 If you've got kids of a certain age, you'd have to be living under a rock not to know about the Lefferts Gardens Charter School by now, but another new elementary school in our District sounds promising as well. The New American Academy in East Flatbush is a collaboration between the Harvard Graduate School of Education, the NYC Department of Education, and the United Federation of Teachers. Unlike the Lefferts school, New American is a public school, not a charter. But unlike conventional zoned schools, New American has an ambitious, progressive program. I'm not going to bother repeating the brochure bullet points, which you can read yourself; rather, I'll simply point out why I'd seriously consider sending my kid to a school in East Flatbush. Trilingual Education: English, French, and Spanish. For kids raised in educated, middle-class homes, the primary benefit of elementary school is social. I can teach my son how to read, write, and add; I can't teach him French or Spanish. If he finished elementary school fluent in three languages, that alone would be more worthwhile than my entire 13 years of public schooling (pre-college, that is). Unusual classroom structure: 60 students and four teachers in one large room. Classes are heterogeneous, meaning that students all along the bell curve, including special needs kids, will also share the classroom. Teachers stay with the same group of children from Kindergarten through 5th grade, so they can hit the ground running each school year rather than having to create relationships anew every year. This is important considering the school's emphasis on providing differentiated, individualized instruction. My neighbor Alison Wildman, whose son, Jelani, will be attending in the fall, said this was a big plus for her. When she toured the school, she was told that part of the school's mission is to make sure that if, say, a student is ready for algebra in 4th grade, he'll get it. (Jelani tested in the 99 percentile of the gifted and talented test, i.e. high enough to get into the city's most elite schools.) The downside, of course, is what if you get stuck with a crummy teacher? But as Wildman put it, "There's four teachers -- they can't ALL be bad!" Plus there's good reason to suspect that they won't be... Focus on quality teachers. One major innovation at New American is that, according to the New York Post, the school will be the first public school in the city to promote teachers based on merit rather than length of service. Daily exercise and longer than average lunch (recess!) periods. A major problem in public schools is that the emphasis on standardized testing has meant cutting out "frills" such as physical education and art. No homework.It's ridiculous to give elementary school kids homework on a daily basis, yet many schools do, particularly at gifted and talented programs. Not terribly inconvenient.
Though the school ain't exactly next door — it will be housed in P.S. 398, The Walter Weaver School (gmap) — a free school bus from PLG will take students there. It is also on the B12 route, which proceeds slowly East from Parkside and Flatbush. On a side note, the school could use some serious help in the design department. The logo makes it look like it is run by some sort of far-right separatist group out of Idaho. Is that an eagle with a school key as prey? Not exactly what you'd expect from a school led by a Spanish-speaking Hasidic Jew.
This Saturday, April 24, there's going to be a workshop for neighborhood parents of school-age children. Building Academic Success, sponsored by the Fellowship Moravian Church and the Caribbean American Social Workers Association, is designed to help parents better understand the NYC public school system. WHERE: Church of the Evangel (1950 Bedford Avenue, at Hawthorne)
DATE: Saturday, April 24
TIME: Noon to 2:30 pm Interested parties should RSVP to thelma.armstrong @ gmail.com or 718-490-6564.
 While pecking around at Amazon, I was surprised to find Ms. Moffett's First Year: Becoming a Teacher in America (2004). That the book follows the year in a life of a New York City Teaching Fellow wasn't what grabbed me. The surprise was where that teacher was working: at PS 92, right around the corner on Parkside. The book was written by a New York Times reporter, Abby Goodnough, and much of it appeared in the Times' Metro section back when. It follows a first-year Teaching Fellow a decade ago, when PS 92 was considered one of the city's most troubled schools. (It no longer is, as Dept. of Education reports show a great deal of improvement.) I don't know much about the book or PS 92, but I ordered a copy. If anyone else is interested in reading and discussing it, book-group-style, email me and let me know ( brooklynite282 (at) gmail).
The Lefferts Gardens Charter School is having another info session on Wednesday night, March 3. This one is at the Brower Park Library, 725 St. Marks Avenue, at 6:30 pm.
While messing around on the web, I just happened upon this job listing. The Lefferts Gardens Charter School is looking to hire kindergarten and first grade teachers. A bachelor's degree is required; New York State Teachers' Certification is strongly recommended but non-essential. Salary is between $35,000 and $55,000. More info at Idealist.
 Last night, as expected, the NYC Panel for Educational Policy voted to approve plans for Lefferts Gardens Charter School to co-locate at PS 92. (See the Daily News.) For supporters of the charter school, it's a huge victory; if the vote didn't go their way, the school could have ended up being sited some distance from the neighborhood.
So what now? Certainly some celebrating is in order. But the charter school leaders need to also dig in their heels and get started on seriously building support in Afro-Caribbean communities around here. If the charter school student body is overwhelmingly white and relatively affluent (as it was at Monday's public hearing), it's going to make the tensions between the two schools at 601 Parkside all that more tense, particularly if the school draws a bunch of kids from out of the district.
