The MCSM Parent Teacher Association meets on the second Tuesday of every month at 6:00 pm in the Library. All parents are welcomed and encouraged to attend. Dinner and refreshments are served at each meeting, and Spanish translation assistance is available as well.
Listed below are the anticipated PTA meeting dates for the coming school year.
September 11, 2007
October 9, 2007
November 13, 2007
December 11, 2007
January 8, 2008
February 12, 2008
March 11, 2008
April 8, 2008
May 13, 2008
June 10, 2008
Friday, July 6, 2007
Parents: So Many Issues, So Little Time
The 2007/2008 school year promises to be a momentous one for MCSM. At the same time our school will be celebrating its 25th anniversary as a high school, we will be searching for a new Principal, trying to figure out how to operate in an empowerment network of 20 schools, and working to requalify as a Title I school. Remember, the Region 9 office no longer exists – MCSM will work through a new DOE superintendent of high schools named Francesca Pena and a network coordinator named Sanda Balaban. MCSM parents still face continuing issues as well with school safety and the Title I program management approach (Targeted Assistance versus the Schoolwide Program option).
As if these changes weren’t substantial enough by themselves, MCSM will be trying to educate children at the same time Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein are introducing or continuing enormous changes to the school system. Some examples of those changes?
1. Fair Student Funding – which promises to reduce MCSM’s budget by over $425,000.
2. More Standardized Tests – which would force our children to take five more standardized “progress monitoring” exams per year in Math and English, with five more each in social studies and science in another year or two. That’s 20 more standardized exams each year!
3. Pay for Performance – the Mayor wants to pay students $500 or more per year for showing up to school on time, passing Regents exams, and getting high grades on their standardized tests.
4. ARIS – a new, $80 million IBM computer system designed to track every student’s standardized test results.
5. School Report Cards – a new system intended to compare each school to other, similar schools and give each school a letter grade ranging from A to F.
6. Continuation of the cell phone ban and planned introduction of kiosks in which students would presumably leave their cell phones in small rented lockers outside the school building.
7. Criminalizing the classroom – a recent ACLU study and editorials by Bob Herbert have made it clear that the NYPD has introduced an entirely new level of abusive police enforcement behavior in NYC schools, especially in schools populated by children of color.
If these items are unfamiliar to you and you want to learn more, or if you want to participate in discussion with our new principal and other parents about how we should deal with them, please come to the MCSM PTA meetings on the second Tuesday of every month at 6:00 pm.
As if these changes weren’t substantial enough by themselves, MCSM will be trying to educate children at the same time Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein are introducing or continuing enormous changes to the school system. Some examples of those changes?
1. Fair Student Funding – which promises to reduce MCSM’s budget by over $425,000.
2. More Standardized Tests – which would force our children to take five more standardized “progress monitoring” exams per year in Math and English, with five more each in social studies and science in another year or two. That’s 20 more standardized exams each year!
3. Pay for Performance – the Mayor wants to pay students $500 or more per year for showing up to school on time, passing Regents exams, and getting high grades on their standardized tests.
4. ARIS – a new, $80 million IBM computer system designed to track every student’s standardized test results.
5. School Report Cards – a new system intended to compare each school to other, similar schools and give each school a letter grade ranging from A to F.
6. Continuation of the cell phone ban and planned introduction of kiosks in which students would presumably leave their cell phones in small rented lockers outside the school building.
7. Criminalizing the classroom – a recent ACLU study and editorials by Bob Herbert have made it clear that the NYPD has introduced an entirely new level of abusive police enforcement behavior in NYC schools, especially in schools populated by children of color.
If these items are unfamiliar to you and you want to learn more, or if you want to participate in discussion with our new principal and other parents about how we should deal with them, please come to the MCSM PTA meetings on the second Tuesday of every month at 6:00 pm.
Thursday, July 5, 2007
How Would Chancellor Klein's Fair Student Funding (FSF) Proposal Affect MCSM?
