Candidate Mamdani opposed mayoral control, he supported a system empowering a role for parents and teachers; however, without any specificity. For many of us his opposition to mayoral control was the tipping point, it determined our vote and we expected him to establish a process to engage parents and teachers in the chancellor search.
“I’ve been critical of mayoral control because of the ways in which it’s been used to take away the voice of parents, of educators, of students,” Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani said during the first general election mayoral debate in October. He has said that he’s opposed to how the current system allows the mayor to make unilateral decisions without input from the people who would be directly impacted.
Out of the blue, changed his mind, he selected a replacement chancellor without any consultation with parents and supported a four year extension of mayoral control.
Mamdani. as a candidate was wary of charter schools,
Mamdani, in the SI Advance questionnaire, vowed to audit charter schools that are co-located in city Department of Education buildings, suggesting they received too much public funding.
“I also oppose the co-locating of charter schools inside DOE school buildings, but for those already co-located my administration would undertake a comprehensive review of charter school funding to address the unevenness of our system,” the survey said.
“Matching funds, overcharged rent, and Foundation Aid funding would be part of this audit as my administration determined how to manage the reality of co-located schools and legal entitlements,” Mamdani claimed.
Will he also change his charter school position?
To be blunt: he used us to get elected. Can we trust him?
Political leaders, mayors, want to “control the message,” we expected better of him.
The Education Council Consortium (ECC-NYC) is an education advocacy organization public school parents and others banding together to create policy from the bottom, as I’ve posted many times those closest to our students: parents, teachers and school leaders should drive policy and the bureaucracy should create the mechanisms to implement. The rate of school district leadership failure is more than troublesome, six chancellors in twelve years, each with their own magic bullet and each mayor attempting to control the narrative, also known as “spin.”
ECC sponsored a Zoom Watch Party: the annual Albany legislative hearing on the 26-27 state education budget, the governor included a four year extension of mayoral control in her budget message. Our brand new chancellor testified, followed by teacher union folk and others, hours and hours, and ECC leaders are beginning a campaign to end mayoral control and create a successor management system, they’re asking the legislature to extend mayoral control for two years and over that period design a school governance structure.
I disagree, we need a new governance system now, in this legislative session.
A quick civics lesson: the current mayoral control system is a law, see here, and by June 5th, the end of the session the current law must be extended, amended or replaced.
The political leadership in Albany are gatekeepers, no bill comes to the floor without their consent and bills frequently are consensus documents, reflecting the views of many legislators. Over the years opposition to mayoral control has grown, there has been no consensus over a replacement system. Let’s begin with my draft:
Composition of the PEP:
An eleven member board, the CEC chairs in each borough shall choose a member, the Speaker of the City Council, the Comptroller and the Public Advocate shall each appoint a member who will be a parent, guardian or grandparent of a public school student and the mayor will choose three members, one of whom will be a parent, guardian or grandparent of a special education student.
Selection of a Chancellor:
The Mayor appoints, with the advice and consent of the PEP a chancellor requiring a majority vote of the PEP that includes the vote of four CEC members.
Why include the citywide electeds? Simply, they fund the schools, instead of the current system, frequently battling a recalcitrant mayor all the political players would be engaged: a higher level of collaboration from the bottom up. On the federal level the president nominates cabinet members, federal judges and the Senate confirms, I’m recommending a similar system in the selection of a chancellor.
My suggestion: lobbying as relentlessly as you can to keep the extension of mayoral control out of the budget, and, I believe the legislature probably agrees; however, the mayor and the governor need each other, the governor needs the mayor’s army of door knockers and the mayor needs the governor to provide the approval of the MTA for “fast and free buses.” You, ECC, have your own army: an army of parents.
The budget approval date is April 1, followed by a Spring recess and the race to the June 5th adjournment date – the primary is June 25th.
Use my draft with whatever additions, subtractions you and your legislative allies choose to draft a bill and ask as many legislators as possible to sign on. The last few days of the session, called the “Big Ugly,” hundreds of bills approved by leadership were passed. (“… a giant, often error-filled mass of legislation that results from a frenzy of secretive and often scurvy deal-making between legislative leaders and the Governor that would never survive the glare of public scrutiny”)
Yes, a messy way to legislate, we should do better; however, it is what it is, you have to learn to play the game if you want to be “,,,in the room where it happens.”
Ed in the Apple: Blogging on the Intersection of Education and Politics Title 