charter schools?

People feel strongly about charter programs. My role is to let parents understand all of their options. Charter schools are publicly funded programs. They are often housed in public school buildings. Sometimes the relationship is good, sometimes it is strained. It is good for parents to know if the school is going to have to move. This is very disruptive to any program.

Charter schools are not zoned. They choose their students by lottery. They are required to give priority in the lottery to families who live within the district where the school is located. When the school is new or under capacity they may often have extra seats and take children from outside of the district. There is no downside to registering for lots of charter programs. You don't need to rank them, or decide which one you like better until you are offered a seat. They often call families from their waitlist. Why not register for every one you like? Charter schools do not have Prek programs. They often begin in Kindergarten and may be K - 5, K - 8, K - 12, 6 - 8, 6 - 12, or 9 -12 programs.

Charter schools are not under the DOE's jurisdiction so they may use a different curriculum, different hours and hire teachers in different ways. They still have to take the same NY state tests and they answer to their own individual Board of Trustees to maintain their charter.

The Brooklyn New School and the Brooklyn Children's School accept their students by lottery but they are NOT charter schools. These schools do have prek programs. To search for Charters in a NYC Charter School directory.

Spanish dual language at PS 46

If you live in Ft. Greene/Clinton Hill (and even if you don't) you should check out the new Spanish dual language program at PS 46, Edward Blum School, in district 13. Karyn Nicholson, their energetic new principal, is reaching out to the community. The staff which has long experience with bilingual education is well suited to put a dual language program into place. They started this fall with preK, k and first grade dual language classrooms. If the program proves popular there would be room for a second class on a grade. They are assessing students who are interested in the program for language proficiency (they are looking for both English and Spanish speakers) as well as looking for strong learners who will be able to handle the challenge of the dual language program. The k class I saw was focused and engaged and reading the Spanish lesson easily. The hallways are lined with excellent and varied writer's workshop published pieces.

Ms. Nicholson has a strong vision for the school and there are good facilities and lots of enrichment in place for her to build on. The school has a beautiful Robin Hood library. There is an art classroom and teacher with a science focus and a second art room/teacher with a math focus. There is also an extensive music program. I was very impressed with the science teacher, who is clearly transferring his enthusiasm for his subject to his students.

The parent coordinator, Cecilia Lopez (347) 563-5323 has a open door policy and her parent's room is open from 8 to 4. Contact her to find out about the next open house which will be scheduled shortly. I will also list it in the newsletter.

Middle School Interviews

The middle school interview season is here. Why interview? The schools want to get an idea of what the child is like, more than just a number and a name. It is hard for many parents to imagine their 10 or 11 year old managing to speak coherently to a strange adult. We all know that when things get "awkward" for a tween (my kids' favorite word for any situation that is the least bit cringy) they either get silly or silent. Parents need to know that these lovely teachers and parents who are conducting the interviews have seen HUNDREDS of 11 year olds. After a while the silly and the silent is so normal that they can surely see through it.

This is what you should tell your child:

• The interviewers are really interested in learning about you. So tell them about what you love in a way that will make them see a picture in their heads. Remember the "because" in your answer.

• Tell them about why you are interested in their school.There are no wrong answers.

• If you are in a group you have to be considerate of the other kids when they are talking and find a way to politely add what you want to say. If you are silent they will not learn enough about you. If you are silly they may misjudge what a good student you will be.

If you think that your child could use some help getting used to talking to a stranger, I can help them with relaxation, presentation and converstation.

redshirting

I answered a question on Park Slope Parents about a child with a late fall birthday whose parents were interested in waiting a year for kindergarten. It seemed to be helpful so I am posting it here.

The age cut off in NYC is Dec. 31. Any child that turns five years from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31 is eligible for kindergarten. Some parents feel that their children are not ready for kindergarten at five and want to wait to enroll them in public school. Starting a six year old child in kindergarten is not completely the parent’s choice. The principals may entertain the conversation if the child has a very late birthday (like the last week in Dec.). The principals are not trying to be rigid (they really care about your child’s education) they have seen a lot of children and there are reasons to keep the kids within a years range of each other. Someone has to be the youngest. The chancellor’s regulations are vague. A child is required to attend the appropriate class at 6 years old. Since the age cutoff is Dec. 31 it implies first grade. Kindergarten is the first academic year (no longer play-based) in public school but it is not a mandated grade. It is common practice for there to be enough seats in the k classes for everyone in the zone, but the desire to keep classes small makes it hard to find seats in very sought after schools when you are not in the regular age cohort.

