 Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced in a statement on Wednesday that, starting immediately, New York City public schools would begin to use test scores to gauge which teachers should or should not receive tenure.
This move has been bitterly opposed by the teachers union, which claims that this is putting too much weight on standardized exams, such as the citywides, and regents exams.
Although most do agree that standardized tests are not a good measure of students’ capabilities, the state government still puts a ton of stock in them. Standardized tests are used to decide teacher and principal bonus pay, assign A through …continue reading
While New York Governor David Paterson tries to convince the state legislature to cut $3.2 billion from the state budget, New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg wants to cut an additional $1.7 billion from the city budget.
Mayor Mike has said that he wants to cut $500 million from this years budget and $1.2 from next year’s.
His plan would involve cutting 1.5% of the education budget, 2% from the “uniformed services” (i.e. cops, firefighters), and 4% from everything else this year.
Next year, the education system would have its budget cut by an additional 4%, …continue reading
In the third year of the A-F grade system, the Education Department has handed down plenty of As but numerous C’s and D’s as well.
In total, 40 schools received better grades than they did last year but 67 schools received lower grades and six schools received an F. In total, 7% of New York City public schools received a D or an F.
While the grades are largely based on test scores, the Education Department claims to also use student progress, graduate rates, and overall performance. Since the grades were introduced in 2007, the city has …continue reading
Last week we discussed the record numbers of people that were applying to Community Colleges and City University of New York schools in general but a new study suggests that the colleges have their work cut out for them.
According to a report done by CUNY itself, 90% of students who graduated from city high schools and are entering a four-year (not two-year) CUNY school cannot do a simple algebra problem. More than a third of the students tested could not convert a fraction into a decimal.
More than 70% of the CUNY system is made up …continue reading
Despite New York State’s growing $3 billion deficit, state senate leaders did not respond to Governor David Paterson’s speech to a joint session of the legislature as he would have liked.
As New York faces an economic collapse similar to the one in California, state legislators are doing what they have always done, avoiding any unpopular yet necessary actions that could threaten their jobs, while the Governor avoids pushing too much and is all too willing to compromise.
New Yorkers have come to expect the state legislature to avoid any unpopular actions but many are starting to …continue reading
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