New York Voices; 725; Grading the Schools

[beep] [woman]: It's a big disservice to children to judge how they are being educated by test scores. [man]: I think it's very unfair considering the amount of involvement that parents show here, the amount of involvement that teachers show here. I really can't understand how this school could have gotten a D. [new speaker]: Ya know those schools that didn't get A's or B's or whatever they're they're going to, uh, say was this wasn't right, this was unfair, it wasn't long enough, wasn't short enough. Then what's gonna happen, they're gonna take the information and they're gonna move forward. And you know what's gonna be very powerful, they don't wanna be an F next year. [music] [new speaker]: I was just walking home one night I had some chalk in my pocket from the restaurant when I used to write the outdoor menu,

and I saw a shadow of a fire hydrant. I was like oh what if I outlined that shadow with chalk. Then I started just it was like a full on assault on the Brooklyn streets man, anything and everything that casted shadows was fair game. [speaker]: New York. One voice at a time. [city chatter] [new speaker]: New York Voices. [Announcer]: New York Voices is made possible by the members of 13. Additional funding by Michael T. Martin And Elise Jaffe and Jeffrey Brown. [Pi Roman]: Welcome to New York Voices. I'm Rafael Pi Roman. You know later in the show we'll profile a Brooklyn street artist and preview a brand new online program of lectures and debates called 13 forum. But we begin with a look at a controversial new system in which almost every public school in the city gets a grade. Why are some failing schools getting A's while other schools with great reputations are getting D's and F's? In a moment I'll sit down with

schools Chancellor Joe Klein to talk about all this. But first, here's a look at the controversy. Brooklyn's P.S. 154 is a school that real estate brokers like to brag about. For years it has been drawing young families to the neighborhood of Windsor Terrace. [Eva Lewandowski]: I can rattle off a list of things that, uh, work for my children. Uh, they include small class sizes, very dedicated teachers, and my kids feel safe. They feel comforted and nurtured and they're learning a lot. [Pi Roman]: But the Department of Education has a different view. P.S. 154 got a D. [Don Alman]: I think it's very unfair considering the amount of involvement that parents show here, the amount of involvement that teachers show here and the basic way that the students are reacting to what's going on in the school. I really can't understand how this school could have gotten a D. [Pi Roman]: Central Park East on 106th street in Madison, is a progressive school where parents commute from all over Manhattan to send their kids. It also got a

D. [Marcia Sells]: There are programs that probably got A's that have no parent association and no parent involvement. They spit on us when they said your school is a D and these parents are involved. [Pi Roman]: According to the formula used to calculate those Ds, 55 percent was based on what the city calls student progress. That's a measure of the extent to which test scores went up or down over the course of one year. Parents say this was the wrong formula. [Sells]: Why the 55 percent? There's no explanation as to why that has to be. And so that, I'm also saying that terms of the choices about how they were going to quantify what the weight was. Unfairly and inappropriately did not give the full value of this kind of school. [Pi Roman]: This emphasis on progress explains many of the bad grades. At P.S. 154, students did well on the state math and English exams last year. But compared with the year before, most students saw their grades go down, not up. [Lewandowski]: That's a a big disservice to children to judge how they are being educated by test

scores. Parents and staff are like, hmm OK, that's important to Chancellor Klein, it's important to some folks in Manhattan, um, it's not that important to us. [Pi Roman]: Nowhere where parents and teachers more surprised by a grade than at P.S. 35 in Staten Island. [Melissa Garafolo]: Good morning boys and girls. [kids, together]: Good morning Mrs. Garafolo. [Garafolo]: What are you doing? [Pi Roman]: Melissa Garafolo is in her first year there as principal. She remembers talking with a retired colleague right before she got the job. [Garafolo]: When I told them that I was going for this school they said to me that they would actually come out of retirement to get this school. So the reputation on Staten Island of P.S. 35 is very, it was like a s- sort out school. My kids can take a test. Definitely. [laughs] [Pi Roman]: P.S. 35 is one of the highest scoring schools in the city. In math, the kids score in the 97th percentile citywide. But last year, the scores dropped. The school's grade,

