| Printable Version

Summer 2000 (v4#2)

"All the right people in the room"
Class Size Summit Draws Influential Leaders

Public Advocate Mark Green convened the Class Size Summit: Smaller Classes/Smarter Kids with three goals in mind: to bring attention to the issue of class size reduction (CSR) as one of the most effective strategies for increasing student achievement; to develop a coalition of leaders from the civic, education and business communities; and to develop an action plan and agenda to ensure that all New York City students in the early grades are in classes of no more than 20 students by 2005. There needs to be an "Apollo-like focus on the issue of smaller classes," the same type of attention that was placed on lowering crime a few years ago, Green said.

The April 27 Summit brought clarity and urgency to the need to create classrooms and the barriers to generating the space that would allow New York City to fully utilize state and federal funding to reduce class size. "The task of the day is to crystallize how we articulate the crisis that those in this room already know exists," said Chancellor Harold O. Levy.

"You've got all the right people in the room to try to work through the issues," added Levy as he addressed the Summit's participants. The Summit brought together Levy, keynote speaker U.S. Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley, and over 150 corporate CEOs, education advocates, labor leaders and high-level New York City Board of Education budget staff to discuss the vital need to create classrooms and implement the class size reduction initiative in New York City. The summit was co-chaired by Robert Kiley, president and CEO of the New York City Partnership, Eugene McGrath, chairman and CEO of Con Edison, and Ivan Seidenberg, chairman and CEO of Bell Atlantic Corporation.

Last year was the first year of New York's class size reduction initiative, which allocated $75 million to create smaller classes in the early grades. The state funding for this initiative will increase to $140 million for the 2000-01 school year, expanding the program to more students. Although the federal initiative allows for

the hiring of floating teachers when space is not available to reduce class size, state CSR funding can be used only to create new classes. If New York City cannot create classroom space quickly, (the Independent Budget Office estimates 2,600 more classrooms are needed), students will not be able to take advantage of the long-term academic and social benefits that stem from this program (see p. 12).

The Summit attacked the issues surrounding CSR implementation from three tiers: administrative options to reduce class size, developing additional classroom space and financing classroom development. Summit participants separated into work- groups, and one member from each subgroup reported back to the entire group later that day.

Administrative Options
Community School District Superintendent Dr. Betty Rosa knows that reducing class size is a balancing act. She has had to weigh the needs of her children in pre-kindergarten, those in the early grades and her older students. Even when she has space in her schools, there are competing interests for that space. "If I don't get them between Even Start and third grade, it's not going to happen for many of my kids,"she stated.

Rosa spoke about how she has been able to free-up underutilized classroom space. She said that District 8, located in the East Bronx, has been able to "reinvent" itself by realizing that "there are possibilities for rethinking the way we think about our jobs."Because she has "wiggle space" in her middle schools, she has moved many of her sixth graders out of elementary schools. She emphasized that moving sixth graders was not always easy in a district divided by expressways and highways and with parents who did not like the idea of their young children leaving their community schools. When Rosa was not able to free-up extra classrooms for her early grades, she tried experimenting with floating teachers by having some of her classes utilize co-teaching and consultant models of teaching.

Rosa's experiences exemplified some of the low- and no-cost administrative strategies of creating space to reduce class size. Rose Diamond, senior director of capital planning and development at the Board of Education (BOE), said that the Capital Task Force goes into schools or leased space looking for low-cost solutions such as renovating unused or previously used space that could be modified to be appropriate for a classroom. Diamond said that they have also pooled resources (sharing operating expenses and sometimes program staff) by finding space on college campuses and with not-for-profits.

Ron Jones, vice president of the elementary United Federation of Teachers, said that he wanted administrative offices out of school buildings. "I want all administrative offices out of schools yesterday ... Get offices into office space ... Give the priority to the classes. Put the offices in modular buildings in the school yard."

Board of Education member Terri Thomson said that she dedicates most of her time to overcrowding issues. She also spoke about the need to "think outside the box."Thomson has convened a Year-Round School Task Force to examine the benefits and drawbacks of building brand-new high schools to be used year round. "When you see the impact of overcrowding, you can't help but to become passionate about it."

Developing Additional Classroom Space
This break-out session focused on the most efficient way to obtain classrooms and schools as quickly and cheaply as possible. Patricia Zedalis, chief executive for school facilities of the BOE, discussed temporary and transportable classrooms and additions to buildings, as well as the variations of turnkey development with not-for-profit or for-profit developers. Richard Anderson, president of the New York Building Congress, provided insight into the ways in which the private and public sectors can work together.

Historically, leasing has been a strategy for bringing in new elementary classes at low costs. Robert Harris, a public policy consultant to the Office of the Public Advocate, described the development options available to the BOE and recommended that the Board engage in more leasing to obtain much needed classrooms.

