Useful contact information:
NY State Education Commissioner Richard P. Mills:
Speaker of the State Assembly Sheldon Silver
250 Broadway, Suite 2307
New York, NY 10007
518-455-3791 or 212-312-1420:
Assemblymember Cathy Nolan, Chair of the Education Committee
61-08 Linden Street
Ridgewood, NY 11385
518-455-4851 or 718-456-9492.
City Council Speaker Christine Quinn
212- 564-7757 or 212- 788-7210
and click on "Who represents me " on the left hand side of the page.
Call the Governor toll free: 1-877-255-9417 and press 1.
The toll free no. is 1-877-255-9417 and press 3.
The toll free no. is 1-877-255-9417 and press 2.
Here is a pdf file with the contact information for all City Councilmembers.
:
Contact information for members of the NYC Council Education and Finance committees is here.
How you can help
Here is our letter to Commissioner Mills, signed by over 200 parent leaders and advocates, including Robert Jackson, chair of the City Council education committee and original plaintiff of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit, urging that the state withhold funding until NYC submits a real class size reduction plan as part of its "Contract for Excellence" as required by state law.
Our earlier letter to the State Education Department, with detailed comments about why the city's inadequate class size reduction proposal should be rejected, is here:
The letter summarizes the numerous flaws of DOE submission:
•
It does not include even the outlines of a five year class size reduction plan, as is mandated.
•Even as a one year plan, it lacks sufficient funding, space and direction.
•The formula used to allocate the funding available for class size reduction as an option deprives 47% of our failing schools – those that according to law and good policy should be addressed first.
•The schools that were selected for “class size coaching” are too few in number, and the process itself will lead to uncertain results.
•There is no alignment with the capital plan, as the law requires.
•No baseline figures are provided for the existing number of instructional classes, and no figures are given for the number of new teachers that will be hired to reduce class size or the number of classes that will be added to achieve the expected results.
•The class size “targets” mentioned in the document thus appear to be based on speculation alone, and are so minimal they will be difficult to measure, given the chronic inaccuracy of the city’s class size data.
•In many grades, the “targets” for class size appear to be higher than would result from enrollment decline alone.
•Instead of a thoughtful systematic plan, this proposal is fatally flawed -- haphazard, scattershot, and indifferent to the law and the regulations.