an F. [Garafolo]: Scores did go down. Do I agree with the progress report and tracking individual students progress? I do. I have a problem with the progress report telling us that our school is failing based on one test. That progress report just says if they didn't have a good day in taking that test, they didn't do well and we did go down in math, but we were at 100 percent. What are you doing? Who can tell me what you're doing cause you're all excited I feel this excitement, but I'm not sure what it's for. I had a child in the 5th grade wr- write a petition. He wants to send it. We are not an F school. We're fantastic. You want to share your story with me. Go ahead. My teachers as much as you say it's not a reflection on them, of course it is. Those are the kids that sit in front of them every day so they took it hard. They took it really hard. For me, I came into this building making changes way before the F. And I'm not making that F dictate the changes

that I'm making. I believe that we need to do what's best for kids. And some kids aren't test takers. [Denise Jamison]: Let's keep it moving. [Pi Roman]: On the flip side, Junior High School 50 in Williamsburg, Brooklyn got an A. Even though only 26 percent of its students passed the state English exam last year. [Jamison]: One of the things that I found when I came to the school was that I felt that there were pockets of excellence, there were pockets of best practices throughout the school. Good morning Miss Cufa. How you doing? What are you guys working on? [Pi Roman]: Denise Jamison became principal 4 years ago, after the school got into trouble under the federal No Child Left Behind Act for its low test scores. Jamison brought in new reading and math programs and fostered collaboration among the staff. [Jamison]: The test scores are moving up. So we're decreasing the level 1 student and moving them into levels 2 and level 3. [Pi Roman]: Overall about 60 percent of the students saw their grades improve in English and math.

But most are still failing. [Jamison]: The school is still under the No Child Left Behind, we're still restructuring year 4 because we still have not made adequate yearly progress under their guidelines. But, with the New York City progress report, we received an A. And to me, I see that as a, um, an affirmation that we are definitely headed in the right direction of moving our schools, of- our children forward to success. [Pi Roman]: Principal Jamison and her staff celebrated when they got the news. [Jamison]: We've enlarged the progress reports and we've plastered them on every floor in the building. One of the consultants that comes to my school, she actually said you should get a banner and have it displayed outside the school building and so I said that might be a little much but, um, maybe next year if we do it next year we'll do it then, get another A. [Pi Roman]: Back at Central Park East, parents say they've shrugged off the D that was given to their school.

[Jonathan Thaler]: We found out that the school that we left because we were really unhappy with the education, got an A. And it just proved to us that the scoring is just done in a ridiculous way. It did not affect our feelings about the school at all. We are very comfortable here and we intend to keep our kid here. [Sells]: I think that for the majority of parents it has galvanized us. Despite what the Department of Education may think we are not stupid, we are not naive, we do understand what kind of education our children is getting. [Pi Roman]: I met with schools chancellor Joel Klein to talk about the new grading system. Chancellor what do these grades say about our schools? Should we consider a school that got an A to be one of the best schools in the city and the school that got an F to be one of the worst schools in the city? [Klein]: I think it's a little more complicated than that. There are 2 things that you need to look at in a school. One is where the students start. And if you get a lot of high performing school students that obviously affects your perception of the school and that's the traditional way. But what we've added is another dimension and that is student progress and that's very important when you think

about it because what a kid brings to the school is not as important in terms of an education as what the school does for the child. So if a school gets an A, what it's saying is it's making great progress compared to similar schools it's doing very well. And what you should include from that is take that information into account as parents and policy makers are making decisions. [Pi Roman]: But there's some confusion out there as I'm sure you know, we've we've heard it we've seen it, especially among parents and aren't they right to feel confused when for example a school like P.S. 35 in Staten Island, which last year achieved a 98 percent proficiency in math among its students, gets an F? While the South Bronx Academy of applied science which last year got an 18 percent proficiency in math got an A? [Klein]: Sure, but you gotta look at where the students start. So so the school you mention in Staten Island right, that got an F. That school its students actually were declining in performance. There are other