Perhaps you have never heard of Fair Student Funding, or FSF? It is the name Chancellor Klein has given to the DOE’s Children First program to change the way budgets are determined for all of the City’s public schools. The old budgeting program was very complex, and few people understood it. The DOE has claimed that the old system was unfair, that similar schools with similar numbers of students often did not receive the same budgets. The new program bases each school’s budget more strictly on the number of students in the school, their family income backgrounds, and whether they are regular education students, special education, or English language learners.
Chancellor Klein has approved this new budgeting system, but he does not plan to implement it until 2009. In the meantime, however, the DOE has begun recalculating what each school’s budget would have been under this new system (even though the old budgets will still be used for one or two more years). So what would happen to MCSM’s budget under of the program?
To understand the effect of FSF, it helps to know that MCSM’s operating budget for 2006/2007 was nearly $9,100,000. About $920,000 of this money came from sources outside the NYC DOE, mostly from the Federal Government under the Title I and Title III programs. Thus, MCSM’s budget allocation from the DOE was about $8,200,000.
Under the Chancellor’s FSF budgeting rules, MCSM’s budget for 2007/2008 would have been cut by $426,649. In other words, the DOE is saying the MCSM has been being overfunded by this amount (5.2% of our 2006/2007 budget allocation from DOE) and getting more money than it deserved! The same result is occurring in a number of District 4 (East Harlem) schools.
What does this mean for MCSM? It means that none of the billions of dollars awarded to New York City schools from New York State as a result of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit will go to MCSM in the next two years. Those funds will supposedly go instead to schools whose budgets appear underfunded based on the FSF rules. According to the Chancellor, schools like MCSM whom the DOE says are overfunded will be “held harmless” for the next two years, meaning that their budgets will be left the same as before, without the “overfunding” being taken away. Note, however, that the Chancellor has said nothing about what will happen in 2009/2010 and beyond. Under the FSF formulas, the DOE could reduce MCSM’s budget later by at least the $426,000 (depending on the school’s student population two years from now). That’s the equivalent of salaries and benefits for somewhere around 5 – 7 full-time teachers.
Our budgetary situation is potentially further complicated by the fact that we are required to requalify as a Title I school this fall. In 2004, MCSM families were required to fill out family income forms and 62% of our families qualified under the Title I guidelines. Since 60% was the minimum level for our school to qualify, we did not have much room to spare. If this fall we fail to have enough qualifying families to continue in Title I, MCSM will lose over $880,000 more from its annual budget. Thus, depending on how the DOE plans to implement FSF in 2009/2010, our school could be operating with $1.3 million less than it does now – not a bright prospect.
Parents, you need to stay aware of this issue. We will try to keep you informed on this blog site and through the Parent Newsletter as more news comes out of the DOE.
Chancellor Klein has approved this new budgeting system, but he does not plan to implement it until 2009. In the meantime, however, the DOE has begun recalculating what each school’s budget would have been under this new system (even though the old budgets will still be used for one or two more years). So what would happen to MCSM’s budget under of the program?
To understand the effect of FSF, it helps to know that MCSM’s operating budget for 2006/2007 was nearly $9,100,000. About $920,000 of this money came from sources outside the NYC DOE, mostly from the Federal Government under the Title I and Title III programs. Thus, MCSM’s budget allocation from the DOE was about $8,200,000.
Under the Chancellor’s FSF budgeting rules, MCSM’s budget for 2007/2008 would have been cut by $426,649. In other words, the DOE is saying the MCSM has been being overfunded by this amount (5.2% of our 2006/2007 budget allocation from DOE) and getting more money than it deserved! The same result is occurring in a number of District 4 (East Harlem) schools.
What does this mean for MCSM? It means that none of the billions of dollars awarded to New York City schools from New York State as a result of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit will go to MCSM in the next two years. Those funds will supposedly go instead to schools whose budgets appear underfunded based on the FSF rules. According to the Chancellor, schools like MCSM whom the DOE says are overfunded will be “held harmless” for the next two years, meaning that their budgets will be left the same as before, without the “overfunding” being taken away. Note, however, that the Chancellor has said nothing about what will happen in 2009/2010 and beyond. Under the FSF formulas, the DOE could reduce MCSM’s budget later by at least the $426,000 (depending on the school’s student population two years from now). That’s the equivalent of salaries and benefits for somewhere around 5 – 7 full-time teachers.
