By Howard Koplowitz
A panel of education advocates blamed a lack of parental involvement and overhauls to the education system by Mayor Michael Bloomberg as contributing factors as to why schools in southeast Queens are underachieving during a forum Monday night in Cambria Heights.
“What eroded parent involvement … was the changes” Bloomberg made, said Lorraine Gittens-Bridges, president of the Queens Community Parent Teachers Student Association.
The meeting was co-hosted by the Queens Civic Congress and the Cambria Heights Civic Association.
The Panel for Educational Policy has voted to shut down Jamaica and Beach Channel high schools and is slated to close PS 30 in Jamaica and IS 231 in Springfield Gardens due to low graduation rates.
Speaking of the city Department of Education’s plans to close IS 231 in Springfield Gardens, Gittens-Bridges said the school needed additional resources and her organization proposed more after-school programs.
She said most school leadership teams — which consist of the principal, PTA president, United Federation of Teachers chapter leader, parents and, in the case of high schools, students — are “not even functioning.”
As far as Campus Magnet High School in Cambria Heights is concerned, which is being phased out, Gittens-Bridges said the school principal “didn’t even have a chance.”
Alicia Hyndman, president of Community District Education Council 29, which covers southeast Queens, lamented that there are no district superintendents or district offices for parents to go to after Bloomberg changed the system.
Hyndman argued that if schools had more involvement from parents, the schools pegged for closure by the city Panel for Education Policy, including Jamaica HS, would not have gone through.
“If our children don’t do well, our community doesn’t do well,” she said.
Washington Sanchez, a UFT special representative and teacher at Newtown High, blamed Bloomberg for quashing parental involvement.
“I think the parents, throughout the last eight years, they have been pushed away from the decision-making process,” he said. “That cannot be education reform. You can’t make education reform by shutting out parents. Teachers have no respect for [city Schools Chancellor] Cathie Black, no respect for what Bloomberg is doing.”
Sanchez also blasted Bloomberg for saying teachers may need to be cut due to budget constraints, which Sanchez said is “absolutely irresponsible,” claiming the city has a $3.1 billion surplus.
Sanchez suggested the city tax millionaires more to get additional revenue, arguing that 90,000 homes in the city earn $10,000 a day while half of New Yorkers earn less than $30,000 a year.
“At the public schools, we don’t get the millionaire kids,” he said.
Sanchez also contended that the way the city evaluates schools — using test grades and school report cards — is not effective.
“It sounds good and it sounds right, but it’s wrong because those children don’t get those years back,” he said.
When asked how parents can get more involved in schools, Gittens-Bridges said her organization, a community PTA affiliated with the national organization, is an effective way because parents can be involved in the group even after their children graduate, unlike school PTAs.
Hyndman suggested businesses partner with education advocates with the enticements of gift certificates for involved parents.
“It takes being really creative,” she said.
Reach reporter Howard Koplowitz by e-mail at hkoplowitz@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4573.