schools that are very high performing. The Anderson schools got kids way at the top. Many schools and District 26 other schools throughout the city. Those schools are moving their level 3 kids to level 4 kids and you know that's important. Simple proficiency is not the game. When you get students who are proficient, you want to move them to advanced in under the current accountability systems like No Child Left Behind, you don't get any credit for that and that seems to me to be ridiculous. If I send my child to schools a level 3, I would hope the school would move that child to level 4 rather than move on from the high level 3 to a low level 3, still proficient, but moving in the wrong direction. That's why it's so important. Now that school in the Bronx, they move many students forward. They have a very challenged and difficult population and they move those students forward so you've gotta take the information into account. [Pi Roman]: But it is easier to raise a bad score then it is to go from say 98 percent to 100 percent. [Klein]: Sure, but 98 percent to 100 percent on proficiency doesn't measure anything about advanced and it's actually

you should be moving your kids from one to the other. And I'm not as sure as you are which is the easier challenge. Um, you know having a whole bunch of highly motivated, successful youngsters and moving them forward I think is probably not as tough a challenge as having a whole bunch of students who come from some of the most challenging environments, uh, and with some of the greatest difficulties and moving them forward. And that's what I think is powerful and important about it but most important is you, the public, our parents. They now have the information and they can make their individual determinations and even more important, the schools will have the information and they have inquiry teams working with that information to improve student outcomes. And you watch the effect, this will create a rising tide. [Pi Roman]: There are a number of parents, uh, whose kids are in schools that got a low grade who are very concerned that, uh, this grading system it's now going to force their schools to change their curriculum and start teaching to the test. Uh, how do you respond to that?

[Klein]: I- I just think that's false. In fact, what I will show you is lots and lots of schools that are succeeding and they far from teaching to the test. They're teaching students well. This notion think about what we're talking about 8th grade math, 7th grade math, regents because you can't teach to these tests. You gotta know math. Even in a 4th grader, I I would show you a 4th grade test in math. If you don't know math they're not going to be able to teach you box checking skills. Second, let's be clear about this. Empirically, I know you know I gave you a P.S. 280 to Manhattan new school, Anderson. I know what these schools are doing. These schools have some of the mo- most robust, most challenging curriculums in the city. They have a lot of art which I'm a big supporter of. A lot of music. They have physical education. But these schools are getting great results. Why? Because they're doing a good job educating our children. Teaching to the test is not a smart strategy. [Pi Roman]: Now as you say the largest factor in determining the grade was the progress in test scores over from one year to the next. Um, some critics as you

know, say that a one year's, uh, progress leaves a lot of room for, um, flukes, for anomalies and that perhaps you should've waited longer. What do you say? [Klein]: Oh, you have to start somewhere. You so you start with the first year, I be the first to admit 2 years, 3 years be much more robust no question about it and I've said that, uh, and I believe that. On the other hand, this is information and data that I think the public is entitled to know. They should take it in a context you just presented it which is obviously statistically over 2 or 3 or 4 years. You get much more power. [Pi Roman]: You know but William Sanders, we spoke to William Sanders who is considered to be the pioneer of this type of assessment. And he said when you only use the advance from one year to the next rather than a few years, well you have to take, uh, the results with a grain of salt. Why, again I ask, why didn- why did you have to come out with these grades this year? Why couldn't you have added one more year of study in and have had much more solid data to