Our budgetary situation is potentially further complicated by the fact that we are required to requalify as a Title I school this fall. In 2004, MCSM families were required to fill out family income forms and 62% of our families qualified under the Title I guidelines. Since 60% was the minimum level for our school to qualify, we did not have much room to spare. If this fall we fail to have enough qualifying families to continue in Title I, MCSM will lose over $880,000 more from its annual budget. Thus, depending on how the DOE plans to implement FSF in 2009/2010, our school could be operating with $1.3 million less than it does now – not a bright prospect.
Parents, you need to stay aware of this issue. We will try to keep you informed on this blog site and through the Parent Newsletter as more news comes out of the DOE.
A Victory for MCSM Parents and Teachers, but Only an Interim Acting Principal in September
On July 3, Francesca Pena, a high school superintendent from the NYC Department of Education, sent an email to the members of the C-30 Committee announcing that Jolanta Rohloff had withdrawn her candidacy for Principal at MCSM. The NY Daily News reported the next day that Ms. Rohloff would remain at the DOE central office and will spend the next year preparing plans for a new school for which she will be the principal.
Since the second finalist from the C-30 meeting apparently “did not clear the reference check,” an Interim Acting Principal will be named for our school for September. In the early fall, a new C-30 Committee will presumably be convened to restart the search for a permanent principal.
This is clearly a case of parents and teachers making their voices heard, with the help of the local newspapers and Internet sites such as NYC Public School Parents and NYC Education Group, at the DOE central office on Chambers Street. Many thanks to all who helped. Next time around, this PTA will make sure that parents in the C-30 understand their rights and have their voices heard in a meaningful way.
Since the second finalist from the C-30 meeting apparently “did not clear the reference check,” an Interim Acting Principal will be named for our school for September. In the early fall, a new C-30 Committee will presumably be convened to restart the search for a permanent principal.
This is clearly a case of parents and teachers making their voices heard, with the help of the local newspapers and Internet sites such as NYC Public School Parents and NYC Education Group, at the DOE central office on Chambers Street. Many thanks to all who helped. Next time around, this PTA will make sure that parents in the C-30 understand their rights and have their voices heard in a meaningful way.
Letter from MCSM PTA to Chancellor Klein
In protest against the deceptive manner in which Jolanta Rohloff was presented as a candidate for MCSM Principal at the C-30 meeting on June 11, the PTA Executive Board sent the following letter to Chancellor Klein on June 28.
Chancellor Joel I. Klein
NYC Department of Education
52 Chambers Street
New York, NY 10007
Dear Chancellor Klein,
It is with deep concern that we, the Executive Board of the Parent Teacher Association at Manhattan Center for Science and Mathematics (MCSM), write this letter to state our very strong opposition to the candidacy of Ms. Jolanta Rohloff as a replacement for our outgoing Principal, Ms. Corinne Vinal.
Ms. Rohloff was presented on June 11 to a C30 Committee convened at MCSM for the purpose of conducting the Level 1 review of five principal candidates. The process was administered in such a way that no one present was allowed to ask any direct questions of any of the candidates – no questions specific to each individual, no follow-up questions, and no opportunity to explore each candidate’s background and resume in more detail. Only six pre-written, generic questions, prepared so as to be equally applicable to each of the five candidates, were permitted. Those on the Committee barely had time to read the candidates’ resumes before the interviews began. They were also never permitted to see the applications of the 21 other candidates who had already been screened out of this process. Having subsequently spoken with parents at other schools who have participated in a C30 process, we believe our committee members were guided through an improperly and unnecessarily restrictive candidate review that appears, in hindsight, designed to prevent Ms. Rohloff’s background from being brought to light.
