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Comments

• [1] michael winslow from INWOOD March 21, 2008 - 09:41AM

  How can any cuts in education be justified?

  You get what you pay for.

  If the city cuts money from the school budgets then they have to expect an uneducated public who won't go to college and in many instances will become criminals.

  Is this the city the mayor and Klien want?

  Stop putting the lottery revenue INTO the general fund!

  The consequences of this are going to be catastrophic.

  
  
• [2] James from new york March 21, 2008 - 10:15AM

  I'm concerned with the possible cuts in special needs education. Will these programs and monies suffer as a result of the budget cuts?

  
  
• [3] Corinna lindenberg from east village, manhattan March 21, 2008 - 10:16AM

  these cuts segregate the schoolsytem even more. J. Klein made sure with lots of no bid contracts that no money can be saved with all the new contracts to private companies (IBM being just one of them-80 million). Plus he introduced the new rating and accountability sytem (schoolgrades) to ensure that the first things cut in crisis will be Arts and Music education and other enrichment programs. Nobody would dare touch math or language or dataprocessing or testing/assesments, no principal is allowed to do that they will also be the ones blamed for the damage since they are in the 'accountable' position to decide what has to go. Therefor arts and music will only be teached to students whose parents can afford it as an afterschoolactivity.

  If you ask parents if they rather pay martina guerrier 150.000 $ or pay for 5 part time music teacher guess the answer!

  If you ask parents if they rather pay chris Cerf 170.000 $ for bringing as much private contractors in the picture as possible or pay for 6 part time arts teachers...

  
  
• [4] Jason March 21, 2008 - 10:31AM

  Education is one of those sink holes of gov't money. There would never be enough of it. THey could add a billion every year and people would complain that there is not enough. its an easy way to get rid of any responsibility for one's own educational failings or lack of family support. That is not to say money is not necessary, just that it is always used as a political tool - in what election cycle have we not heard money for education over and over again. i think entire layers of middle management in the schools should be removed. There is most definitely money to be saved in this dept.

  
  
• [5] Vinzenz from east village, manhattan March 21, 2008 - 10:40AM

  (4th grader at Earth School, PS 364)

  It's not funny, give us our money.

  
  
• [6] Kim from Park Slope March 21, 2008 - 10:49AM

  Has Klein made cuts in Tweed? As a classroom teacher I do not understand how Klein can justify spending millions on testing to McGraw Hill, millions on consultants from England for the School Quality Review, millions on surveys and lots of money to pay people over $190K at Tweed. Bottom line is the kids. These cuts will impact kids tremendously if class size jumps.

  
  
• [7] jessica from Woodside, NY March 21, 2008 - 11:24AM

  I am a second year 8th grade English Language Arts teacher and can easily attest to the fact that social promotion is still very much in the works in NYC. Last year I had several students fail my class for the year, but were promoted without having to attend summer school because they received a 2 or higher on the LA exam. Overlooking the obvious absurdity of it all, the public should know a 2 scored on the exam indicates a student performs two to three years below grade level. Sadly, this happens all of the time and the students know it. It is quite amazing to watch a student who has chosen to fail quarter after quarter, roll up their sleeves and attack the state tests with a diligence never to be exhibited in the classroom.

  
  
• [8] Babwah March 21, 2008 - 11:45AM

  What about the heavy police presence in schools? And the presence of costly video surveillance cameras that have questionable impact on security and raise significant privacy concerns for students?

  
  
• [9] KK from Brooklyn March 21, 2008 - 02:13PM

  I've been very dismayed at the mayor's (and the media's) response to the state cuts. Basically, the line has been, "We're in hard economic times and the state did this bad thing to us." Well, the state did do this bad thing, spurred no doubt by hard economic times, but what gets lost in the articles is that the mayor and the DOE have DISCRETION as to how they would implement these cuts.

  This show was the first time I heard Klein say that he would look into cuts at Tweed. It is imperative that the DOE whittle at its bloated testing apparatus. Every year brings announcements of yet another round of required tests. These unduly tax the staff and students AND, of course, they cost the big, big bucks. The city has gone way beyond what the Feds and state require in terms of testing. Next year, they're even going to start testing all kindergartners (no opt out!).

  I found Klein disingenuous when he said that he has talked to many parents around the city who are happy about progress reports and parent surveys; most folks I know are disgusted at the reductionist nature of the reports, which depend heavily on test scores, and the survey.

  I hope you will be able to do more shows on this topic as the DOE's practices must be kept in the public view--complaining to our elected council officials doesn't really help since they are largely powerless under mayoral control...