February 1998
We must be as urgent about the resources we need as we have been about the standards. In every area where the Regents have responsibility, we have pressed hard for higher performance – teacher education, cultural institutions, schools, vocational rehabilitation, and in so many other fields. Leaders in these institutions are responding. But performance has a cost, and so we have argued in every forum for the Regents budget priorities.
In the last month, we have advocated for the budget before legislative committees and with individual legislators, talked with many editorial boards, and encouraged widespread involvement from many groups. With talk of an early budget in the air, it is all the more important that we be active and focused.
In the budget presentations, we have stressed the link between dollars and results. Our state aid proposal to increase aid to schools by $723 million springs from data about what some schools have done to boost performance, and about what others have not been able to do because they simply lack the financial capacity.
We have kept our list of priorities short and specific. Our budget book is in plain words and there is a list of what we need and why. I didn’t read a script to the legislative committees – we had a conversation using plain charts that show what we have done with what we have and what we will do with what we request.
We have to keep local school leadership in the forefront as we advocate for the funds. Superintendents and boards, college and university presidents and chancellors, rehabilitation program directors and librarians – these are among the people we talk about because they are showing themselves worthy of the support.
When the School Report Cards appear shortly, a key statistic to watch for will be the percentage of the students in each high school that have passed the English and mathematics Regents exams. This will be an early indicator of how close schools are to meeting the standards, and will focus even more attention on successful strategies to help all students learn what they need to learn. Watch also for greatly expanded data on the performance of students with disabilities. These results will enlighten the campaign to reform New York’s special education funding system and will help more people understand what these youngsters can accomplish when given the opportunity.
At the February Regents meeting, we will report good news and bad news about special education. The good news is that more preschool students with disabilities are being educated with their non-disabled peers -- up from 26.6 percent in 1994-95 to 37.2 percent in 1996-97. That is real progress. But the report also shows that the percentage of students classified in grades K-12 continues to rise while the percentage being returned to general education programs declines. The classification rate rose from 11.1 percent to 11.6 percent in one year. The declassification rate fell from 5.8 to 4 percent. The time to act on the Regents special education proposal is now.
The State Archives and Records Administration (SARA) and the Center for Technology in Government (CTG), at the State University of New York at Albany, have received almost $400,000 from the National Historic Publications and Records Commission, an arm of the National Archives. This award, which is one of the largest ever from that source, will be a major help in meeting the fourth Regents Goal. The project is called Gateways to the Past, Present, and Future: Practical Guidelines to Secondary Uses of Electronic Records.
A growing percentage of New York’s records are being created in electronic form. Gateways will help preserve our documentary heritage by identifying effective methods to preserve and make available these records beyond their immediate business use. Gateways will produce guidelines for using emerging technologies, and will assess complex issues of cost, threats to privacy, and appropriate archives and records management requirements. Both scholars and the general public will benefit.
SARA’s ability to develop partnerships such as that with CTG and other agencies (e.g., the Governor’s Office of Technology), together with SARA’s reputation in the archival community was an important factor in securing this important award.
North Country schools are all back in session after the ice storm forced closings that ranged from two days to twelve in some cases. A maximum of six days will need to be made up using holidays and conference days. Attendance is now normal and sometimes better than normal and the Regents exams took place as scheduled.
Daily reports on the State Emergency Management web page and from our seven-member School Emergency Management Team (who were among those from nineteen state agencies staffing the emergency center) tracked the progress of our colleagues in the affected schools. Many schools were used as shelters and food distribution points. At one point, State Education Department staff intervened with U.S. Department of Education officials to enable all students to get hot lunches without the distraction of immediate paperwork. The sheer exhaustion that comes from living and working long hours for many days without power was evident in the voice of a superintendent I talked with as he prepared to reopen school. Our northern colleagues met the emergency with great fortitude.
The foreign language implementation committee met for the first time on February 2. Co-chairs Virginia Levine, Interim Associate Dean at SUNY Cortland and Robert Manley, School Superintendent at West Babylon will present in June the committee’s plan to enable all students to reach "checkpoint B" on the appropriate Regents exam.
The Regents are interested in closer relationships with the boards of SUNY, CUNY and the Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities (CICU). As a first step, I have had discussions with Chancellor John Ryan of SUNY and Chancellor Christoph Kimmich of CUNY. Both leaders have expressed the interest of their boards to participate in these discussions with the Regents. We are developing schedules and the agenda for the meeting with SUNY.
My colleagues and I met with the chief school leaders of New York’s five largest school districts last month to review results and support an exchange of information on their reform strategies. Each of these districts has a plan and each can point to schools that have improved. And yet everyone knows that these districts have far to go. Our task is to do all that we can to help.
The State Education Department has many elements of a comprehensive urban strategy, including standards, exams, intervention in the case of low performing schools, and a state aid proposal that would place more resources behind high need school districts. We have also fielded large teams to support specific districts, and we meet biweekly to review results and plan next moves. The greatest challenge to meeting the Regents standards will be in these five districts, and so we must link state and local efforts to a degree never before attempted.
On December 30, 1997,Supreme Court Judge Anthony Kane upheld the Regents Rule concerning the delegation of professional design work. His ruling dismissed the effort to have this rule declared invalid and noted in his decision that the Regents Rule is consistent with what has been the customary practice in the construction industry. He concluded that the rule promotes public safety, is advantageous to the competitive bidding process, and may reduce project costs. The Regents Rule in this matter brought clarity to the longstanding issue of design delegation in New York.
Teachers need the details about the exams in order to prepare their students. This month, Deputy Commissioner Kadamus will send a pamphlet packed with answers to every teacher in New York. It will also go to every administrator, board president, education and parent group, and many others in both public and nonpublic schools. In addition to providing specific information on sample test questions, test administration, and other questions that we know people are asking, the pamphlet includes the schedule for when sample tests will arrive in schools. Teachers and everyone else will know what to expect and when. The pamphlet will be on our web page for parents and other citizens, but we are already working with newspaper publishers on a newspaper insert that will be designed for parents and the general public.
We are facing a critical need for certified technology education teachers in our schools. This is due to the requirements of the new Math, Science and Technology learning standards, the anticipated number of teacher retirements over the next several years, and the fact that there is an insufficient number of higher education programs to prepare technology education teachers.
Colleges have joined with secondary schools and the Department’s Offices of Higher Education and Elementary, Middle, Secondary, and Continuing Education to find new ways to address this need. One recent initiative involving the College of St. Rose, Hudson Valley Community College, North American Carbide, Charitable Venture Corporation, Project Lead the Way, and the Office of Teaching has resulted in the following proposals:
These innovative programs are currently under development with guidance from Department staff. We hope that this venture between the public and private sectors will have counterparts throughout the state.
In his State of the State message, Governor Pataki spoke of the need for more technology in schools. For several months, we have participated in the Governor’s Task Force on New York Wired. Other states that have made major progress in education technology have done so with a combination of gubernatorial, legislative, business, libraries, and education leadership. I am glad that New York is pursuing a strategy that has a high probability of success.
The State Education Department has worked hard to bring our strategic plan to life. Over the last seven quarters, we have held 42 separate quarterly performance reviews to keep our focus on results. We will report on results soon.
