Concerns Aired at Hearing For MS-571 Phase Out
More than 80 parents and faculty signed up to speak at last night’s public hearing on phasing out Middle School 571 in Prospect Heights to make room for Brooklyn East Collegiate, a charter school now located in East New York. The building is also home to PS 9. District Leader Chris Owens asked the crowd,…
More than 80 parents and faculty signed up to speak at last night’s public hearing on phasing out Middle School 571 in Prospect Heights to make room for Brooklyn East Collegiate, a charter school now located in East New York. The building is also home to PS 9. District Leader Chris Owens asked the crowd, “It turns out MS-571 was not as successful as planned… but whose fault is that?” That seems to be the big question as the Department of Education proposes to bring in charter schools in response to failing public schools. Indeed, MS-571 received a “D” on its most recent progress report, with only 8 percent of students performing at grade level in English Language Arts. This ranks the school in the bottom two percent of all middle schools in NYC. DOE Deputy Chancellor Laura Rodriguez said, “Only the most serious intervention will address these longstanding performance problems.”
So what did MS-571 and PS9 parents have to say about this?
Parents of MS-571 and PS9 were not to keen on the notion of phasing out the existing middle school to make way for the charter school, and the ideal situation would be to expand PS9 into a K-8. “This school took the children everyone already shut their doors on,” said MS-571 PTA President Maria Salichs. “Where do they go after that?” And although parents from Brooklyn East Collegiate vouched for the quality of the school’s education, MS-571 parents shouted from the crowd that Collegiate was only an option if “you can win the lottery.” The lottery for Brooklyn Collegiate, if relocated, would be available to all students in Brooklyn but favor those already in the district. Jo Anne Simon brought up a good point that “the problem with co-location is that it automatically sets up a division.” Another parent agreed, saying the process was “unnecessarily divisive.” Those comments rang loudest during the night, during which crowd members booed or shouted during opponent’s speeches. A rally against co-location is scheduled for January 29th, and a vote on the matter takes place February 3rd. If the phase-out is approved, it will be fully complete by June 2013.
There will be a rally Saturday to oppose the co-location in PS 9:
JOIN NYC COUNCIL MEMBER LETITIA JAMES
in PROTEST against the CO-LOCATION OF CHARTER SCHOOLS in the
PS 9/MS 571 and PS 316/MS 353 BUILDINGS
When: SATURDAY, JANUARY 29, 2011 @ 1:00 PM
Where: DURYEA PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH
362 STERLING PLACE (corner of Underhill Avenue)
**enter down side stairs on Sterling Place**
PLEASE JOIN US IN SAYING THAT WE WILL NOT STAND FOR THIS!!!
Great post, prospect heights mama! I taught at PS 9 at the time their original library media center was opened (mid-70’s). I’m sure the new library is an improvement on that one. As a proposal writer, I was also partly responsible for and very much involved with the renovation and expansion of many of the CSD 19 libraries in that district (largely through the largesse of the Library Power program) about 10 years ago. If I were a parent of children in those zoned schools, I would be sorely PO’d if my child were to be denied use of those libraries so that a new school could basically take over the show. Actually, as proposal writer, I think I would be equally PO’d.
This is another case, among MANY others, of the DOE totally riding roughshod over the will of the various communities in New York City. Makes one seriously reconsider the wisdom of handing the mayor control over the school system and doing away with a central board with any semblance of independence. (Truth be told, I was never in favor of THAT.)
The Dept of Ed is practicing “fuzzy math” with their proposal to co-locate PS 9, MS 571 and Brooklyn East Collegiate. BEC looks like a wonderful school – that is not at question. Having the three schools in one building at 80 Underhill Avenue will force all three schools to be out of compliance with state mandates in terms of physical education requirements, pose a health hazard as time to clean tables between the three schools lunch shifts in the cafeteria has been eliminated and allow PS 9 students exactly 9 minutes per week in the new library facility created entirely on their parents’ initiative. The DOE seems to have made their plan without consulting any of the administrators, city leaders or the Prospect Heights community at large. They are out of touch with the astounding “baby boom” that is happening in Prospect Heights and the wave of success that PS 9 is riding. MS 571 has been kicked to the curb – left under-funded and under-resourced with a disproportionate number of special education students and students living in transitional housing. These students need help, not to be told that they have “failed”. ELA scores may be low at MS 571 and that is because a large number of MS 571 students are English Language Learners and very recent immigrants to the U.S. DOE – get out of the way and let PS 9 and MS 571 partner together to transform the middle school into the viable district 13 junior high school that it can be. There is space for BEC in a DOE building just down the block if they must reside in district 13 – despite the fact that they were chartered to serve Brownsville in district 23 and currently reside in district 17. Parents of PS 9 and MS 571 oppose the DOE’s plan to co-locate Brooklyn East Collegiate within our school!
There is a great article in the Local comparing this situation to Atlantic Yards.
http://fort-greene.thelocal.nytimes.com/2011/01/21/opinion-the-people-divided/
Rob, I don’t think that kids should cut more than 10 days in a school year. (shouldn’t cut any) This is coming from a retired teacher who probably made more calls home for absence and lateness than any all other teacher’s in his school combined. This 10 day rule, however, is probably rather more strictly enforced in the case of a student who is underperforming rather than the brilliant one scoring off the charts who gets a couple of major illnesses. This is one way that charters or other magically effective schools manage to obtain such wonderful results.
Remember the old saying that anything that sounds too good to be true probably is.
quote:
One rule is, no student can miss more than ten school days in the year. Going by that alone, my child would already be kicked out.
im SURE it’s 10 days out without a valid doctor’s note. we had 11 in our school system but there were people who were okay as long as they had VALID doctor notes and excuses. sorry, but kids shouldnt be cutting more than 10 days of school in one year.
*rob*
A lot of these charters do quite well with their preselected “randomly chosen” students who are not somehow “counseled out,” perhaps because their needs cannot be met by the charter (e.g. special ed, ELL, among others) or because they just don’t seem to be able to abide by the school rules. Or perhaps because their parents are uncooperative. Gee, how great it is to be a school that can manage, somehow, to select their own students!
BCE has crazy extended hours and requires all students to sign a contract and abide by their rules. If you don’t, you’re out. (I got this from their website.) One rule is, no student can miss more than ten school days in the year. Going by that alone, my child would already be kicked out.
It appears that the MS 571 students are pretty much local, or very close to PS 9. If such a low percentage are scoring at grade level on the ELA, obviously something is not working. Since the DOE is so convinced that Brooklyn East Collegiate will be able to work wonders, perhaps the DOE should allow BCE to open at the PS 9 site taking in ALL of the MS571 students and demonstrating just how effective they are with them. More likely, though, there are problems unique to these students which BCE would be no more effective at ameliorating than MS571 has been. But, I could be proven wrong. (PS, I’m not betting on it.)