By Tien-Shun Lee
At the seventh annual Parents' Symposium for School District 28, more than 300 parents, teachers and school administrators gathered Saturday to network, share ideas, and find out what they can do to help the children in their schools.
“I hope to learn more basically about what we can do to educate these children, and for the ones that are behind, what we can do to bring them up,” said Patricia Worthy, the president of the Parent Teacher Association for Gateway, a secondary school in Jamaica that specializes in health and science. “The symposium is educational for me, and in turn we take the information back to the students.”
Held at the LaGuardia-Crowne Plaza Hotel in East Elmhurst, the symposium began with breakfast from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m., followed by short speeches made by school administrators, including Deputy Mayor Dennis Walcott, District 28 Superintendent Neil Kreinik, Board 28 President Shirley Huntley and Division 3 Regional Superintendent Judith Chin, who works with schools within School Districts 25, 26, 28, and 29.
District 28 covers schools in Jamaica, South Ozone Park, Richmond Hill, Rego Park, Forest Hills, Kew Gardens and Briarwood.
“There's a lot of changes going on with the Department of Education,” said Huntley. “The school boards are not gone yet, but whether the boards are here or gone, you need to get involved. You need to let them hear you.”
Chin said that with the new restructuring of the school system, the city's 42 school districts had been consolidated and redivided into 10 instructional regions, which are each headed by a regional superintendent. Each regional superintendent supervises 10 network leaders, who in turn supervise 10 to 12 schools within their region.
“The 42 districts were in some ways unmanageable,” said Chin. “The 10 regions would be easier to focus on.”
Walcott said the effects of some of the changes which were currently being talked about should be noticeable by the beginning of the next school year, provided that the school system received money from Albany to put the changes into effect.
“There will be expansion of classroom seats and additional schools throughout the city starting this September, and every school should have books for every student at the start of the year,” said Walcott.
The deputy mayor also talked about implementing New Beginning schools within the next two to three weeks, which would serve students who are perpetually disruptive in their regular schools.
Walcott, whose son is in public high school, stressed the importance of having parents involved as much as possible in the school system.
“It's all about the parents. Without parent involvement, we can't have our children succeed,” he said. “It's our goal to get more parents involved, but we can't manage that from City Hall. It's up to the local school.”
After listening to opening speeches, parents, teachers and administrators had a choice of workshops to attend. The 55-minute workshops addressed topics ranging from science for elementary schools to easing the transition from elementary to middle school to the federal “No Child Left Behind” act, which states that any student in a failing school has the right to transfer to a better one anywhere within the city.
“I came here to get a better understanding of what's going on in the school system, so when I do show up in Klein's office, I know what I'm talking about,” said W. Edmund Chambers, the vice president of the PTA for PS 86 in Jamaica.
Chambers said he had called New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein's office in the past but had never received any replies from his office.
“I want to find out what I can do to help the kids because the kids – they're the ones that are going to pay,” said Chambers.
Reach reporter Tien-Shun Lee by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com, or call 718-229-0300, ext. 155.