As no one present at the meeting (seven parents, two students, and school representatives of the UFT, DC37, and CSA) knew Ms. Rohloff or her recent background at Lafayette High School, they were all effectively misled about that individual’s qualifications. Had this readily known information been disclosed, a far different discussion would doubtless have ensued. Failure to disclose this information, coupled with Regional Superintendent Heaney’s failure to engage in further discussion with parents or school staff has only served further to inflame the situation and give it an even greater appearance of a secretive, “back room” deal.
Please understand that we hold nothing against Ms. Rohloff personally. Had she been presented as the candidate she is and given the chance to tell her story and answer questions, parent representatives on the C30 would certainly have given her fair and responsible consideration. Instead, the DOE pursued a process that hid her true background and apparently sought to co-opt parents’ legitimate role in the selection process. Thus, instead of giving parents a responsible voice in choosing our children’s next principal, that voice was effectively silenced. This is not, in our judgment, the right way to go about forging the partnership with parents that the DOE regularly asserts it seeks to do. Nor is it an appropriate way in which to introduce a principal candidate known by the DOE to be controversial into a school community.
We recognize that as of the time of this writing, no formal decision has been announced regarding the Principal position at MCSM. As elected representatives of that school’s parent community, however, we strongly urge you not to appoint Ms. Rohloff to that position. In our view, such a decision will be self-defeating from virtually the moment it is announced. At this juncture, we would prefer that an Acting Principal be named and a new and more open C30 process be convened in September.
Thank you for your consideration in this matter.
Respectfully submitted,
The PTA Executive Board of Manhattan Center for Science and Mathematics
Stephen Koss, President
Deirdre Rose, Co-Vice President
Donald Redish, Co-Vice President
Yara Rodriguez, Secretary
Nevis Almeida, Treasurer
cc: Randi Weingarten, President, United Federation of Teachers
Robert Jackson, New York City Council, Chairperson, Education Committee
Melissa Mark Viverito, New York City Council, District 8
Chancellor Joel I. Klein
NYC Department of Education
52 Chambers Street
New York, NY 10007
Dear Chancellor Klein,
It is with deep concern that we, the Executive Board of the Parent Teacher Association at Manhattan Center for Science and Mathematics (MCSM), write this letter to state our very strong opposition to the candidacy of Ms. Jolanta Rohloff as a replacement for our outgoing Principal, Ms. Corinne Vinal.
Ms. Rohloff was presented on June 11 to a C30 Committee convened at MCSM for the purpose of conducting the Level 1 review of five principal candidates. The process was administered in such a way that no one present was allowed to ask any direct questions of any of the candidates – no questions specific to each individual, no follow-up questions, and no opportunity to explore each candidate’s background and resume in more detail. Only six pre-written, generic questions, prepared so as to be equally applicable to each of the five candidates, were permitted. Those on the Committee barely had time to read the candidates’ resumes before the interviews began. They were also never permitted to see the applications of the 21 other candidates who had already been screened out of this process. Having subsequently spoken with parents at other schools who have participated in a C30 process, we believe our committee members were guided through an improperly and unnecessarily restrictive candidate review that appears, in hindsight, designed to prevent Ms. Rohloff’s background from being brought to light.
As no one present at the meeting (seven parents, two students, and school representatives of the UFT, DC37, and CSA) knew Ms. Rohloff or her recent background at Lafayette High School, they were all effectively misled about that individual’s qualifications. Had this readily known information been disclosed, a far different discussion would doubtless have ensued. Failure to disclose this information, coupled with Regional Superintendent Heaney’s failure to engage in further discussion with parents or school staff has only served further to inflame the situation and give it an even greater appearance of a secretive, “back room” deal.
Please understand that we hold nothing against Ms. Rohloff personally. Had she been presented as the candidate she is and given the chance to tell her story and answer questions, parent representatives on the C30 would certainly have given her fair and responsible consideration. Instead, the DOE pursued a process that hid her true background and apparently sought to co-opt parents’ legitimate role in the selection process. Thus, instead of giving parents a responsible voice in choosing our children’s next principal, that voice was effectively silenced. This is not, in our judgment, the right way to go about forging the partnership with parents that the DOE regularly asserts it seeks to do. Nor is it an appropriate way in which to introduce a principal candidate known by the DOE to be controversial into a school community.