Financing Classroom Development
Summit participants focused on possibilities for financing school construction with three constraints in mind. Options should maximize state and federal funding and aspire to minimize city spending; minimize reliance on general obligation bonds; and seek an alternative source of revenue for school construction that maximizes the city funds that it does utilize.

Charles Szuberla, coordinator of facilities management and information services at the State Education Department (SED), addressed issues specific to New York City and Building Aid (BA). Under BA, NYC is entitled to have 65 percent of its eligible expenses reimbursed. However, these eligible items do not cover the real cost of construction in such a dense, urban area. Although there was discussion of how NYC can maximize its portion of BA, Beverly Donahue, chief financial officer of the BOE, said that there was not enough money for school repair or to decrease overcrowding without an additional funding mechanism.

The Schoolhouse Foundation's proposal would finance the construction of school buildings, built to BOE specifications, with lease payments over a predetermined period. Chairman and CEO of the Schoolhouse Foundation Dennis Mehiel said that his proposal was an "incremental program on top of the current BOE capital program. It is not a substitute for it."

Anthony Shorris, former commissioner of the NYC Department of Finance, agreed with Donahue in that, "At the end of the day, there simply isn't enough money from city and state sources to solve the facilities problem."Shorris discussed the links between property values and education and said that the property values in Manhattan's surrounding boroughs could increase with an improvement in the quality of education. A surcharge on property taxes that was dedicated to school construction, school improvement districts (zones in which home owners agree to an increase in property taxes that go directly to local schools), and the elimination of future tax cuts were all possible funding streams that Shorris addressed.

There was discussion surrounding New York City's need to establish construction priorities within the capital plan. Schools need to be put ahead of the construction of sports facilities and entertainment venues, Shorris said. Donahue noted that the capital plan for the Metropolitan Transit Authority is three times that of the BOE.

The U.S. Department of Education Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education, Thomas Corwin, addressed federal level activity aiming to help school districts with the cost of constructing and renovating schools. The pending Rangel-Johnson bill is a bipartisan bill that would provide interest-free loans, issued by states or local school districts, to finance school construction and renovation. Of the $22 billion earmarked for interest-free bonding, 60 percent would be allocated to states and 40 percent would be allocated to the 125 school districts with the largest number of low-income students.

The Rangel-Johnson bill would bring $1.5 billion in bonding authority to New York City over two years. This bill would also provide $2.4 million for the expansion of Qualified Zone Academy Bonds (QZABs), a program which encourages public-private partnerships in underprivileged neighborhoods and eliminates interest payments on bonds to be used for renovation and repair of buildings, investment in equipment and technology, development of curriculum and teacher training. New York needs to alter state regulations to be able to take advantage of QZAB funding.

Communicating Crisis
Keynote speaker Richard Riley extolled the virtues of CSR as a strategy to raise achievement - no surprise considering that the Secretary of Education considers quality education a civil right to which every child is entitled. Riley stated that in the two years since the initiation of the flexible federal initiative, 100,000 teachers have been hired to reduce class size in kindergarten through third grade. His office's research shows increased achievement (especially for disadvantaged and minority students), less disruptive behavior and higher reading scores. "Our goal is that every child read and read well by the end of the third grade," Riley said.

Noreen Connell, executive director of Educational Priorities Panel, stressed the urgency of creating classroom space immediately to utilize the funding that currently exists to ensure that all children have the opportunity to achieve early in small classes. "An awful lot is at risk. We could do a really good job and bring the school system forward, or we could do a really bad job and use this [CSR] for remediation," Connell said.

Public Advocate Mark Green said that, all too often, our political system only responds to "emergency situations." He used the analogy of a plane crash as an "emergency" that could not be overlooked. "Children aren't crashing from the sky ... it's something you can't see daily," Green said. Beth Lief, director of professional development for Teachscape, said that in the 1970s there was the political will to solve a fiscal crisis about to collapse the political structure. "This is as deep as a crisis as that was in 1975," she said.

The participants at the Summit did not attend under the impression that they would be able to solve the "facilities problem" on that day or even within the next year. However, those in attendance, from various sectors and communities, were able to have detailed discussions of the problems and tentative solutions on various levels of a complex issue. Pragmatic working sessions were held to analyze the complexities of what needs to be done to create classrooms quickly. Although there was not necessarily agreement on the "solutions" to creating space, there was unanimous support for "thinking outside the box" and relaying the importance of getting young children out of overcrowded classrooms and into smaller learning environments as soon as possible.

Meanwhile Richard Barr, a PS 87 parent, says that the desire for smaller classes at his daughter's school is present, but there is no room to reduce class sizes. The summit brought "all the right people" into the same room - the question is how long it will take for schools like PS 87 to get smaller classes.

Money Doesn't Matter: State's Shameful Defense: Money Doesn't Matter
Class Size Summit Draws Influential Leaders
Outcome of New York State Budget Negotiations
Outcome of City Council Budget Negotiations
The First Year of Class Size Reduction in NYC Schools

Printable Version

Subscribe