Aid to Community Colleges
The NYS Assembly website has a listing of aid for community colleges in the 2007-08 Enacted Budget. How did our region fare?
Finger Lakes
Estimated Funded Enrollment: 3,528
Executive Proposed $100 Base Aid Increase: $352,818
Enacted $50 Base Aid Increase: $176,409
Total 07-08 Base Aid Increase: $529,227
Monroe
Estimated Funded Enrollment: 14,220
Executive Proposed $100 Base Aid Increase: $1,421,976
Enacted $50 Base Aid Increase: $710,988
Total 07-08 Base Aid Increase: $2,132,964
Showing posts with label education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label education. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Tuesday, April 3, 2007
Where's the Accountability?
Local Leaders Question Rivera's Role
Continuing down the slippery education funding slope, which saw its grade steepened by initiatives that set hazardous precedents like the Campaign for Fiscal Equity, the 2007-08 Enacted Budget works further to take the issue out of the hands of localities and centralize the power to disburse funding in Albany - not a recipe for success in my book.
The passing of Maintenance of Effort legislation in the state budget requires the City of Rochester to give the City School District the same amount of aid as last year with no ties to accountability or performance standards.
Puzzling for a district which, despite receiving considerably more in aid than districts in other Upstate cities, has produced one of the most dismal graduation rates in the nation. According to statements from Monroe County District Attorney Mike Green on the Brother Wease program last week, he possesses data which indicates that only 25%-35% of RCSD students eventually graduate.
Why, in the midst of a conversational storm about reform and accountability standards, would this Maintenance of Effort legislation be passed? Some local leaders are questioning the role Manny Rivera, currently in a dual role as Superintendent and gubernatorial Education chief, played in its passage:
Continuing down the slippery education funding slope, which saw its grade steepened by initiatives that set hazardous precedents like the Campaign for Fiscal Equity, the 2007-08 Enacted Budget works further to take the issue out of the hands of localities and centralize the power to disburse funding in Albany - not a recipe for success in my book.
The passing of Maintenance of Effort legislation in the state budget requires the City of Rochester to give the City School District the same amount of aid as last year with no ties to accountability or performance standards.
Puzzling for a district which, despite receiving considerably more in aid than districts in other Upstate cities, has produced one of the most dismal graduation rates in the nation. According to statements from Monroe County District Attorney Mike Green on the Brother Wease program last week, he possesses data which indicates that only 25%-35% of RCSD students eventually graduate.
Why, in the midst of a conversational storm about reform and accountability standards, would this Maintenance of Effort legislation be passed? Some local leaders are questioning the role Manny Rivera, currently in a dual role as Superintendent and gubernatorial Education chief, played in its passage:
“I question why it was put in place with absolutely no language for accountability whatsoever,” [Rochester Mayor Bob] Duffy said.
Duffy has been highly critical of the district’s dismal four-year graduation rate, and wanted the option to pull funding. The city is facing a $17 million budget gap.
A month ago, the mayor sent a letter to the school district demanding information relating to spending and academic performance. In his State of the City address last week, he proposed tying school aid to results. He has not received a response from school officials.
Morelle says he was the only lawmaker to take the floor to oppose the maintenance of effort legislation. He said the law is unprecedented, and has the effect of taking away local control and accountability of school funds.
Morelle suspects Rochester’s superintendent, Dr. Manuel Rivera, played a role in getting the bill passed. Rivera has been serving as the governor’s deputy education secretary, a job he will assume full time next month.
“I certainly think there may have been undue influence by Manny as a superintendent, and while there is disclosure about that, I just think it's something we need to think about,” Morelle said. “I think he needs to question whether or not he can serve both masters at the same time.” 13WHAM asked Mayor Duffy if he believed Rivera played any role in getting the legislation passed.
“In terms of the role of the superintendent, I would say this, that's a very good ethical question and I'm going to decline comment at this time,” Duffy said.
Rivera had already counted the full $119 million in the budget he submitted to the school board last month.
Monday, March 19, 2007
RCSD Cool With Dem Ebonix
Diversity Dialogue Newsletter Supports BEV in School
Rochester City School District officials have voiced their support for the use of Ebonics, or Black English vernacular (BEV), as a classroom learning tool in the Winter '07 issue of the Diversity Dialogue newsletter distributed to staff.
The newsletter was authored by Michelle Hancock, RCSD Chief of Diversity and Leadership, and Tyra Webb-Johnson, Director of Coaching and Leadership.
According to the letter, to implement BEV in the classroom teachers can:
- Model standard English as part of formal speech in the class (shouldn't this be common practice anyway?)
- Switch into BEV during informal discussion
- Discuss features that differ in BEV and Standard English
Now, on top of the dozens of other responsibilities piled on our educators, teachers must be "bilingual" and proficient in a language that does not even exist. The newsletter frequently refers to BEV as a second language, I was unaware that there is a land of Ebonia where everyone speaks Ebonics.
Spanish is a second language, French is a second language, Ebonics is a joke and a travesty. Languages are based on form and structure with rules that apply based on situation and context, not which Chingy song is in the Top 40 this week.
By validating these so-called speech patterns the RCSD does nothing to assimilate the section of society that uses BEV. Rather than working to motivate individuals to develop skill sets that will make them successful in the predominant culture, such policies only enforce the status quo which has created the rift that produced these differences in socio-economic standing resulting in something like Ebonics.
How can a middle-class white guy with a private college English and Lib Arts degree formulate such an opinion? Well, I didn't really. I had always been on the fence on this issue until I read Richard Rodriquez's novel Hunger of Learning. As the child of immigrant parents Mr. Rodriguez lived this issue and his views on bilingual education are illustrated in a Time magazine article:
Rochester City School District officials have voiced their support for the use of Ebonics, or Black English vernacular (BEV), as a classroom learning tool in the Winter '07 issue of the Diversity Dialogue newsletter distributed to staff.