We recognize that as of the time of this writing, no formal decision has been announced regarding the Principal position at MCSM. As elected representatives of that school’s parent community, however, we strongly urge you not to appoint Ms. Rohloff to that position. In our view, such a decision will be self-defeating from virtually the moment it is announced. At this juncture, we would prefer that an Acting Principal be named and a new and more open C30 process be convened in September.
Thank you for your consideration in this matter.
Respectfully submitted,
The PTA Executive Board of Manhattan Center for Science and Mathematics
Stephen Koss, President
Deirdre Rose, Co-Vice President
Donald Redish, Co-Vice President
Yara Rodriguez, Secretary
Nevis Almeida, Treasurer
cc: Randi Weingarten, President, United Federation of Teachers
Robert Jackson, New York City Council, Chairperson, Education Committee
Melissa Mark Viverito, New York City Council, District 8
Looking for a New Principal
The last days of June and the first days of July were an extraordinarily busy and unsettled time. While the events that took place were disturbing, the final result was a triumph for MCSM parents and teachers alike, as both the PTA and the UFT collaborated and made their voices heard all the way to the top of the DOE.
Here’s what happened. Following the unexpected resignation of Principal Corinne Vinal in May, the Regional Superintendent authorized a C-30 process to search for a new principal. The C-30 Committee, which included seven parents, met on the evening of June 11 to interview five candidates who had been selected as finalists from a larger pool of 26 applicants. By the end of the evening, two of the five individuals were chosen for further evaluation by the Regional Superintendent and his staff.
Several days later, members of the teachers’ union and the MCSM PTA each separately discovered that one of the two finalists, Jolanta Rohloff, was the former principal at Lafayette HS in Brooklyn. Ms. Rohloff had been forced to leave her previous position in March amid a huge public outcry rose against her from Lafayette’s students, teachers, parents, and even alumni and local politicians. Not one word about Ms. Rohloff’s previous troubles had been mentioned in the C-30 interviews, a meeting in which parents and teachers alike were told they were not allowed to ask any direct questions of any of the five candidates.
On June 18, PTA President Steve Koss sent a private email to Regional Superintendent Peter Heaney expressing concern about Ms. Rohloff as a finalist for the MCSM Principal’s job. The email explained that the C-30 Committee members felt that they had been misled and asked Mr. Heaney for an opportunity for MCSM parents to meet with him and discuss Ms. Rohloff’s candidacy further. No reply to the email was ever received.
By the following week, news of Ms. Rohloff’s candidacy had become public, appearing first in the New York Post and, several days later, in the Daily News. Randi Weingarten, president of the teachers’ union, spoke out publicly against Ms. Rohloff’s candidacy. In addition, the PTA Executive Board quickly drafted a letter of protest and delivered it to Chancellor Klein’s office.
Here’s what happened. Following the unexpected resignation of Principal Corinne Vinal in May, the Regional Superintendent authorized a C-30 process to search for a new principal. The C-30 Committee, which included seven parents, met on the evening of June 11 to interview five candidates who had been selected as finalists from a larger pool of 26 applicants. By the end of the evening, two of the five individuals were chosen for further evaluation by the Regional Superintendent and his staff.
Several days later, members of the teachers’ union and the MCSM PTA each separately discovered that one of the two finalists, Jolanta Rohloff, was the former principal at Lafayette HS in Brooklyn. Ms. Rohloff had been forced to leave her previous position in March amid a huge public outcry rose against her from Lafayette’s students, teachers, parents, and even alumni and local politicians. Not one word about Ms. Rohloff’s previous troubles had been mentioned in the C-30 interviews, a meeting in which parents and teachers alike were told they were not allowed to ask any direct questions of any of the five candidates.
