hub:
June 9 and June 28: For all schools, June 9 is Anniversary Day: Chancellor’s Conference Day for staff development, and June 28 is a professional development day. On June 9 and June 28, teachers and mandated related service providers shall be permitted to work remotely; however, the principal may, with reasonable advance notice, direct staff to be on site. Principals should inform these employees if they are expected to work in person by the following days:
By May 27 for June 9; and
By June 14 for June 28.
june 28th is a chancellors day for professional development. Its not asynchronous instruction. So your school is suppose to provide 6 hours and 50 minutes of professional development. Your principal can request you come to the building if they have a valid reason for doing so.
Read the extended version.. It's also June 27, because June 28 is a holiday next year
Next year, the last day for students and teachers is June 27th. Because June 28th is a holiday. We are not allowed to work past the 28th with current contract language. All other personnel have to return on the 29th and 30th - secretaries, guidance, etc.
You can bet that the city will try to negotiate ending after the 28th or starting before labor day, so that they can either add more holidays or not have such a tight calendar going forward.
A: because they want to become a mayor of NYC.
The citizens of NYC need to start the recall campaign.
How naive.
Why wouldn't it?
In our future is a calendar with Eid, Lunar New Year, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Juneteenth on weekdays with the spring lunar cycle pushing Passover and Western Easter into separate months...it happens now and then.
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