The newsletter was authored by Michelle Hancock, RCSD Chief of Diversity and Leadership, and Tyra Webb-Johnson, Director of Coaching and Leadership.
According to the letter, to implement BEV in the classroom teachers can:
- Model standard English as part of formal speech in the class (shouldn't this be common practice anyway?)
- Switch into BEV during informal discussion
- Discuss features that differ in BEV and Standard English
Now, on top of the dozens of other responsibilities piled on our educators, teachers must be "bilingual" and proficient in a language that does not even exist. The newsletter frequently refers to BEV as a second language, I was unaware that there is a land of Ebonia where everyone speaks Ebonics.
Spanish is a second language, French is a second language, Ebonics is a joke and a travesty. Languages are based on form and structure with rules that apply based on situation and context, not which Chingy song is in the Top 40 this week.
By validating these so-called speech patterns the RCSD does nothing to assimilate the section of society that uses BEV. Rather than working to motivate individuals to develop skill sets that will make them successful in the predominant culture, such policies only enforce the status quo which has created the rift that produced these differences in socio-economic standing resulting in something like Ebonics.
How can a middle-class white guy with a private college English and Lib Arts degree formulate such an opinion? Well, I didn't really. I had always been on the fence on this issue until I read Richard Rodriquez's novel Hunger of Learning. As the child of immigrant parents Mr. Rodriguez lived this issue and his views on bilingual education are illustrated in a Time magazine article:
In the book, Rodriguez bears knowledgeable and compelling witness against America's recent methods of educating the underprivileged, and especially against bilingual education.
Rodriguez, in fact, is his own best case history. "I have been haunted by how my education has made me different," he says. As a "socially disadvantaged" son of Spanish-speaking parents, he entered a Roman Catholic grammar school in Sacramento, Calif., when he was six, speaking barely 50 words of English. By day, in class, he sat silent and unlearning. At night he luxuriated in the warmth and intimacy of his family's Spanish language and the separate, private world of his home. It was only when his teachers finally prevailed on Rodriguez's parents to try speaking English at home that his education began.
-snip-
Rodriguez has scant patience with middle-class ethnics, "filled with decadent self-pity," who resist entering the mainstream of American life. Today's bilingual classes, he maintains, keep children "poised at the edge of language too long." Using black English or Spanish in school is crippling because it reduces learning and delays assimilation; hence it reinforces a public form of separateness, a distinction that ultimately keeps minorities in their ghettos. "What I needed to learn in school was that I had the right—and the obligation—to speak the public language of los gringos," writes Rodriguez. "Only when I was able to think of myself as an American, no longer an alien in gringo society, could I seek the rights and opportunities necessary for full public individuality."
-snip-
"I've always been in favor of affirmative action, but only if class was the criterion rather than race."
What can students do, according to the newsletter, to help this program:
- Analyze the way black characters (their words not mine) deliberately alter speech patterns in media
- Create a list of BEV expressions and translate them into Standard English
Oh, oh . . . I have one. Whack, as in stupid, pointless or f-ed up.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Manny Continues to Play the Game
We Continue to Pay Him
In June of 2006 Rochester City Schools Superintendent Manuel Rivera announced that he would not be leaving the school system (again) and the community gave mixed reviews, some were tiring of his excuses for the failures of the school district while others praised his dedication.
The City School Board accepted Rivera's resignation from the school district effective in July of 2007.
In September Rivera announced that he was leaving Rochester to assume the position as head of the Boston school system. Those of us tired of his failings cheered that he would no longer be supported by the tax rolls, but not so fast - Rivera has decided that he will not be headed to Boston.
Not suprisingly compensation appears to be a determining factor as suggested by a quote from Board of Ed Chief Domingo Garcia in the Democrat & Chronicle: "Manny mentioned with me that he was having problems negotiating with Boston. That's all he said to me. That was some time ago, about two weeks ago," Garcia said. "He said 'we're having some difficulties and it's getting a little frustrating."
Rivera, it appears, will also continue to be paid by the residents of Rochester as reports circulate that Rivera will be named to a cabinet position with the Spitzer administration. Normally promotions are reserved for individuals who achieve, but in Rivera's case it is obvious that knowledge of how to play the political game is more valuable than displays of success when it comes to career advancement.
In June of 2006 Rochester City Schools Superintendent Manuel Rivera announced that he would not be leaving the school system (again) and the community gave mixed reviews, some were tiring of his excuses for the failures of the school district while others praised his dedication.
The City School Board accepted Rivera's resignation from the school district effective in July of 2007.
In September Rivera announced that he was leaving Rochester to assume the position as head of the Boston school system. Those of us tired of his failings cheered that he would no longer be supported by the tax rolls, but not so fast - Rivera has decided that he will not be headed to Boston.
Not suprisingly compensation appears to be a determining factor as suggested by a quote from Board of Ed Chief Domingo Garcia in the Democrat & Chronicle: "Manny mentioned with me that he was having problems negotiating with Boston. That's all he said to me. That was some time ago, about two weeks ago," Garcia said. "He said 'we're having some difficulties and it's getting a little frustrating."
Rivera, it appears, will also continue to be paid by the residents of Rochester as reports circulate that Rivera will be named to a cabinet position with the Spitzer administration. Normally promotions are reserved for individuals who achieve, but in Rivera's case it is obvious that knowledge of how to play the political game is more valuable than displays of success when it comes to career advancement.
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