work with? [Klein]: We want the schools to start to use the information. You know those schools that didn't get A's or B's or whatever, they're they're gonna, uh, say it was this wasn't right, this was unfair, it wasn't long enough, wasn't short enough. Then what's gonna happen, they're going to take the information and they're going to move forward. And you know it's going to be very powerful they don't want to be an F next year. They don't want to be a D next year. Now they had information from last year and they had a lot of information simply without a grade just as w- and you know what happened then, they paid far less attention to it. So you want to create a motivator. Let's be candid with each other. In urban education today, if we don't dramatically improve outcomes and I'm not talking about small bore this year to next year we gotta dramatically improve it and the way you do that is rigorous accountability and public information and knowledge and I want the public to get familiar with this. I enjoy the debate and I'm not saying we don't learn things from it, I do but in the end, this is a debate that never would have happened if this mayor wasn't prepared to show

leadership on accountability. [Pi Roman]: You know after my interview with Chancellor Klein, the Department of Education announced that 13 schools with failing grades will be shut down. And according to the chancellor, there will be more to follow. Stay tuned. We turn now to a story about Ellis Gallagher. A Brooklyn artist who believes he's blurring the line between graffiti and art. But the cops don't quite see it that way. Take a look. [Gallagher]: My name is Ellis Gallagher. I'm 34 years old and I am a visual artist based in Brooklyn, New York. [music] It's definitely in the thousands how m- many shadows I've outlined. Lampposts, mailboxes, parking meters, traffic boxes, don't walk signs. You name it, I've I've definitely outlined it. [music continues] It's really exhilarating for me to be working in chalk in the street.

I get people walk down and say oh, that's really great you know I love your stuff. And I'll be like yo thank you very much you know like that's unheard of with graffiti. [music] I grew up in Manhattan and the East Village. Growing up I would see graffiti you know around the neighborhood and I would see certain names you know take trips with my mother out to Long Island. And I would see the same graffiti on the Long Island Expressway that I would see the like on 14th Street. And it was just constantly on my mind. [music] I used to get in trouble as a kid writing, uh, you know the cops would- I'd get busted and they'd bring me home and my mom would yell at me and tell me to stop writing graffiti and I mean it was just everywhere and you really couldn't escape it. And it was just constantly on my mind. I guess my

graffiti career kind of ended when I was with a friend, um, this guy Hector. We were writing, just like tagging and stuff. And, uh, I started to walk towards the F line. Went into the tunnel and he was struck and killed by the train. And that was kind of like a wake up call for me like you know. I was at that point I was like, what is this all for. Why am I doing this? This is like a waste of my time. [music] I started doing the shadows because I was inspired by being robbed. I was coming home late at night from a shift at my restaurant job. I was opening the door to my apartment and see a shadow on the wall and it passes from my right to my left and then it stops and I turn around and I see this guy got a machete, 2 foot machete, pointed to my face and says, give me your money.

Kinda like a few days after that, I had this thing with shadows. I was just walking home one night, I had some chalk in my pocket from the restaurant when I used to write the outdoor menu and I saw a f- shadow of a fire hydrant, I was like oh what if I outlined that shadow with chalk and I outlined it then I just looked at it I was like, wow that really looks crazy to me. Then I started just it was like a full on assault on the Brooklyn streets man. Anything and everything that casted shadows was fair game. [music] What I do in the street is art. You know it's like it's interactive in a way it because it makes you stop and think for a second. You know that's what art does. [woman]: I think it's art because he's making something out of the life around us that no one else sees and he comes up and sees it and makes it into art. And that's what art is. Or that's what art should be. [man]: Graffiti was banned because their

ruins property and people get upset about it. It's just shadows and it washes away and nobody gets hurt behind it. And when you look at, it's kinda it's kinda cool. I think it's cool. [Gallagher]: It's just a matter of how the viewer sees it you know. I- I see it as art. Most people see it as art. You know some people just think it's, uh, you know I've I've had the few people just think that it's just not it's just dirty or it's just like graffiti. It's not graffiti, it's street art. You know. [music] [cop 1]: What's that for? [Gallagher]: I was gonna write my name. [cop 1]: So you would write your name on pavement? [Gallagher]: Yes. [cop 1]: Like graffiti? [Gallagher]: No I- I sign I sign my pieces. [cop 2]: What made you put up in you in your writing? [Gallagher]: Ellis. I was about to write it. [cop 2]: OK. All right we're gonna go back to the precinct, all right? [Gallagher]: Am I am I un- am I under arrest? Am I under arrest?