There's been a lively discussion on the Lefferts Yahoo group about the local school situation. If you're not already on that list, you may want to sign up and read the archives. (Reading archives requires a Yahoo account but subscribing to the email list does not.)
One standout item was a post by Johnny Kline, a neighbor on Hawthorne, including a list of suggestions for building community support for the school. We like them so much that we're copying them here:
Continue reading "City Approves Co-Location of Charter School at PS 92" »
 Following up on our local schools discussion, I asked educational consultant Joyce Szuflita to comment on the possibility of parents working with local public schools to reform them, as well as considering the new charter school. Commenter Babs cited PS 8 in Brooklyn Heights as a possible public school model, writing: "Ten years ago PS 8 was not a desirable school; the kids in Brooklyn Heights attended private schools… With the increase in real estate prices, however, private school tuition became less affordable and parents turned their attention to PS 8, resulting in a remarkable turnaround for the school.”
This is what Ms. Szuflita had to say:
Even though the school is called “Lefferts Gardens Charter School,” priority is
given to all families living within District 17... If
there are seats vacant, families from outside of the district may fill
them. It is very likely that in the first couple years at least that
there will be a sizable number of students from outside the neighborhood
and the district (perhaps even the borough).
Continue reading "Our Educational Consultant Weighs In" »
 We regret to inform you that several key members of the Lefferts Gardens Charter School have resigned from the school's board: Michelle Dees, Allison Jack, and Clark Dees. Another board member (though one who has never been active), Tolonda Tolbert, has also asked to leave. I asked LGCS board member Mark Dicus about the resignations, but he said he didn't know why the members had resigned, with the exception of Tolbert, who has too many prior commitments. As some of you may know, I was on the steering committee of LGCS for most of last year. I resigned in November, but Charles and I continued to support the school on the blog, despite our serious reservations with the leadership. With the departure of the Dees and Jack, however, the future of LGCS isn't looking as supportable. No one who was actively involved in steering committee meetings last year (except for board chair Renee Ciccone and her mom, Elaine) remains with the group. None of the board members who have left were willing to discuss their decision publicly. As someone who made the same decision to go quietly in November, I'm not exactly surprised. My hope for LGCS is that the remaining board members — Renata Gomes, Martin Mohabeer, and Brad Choyt, not to mention Dicus and Renee and Elaine Ciccone — see the resignations as a wake-up call and start seriously examining why they keep losing good people. RELATED:
Public Turns Out for Charter School Hearing
 Those of us who expected the public hearing for the Lefferts Gardens Charter School last night to be a love-in for the new environmental science school were in for a surprise: the opposition to placing the school at P.S. 92 was passionate and vocal. Most of the opposition stemmed from parents of students at P.S. 92. The overwhelming concern was that sharing the space would create problems for kids already attending the school. "If your child can't take the seat next to my son, find another spot," said one of the charter school's critics. To my mind, the most persuasive argument against locating the school at PS 92 was one raised by a few people who spoke at the hearing: though the Department of Education and LGCS insist that the charter school will only be at PS 92 for a few years while they raise money to build a permanent site, odds are that the permanent site will never materialize, the DOE won't kick LGCS out, and PS 92 will become overcrowded as LGCS continues to grow. At least, that's the typical pattern. There were lots of positive things said about the charter school, too, but I was too busy chasing my toddler to write them down… and, frankly, I'd be preaching to the choir here. In the end, the supporters of the school outweighed the opposition by a sizable margin: 21 pro, 10 against, and 3 neutral (arguably positive) by my count. That said, it was hard not to be troubled by the racial dynamic at play, with white people tending to support the school and black people opposing. If the DOE elects to locate LGCS in the same building as PS 92, LGCS needs to seriously step up its community outreach beyond the Manor. The PS 92 student body is 0% (yes, that's zero percent) white and 83% black. The Lefferts supporters are about as white as the PS 92 students are black, a situation that's bound to create tensions. As one friend of mine who attended the hearing wondered, "Are they planning on hiring bodyguards for all the rich white kids so they don't get beat up?" LGCS also needs to do serious fundraising to raise the hundreds of thousands of dollars necessary to build their promised "green" permanent facility. All the more reason for LGCS to get its house in order and rebuild its flagging board of directors.
A flyer posted on apartment buildings along Winthrop Street by one of Lefferts Gardens Charter School's critics
RELATED:
Board Members Resign From Lefferts Gardens Charter School
Update on the Lefferts Gardens Charter School
Due to the coming snowpocalypse, all NYC public schools are closed tomorrow and that includes meetings to be held at those schools. The public hearing on the Lefferts Gardens Charter School has been pushed back to February 22. When a time for the meeting is announced, we'll post it here. Get some salt on the streets tonight and stay warm.
|
Search
- brooklynite282 (at) gmail.com
|
Recent Comments