GRITtv: Education Inequality in "Liberal" New York

[madfloridian]

Run time: 04:56 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTC04QcmFVs   Posted on YouTube: April 15, 2010 By YouTube Member: lauraflanders Views on YouTube: 51   Posted on DU: April 22, 2010 By DU Member: madfloridian Views on DU: 337

 
Comments from the Grassroots Education Movement NYC

Wednesday, April 21, 2010
"Separate and Unequal school system in 'liberal' NYC" - GRIT TV
Apr 14, 2010 "If you're a white student and you arrive at the public elementary school building on 95th Street and Third Avenue, you'll probably walk through the front door. If you're a black student, you'll probably come in through the back. So reported the Village Voice on one of New York's best-kept secrets: its public schools are some of the most segregated public schools in the country. The schools have two tiers: one for affluent white families who pump private funds into THEIR kids classrooms, and another for largely minority, poor communities-- underfunded, underserved and overcrowded: 43% have severe space problems, and the recession ensures that no help is in sight. GRITtv went to Donna Nevel, an advocate for fairer schools in New York, for her take."

The video refers one to more about such a school in an article at The Village Voice

Inside a Divided Upper East Side Public School

If you're a white student and you arrive at the public elementary school building on 95th Street and Third Avenue, you'll probably walk through the front door. If you're a black student, you'll probably come in through the back.

It's a very New York kind of school facility: two completely different elementary schools sharing the same space. The boxy, utilitarian structure was built in 1959 to house P.S.198, named after Isador and Ida Straus to commemorate the Congressman and Macy's department store owner and his wife, who both died in the 1912 sinking of the Titanic.

Since 1988, the building has shared space with another school, in a tradition that has rapidly increased under the reformist scheme of Mayor Mike Bloomberg. In this case, it's the Lower Laboratory School for Gifted Education (P.S.77) that has been given space in the old Straus building—including the part that contains the front door.

Lower Lab is mostly composed of white students (69 percent) and Asian children, who are driven in from all over Manhattan. Straus is zoned, which means it has to serve any child from the local neighborhood. For that reason, it's overwhelmingly Latino (47 percent) and black (24 percent). Over the main entrance, the old sign for Straus remains, but Straus kids are told to go around to the back of the building.

It seems a message is sent to kids at an early age about who is special.

But, as one teacher put it, you can see the message taking hold that the children are already receiving about their station in life: "These children are babies—they're four years old—when we start separating them! When you tell them from such a young age, 'You are more than, and you are less than,'—when you tell them 'You are gifted,' and 'You are not,' they get the message."

To hear the staff of Straus tell it, the teachers of Lower Lab—who have exclusive use of the front door—have gotten the message that they're special, too.

"Some of those teachers, they think that because their children are 'gifted,' that makes them better teachers," says one teacher at Straus. "But why? They've already selected out the highest-achieving kids. They're easy to teach. We have to take anyone who walks in. We have to bring kids to the table."

[bluestateguy]

1. The really really rich in NYC send their kids to private schools

And opt out of public education all together.

I see the problem here, but what is she proposing to do about it? Forbid parents from donating to a public school? I don't see that happening.

[madfloridian]

2. There is nothing to be done about it.

It is what it is. The creeping changes into public schools have been deemed acceptable.

[exboyfil]

4. I think keeping TAG as a percentage of the zoned population

would be a start. One of the parents mentioned this as being the issue. The TAG should also reside at the same school with the zoned population.

I don't see how you can address different zones having more or less parental support. We see it at a much smaller scale in our district. Our district is mostly white and has really high levels of performance. Our sister district is more mixed, and its performance is lower. They actually spend more per student in the other district, have, in general better facilities, and benefit from more economies of scale by being larger. At the elementary level in our school district a considerable amount of money is raised each year that goes to school improvements (like playground equipment). Probably the spend per student then equalizes. I don't know if the parents in the other district do as much.

Obviously the biggest difference comes with the parents. My sister in law student taught in the other school district, and we had a family friend who also taught over there. The contrast is striking. When my sister-in-law tried to call in the parents of one child for a discipline issue, not only was she insulted and threatened for her intervention, the father actually was arrested for stealing from the school.

[exboyfil]

3. My oldest daughter is in a TAG pull out program

My youngest is not. It is interesting to see the contrast in how the two are treated. In addition even within the TAG framework certain kids are given more consideration than others. I think it all comes down to the CogAT score (the higher scores can get whatever acceleration options they want and are even pushed when they don't want to be accelerated).

My oldest must have been fairly low in comparison to the other TAG kids(since we had to really push to get her into TAG in 6th grade - she was not in it in 5th grade). That same CogAT score was used to try to stop her from taking Algebra in 8th grade (she missed PreAlgebra in 7th in part because of it) by the Jr. High TAG teacher. The fact that she, through the intervention of her 7th grade math teacher, got into Algebra and now has an A average in Algebra does not even register with this person. She cannot admit that she made a mistake. Her second mistake with my oldest was resisting the entire way my daughter's acceleration in Science (taking 8th and 9th grade Science at the same time). My daughter has had straight As so far this year and has the highest class grades in both 8th and 9th grade Science. Woops another mistake by the TAG teacher who sees no issue with false positives (excluding competent kids from acceleration opportunities).

My youngest was right on the cut line on the PreAlgebra assessment test, but, since she had a really low CogAT score (67 percentile), she was excluded from PreAlgebra as well. Her other criteria (A in her current 6th grade Math and 94% on the ITBS Math) was not considered. The CogAT was given in 4th grade (two years before the placement decision). I do not understand how a child who is in the top 6% in the nation is not slated for Algebra in 8th grade when 30% of the country is taking it.

As far as I am concerned our elementary and junior high TAG program and its 3 teachers could be dissolved and the money spent to keep a bunch of associates who are slated for dismissal because of budget cuts. Acceleration decisions should rest with the parents and departmental teachers anyway.

The thing that made me uneasiest about this whole TAG thing was a section they did on how they are special because they are TAG. It made my skin crawl - just because they can take a standardized test better than others does not make them special.