[cop 2]: Yes you are. [Gallagher]: I'm und- what am I under arrest for? [cop 2]: Making graffiti. [Gallagher]: I don't understand, I've been doing this for- [cop 2]: I understand. When we go back, we'll make you understand when we get to the precinct. [music] [Gallagher]: So this, they gave me last night. It's a prisoner movement slip. It's my, uh, mug shot there. Graffiti is the placing of a mark, uh, with intent to damage. Now I'm placing a mark, but it's water soluble. And I'm not intending to damage anything. I'm just creating

artwork in the street. That's all I'm doing. Uh, but I just want to finish what I started here. This is definitely not the end of my chalk career, this is what I do this is I'm an artist. I enjoy doing my work and I I I'm gonna continue to do my work. I feel better. [music] [Pi Roman]: We close now with a preview of a new online program called 13 forum. It's 13's dedicated website for smart and civic debate which we'll be building over the next few months. Here's an excerpt from a recent discussion about George Orwell and propaganda. It took place at the New York Public Library. [music] [Schell]: The word propaganda, uh, it came out of the papacy in 16 22 when Pope Gregory the 15th, uh, summoned a council. The congragia de propaganda fide. Uh, congregation for propagating the faith. [Miles]: Religion, art and propaganda always

overlap. But each of the 3, has its own distinct norms and we get in trouble when we allow the norms of one to govern the activities of the other. Ignatius Loyola h- wrote a set of rules for thinking with the church and one of which is that if the hierarchy says something is black and my eyes tell me that it's white I will believe the hierarchy. It's like Chico Marx, who you gonna believe? Me or your own eyes. [Gessen]: So the second question is, uh, and I think this is part of the answer. Why should America care, in 2007, that Russia is dusting off the rusted tools of a failed empire? And answer is because propaganda works. [in Russian]: To respond asymmetrically so that everyone understands that the missile defense system system is pointless against Russia because we have the weapons that could overpower it easily. That's exactly what we're going to do. It's cheaper for us.

[Gessen]: To be blunt, I think that President Putin has come to believe his own television anchors, who tell him that the Western world is the aggressive enemy and only a revitalized and aggressive Russian military will protect the country and him personally from this threat. [Gebert]: A propaganda that leaves no room for dissent, compromise, horse trading, is effective. It's always dangerous. Even the good guys do it. [Soros]: And nevertheless, the propaganda methods described in, uh, uh, Orwell's 1984 newspeak of which is basically the language of de- liberate deception is flourishing in America today. I I think that what we have all taken for granted because we are all grounded in this what I call the enlightenment fallacy of of of thinking that we are in fact, uh, um, concerned

with the pursuit of truth. Uh, so we we need to we have taken that for granted. But that was a mistake. And we must reintroduce it as a a as a requirement for a democratic, uh, uh, open society to to to prevail. In all our activities, uh, we basically just took it for granted what open society stands for. I never needed to explain it to anybody in Eastern Europe because they knew exactly what it meant. It meant the opposite of the regime in which th- they were living, right. And certainly in the United States it is n- it is much more complicated because we are an open society but we don't understand the the principles of open society. So we a- have it's a strange contradiction and we really need to read

that ?inaudible? to ourselves to the values that have made America great because we have lost our way. We have been misled and we are on a false track and we have to re- to somehow regain our sal- sanity. [Pi Roman]: And that's it for this edition of New York Voices. For more on this or any other New York Voices program, log on to our website at 13.org. I'm Rafael Ri Roman. Thanks for watching. We'll see you next week. [music] [speaker]: New York Voices is made possible by the members of 13. Additional

funding by Michael T. Martin and Elise Jaffe and Jeffrey Brown.