On June 18, PTA President Steve Koss sent a private email to Regional Superintendent Peter Heaney expressing concern about Ms. Rohloff as a finalist for the MCSM Principal’s job. The email explained that the C-30 Committee members felt that they had been misled and asked Mr. Heaney for an opportunity for MCSM parents to meet with him and discuss Ms. Rohloff’s candidacy further. No reply to the email was ever received.
By the following week, news of Ms. Rohloff’s candidacy had become public, appearing first in the New York Post and, several days later, in the Daily News. Randi Weingarten, president of the teachers’ union, spoke out publicly against Ms. Rohloff’s candidacy. In addition, the PTA Executive Board quickly drafted a letter of protest and delivered it to Chancellor Klein’s office.
New 9th Graders' Orientation a Big Success
In place of our normal meeting on the evening of June 12, the PTA welcomed the incoming class of 2011 and their parents at MCSM’s New 9th Grader Orientation session. Turnout was excellent and, despite the heat and humidity, the new 9th graders received a very good introduction to the school, including a chance to get lost trying to find their assigned rooms. They filled out necessary information forms and got their summer reading assignments.
This year, the PTA took its most active role ever in greeting the new students and their families. A welcome letter, a survey of parents’ interests for future PTA meeting topics, and several pages of useful information were included in the usual MCSM orientation folder. In the entrance lobby, across from the auditorium, the PTA displayed its new “Welcome/Bienvenidos” banners and maintained an information table with MCSM logo gym bags, CD cases, and ballpoint pens for sale. In the process, parents had a chance to meet and chat with Parent Coordinator Julia Valentin and four members of the PTA Executive Board -- Nevis Almeida, Deirdre Rose, Don Redish, and Steve Koss – along with parents Oriel Sanchez and Clemence Henry.
Don Redish and his 10th grade son Deane, Oriel Sanchez, and Steve Koss were back again Saturday morning when the new 9th graders and their parents returned for math and Spanish language placement exams and had their pictures taken by Ms. Warner for the school ID cards they will receive in September. PTA members helped parents with their forms and answered numerous questions about the school.
Something new was also added for this coming year and beyond – a request for a PTA dues donation. Incoming parents were asked to make a donation of $20.00 to cover all four years, just $5.00 per year. The PTA plans to continue this policy and will make the same request for dues to parents of 10th, 11th, and 12th grade students. Between Tuesday and Saturday alone, the PTA received over $1,000 in dues donations from our incoming class of 2011. They and their families are already making they mark as MCSM enters its Jubilee 25th Anniversary year. Many thanks to those families and to all the parents who volunteered time to make our new students and parents feel welcomed at MCSM.
This year, the PTA took its most active role ever in greeting the new students and their families. A welcome letter, a survey of parents’ interests for future PTA meeting topics, and several pages of useful information were included in the usual MCSM orientation folder. In the entrance lobby, across from the auditorium, the PTA displayed its new “Welcome/Bienvenidos” banners and maintained an information table with MCSM logo gym bags, CD cases, and ballpoint pens for sale. In the process, parents had a chance to meet and chat with Parent Coordinator Julia Valentin and four members of the PTA Executive Board -- Nevis Almeida, Deirdre Rose, Don Redish, and Steve Koss – along with parents Oriel Sanchez and Clemence Henry.
Don Redish and his 10th grade son Deane, Oriel Sanchez, and Steve Koss were back again Saturday morning when the new 9th graders and their parents returned for math and Spanish language placement exams and had their pictures taken by Ms. Warner for the school ID cards they will receive in September. PTA members helped parents with their forms and answered numerous questions about the school.
Something new was also added for this coming year and beyond – a request for a PTA dues donation. Incoming parents were asked to make a donation of $20.00 to cover all four years, just $5.00 per year. The PTA plans to continue this policy and will make the same request for dues to parents of 10th, 11th, and 12th grade students. Between Tuesday and Saturday alone, the PTA received over $1,000 in dues donations from our incoming class of 2011. They and their families are already making they mark as MCSM enters its Jubilee 25th Anniversary year. Many thanks to those families and to all the parents who volunteered time to make our new students and parents feel welcomed at MCSM.
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