It is up to the principal if there will be a seat in k at 6 years. It may also depend on available seats. Trying to work the private and public school admissions together is a very difficult thing. The problem starts with the different age cut off dates and then you have to contend with the different program notification dates (when they tell you that you have been accepted). The  Chancellor’s regulations do say that if you are entering the NYC public school system from another city or a private school that the child will be placed in the appropriate grade. They will not arbitrarily move a child ahead a grade just because of their age. For example, if a child is 7 years and has completed k they won’t place him in second grade just because 7 years is when the rest of the city’s children are in second grade.

There are no age exceptions made for public school prek programs or gifted and talented.

test scores are only a small piece of the puzzle

How do you judge a school?  To start you can look at the test scores. These may come in the form of the School Progress Reports (the DOE's flawed number crunching), the more nuanced but not fool-proof Quality Reviews or the number rankings given by the national websites. The black and white reality of a simple number or letter ranking is that it predicts how well your child will be able to complete a standardized test, not the quality of their education. The scores are often clung to as a measure of quality by prospective parents, but the tests are scorned by parents whose children already attend school. Assessments need to be made and there has to some kind of accountability, but the richest learning doesn't happen within test prep and the score can be a smoke screen.

You can read reviews on insideschools, study the school's website and get individual parent comments on the list serves. You can tour the schools and stand outside at 2:45 for dismissal and eyeball the parents picking up their kids. All of these are pieces of the puzzle, but none of them will give you the the kind of information about the right school for your child except the school tour that you take with your own eyes.

If you are an informed consumer, armed with the test scores and comments by others, the tour should seal the deal or expose the school as a bad fit and be the biggest factor when deciding.  Even though many parents feel that there is safety in numbers (the most popular schools must be the "best") there are many quality programs laboring in obscurity (often with smaller class sizes). If you can tour several schools, you will start to see similarities and differences. Many of the differences will be comparing apples and oranges, an old building compared to a newer building, a variety of enrichment classes compared to a fabulous afterschool, etc.

Keep your mind open. Look for exciting classrooms instead of the highest test scores. Does what you see in the classroom make sense with the school's scores. Do they seem realistic? Is the work on the bulletin board suspiciously flawless or all the same? Remember to trust your instincts. There are no guarantees in life but it is very possible to get a wonderful public education in the NYC public schools.

looking online for a good school

There are a number of sites that show information on local schools. They often have links to real estate sites that show properties in the area.

insideschools.org is above all my favorite. It is a local non profit run by Advocates for Children. It has a tremendous reach and depth and the first thing any parent worried about schools should do is sign up for their newsletter alerts and send them a little tax deductible thank you for the incredibly good work that they do. (I am not affiliated with them, I just love them.) You can "Ask Judy" a question, browse their forum, check their calendar, and most importantly read their reviews. The data at the beginning of the review (test scores and numbers) are updated every year and any change in principal or location is added right away. Because they review every school in the city, some reviews are a couple years old, check the dates at the end of the review. Remember that all parents that comment on schools are on a mission. They either love the school or hate it and it is difficult to get an objective reading of how much the parent body as a whole feels. If you have trouble searching for the school by name, also try searching by zip and age level, one of these two ways always gets results.

schools.nyc.gov is the Dept. of Education's website. There are individual school pages here (go to find a school). You can find copies of state and city reports on each school under the "statistics" tab on their school page. I recommend browsing the menu on the homepage, often publications, calendars and procedures are listed here or downloadable as pdf files. This is a very large deep and sometimes confusing website. If you find a page that you like, bookmark it so that you can find it again.

https://nyccharterschools.org/ is a searchable NYC database of charter schools

greatschools.org is a national site where you can search by city, or address, district etc. The search tool is clumsy at best and it is difficult to browse. The comparison of local schools also gives a weirdly haphazard and incomplete mix and sometimes elementary, middle and high schools are incorporated in the same list. For a national site that doesn't really address the complexities of the NYC school system, it is the best by far. They give a number ranking to the schools that is mostly based on test scores which can be misleading and are only a small indication of school's quality. There are parent comments and lots of general articles.

schooldigger.com searches by zip or address or city and gives a clear map of public elementary choices, but their ranking system is out of date and based on scores. They have very clear links to real estate if you are looking for that.

All the others are just lists of addresses.

how to find your zoned school

I have written a more recent blog on this topic here.

There are a couple easy ways to find out what elementary school zone you live within. You can call the school and ask them. You can call 311 and give them your address and they will tell you everything you need to know. You can go to the DOE website. In the middle of the homepage and choose "find by address". You will be directed to a map that shows your address and your zoned school. Some websites show maps of the zones. These are generally accurate but you need to be careful particularly if you live on a border street, because you may be on the wrong side of the street or at the wrong address for the school that you want.

The school zone is the small (weirdly shaped) catchment area around a school. The district is the larger area that encompasses many school zones. An example of a district is Williamsburg/Greenpoint. Both neighborhoods make up district 14. The district boundaries come into play at the middle school level. Many districts no longer have zoned middle schools. They have district wide choice. This means that if you live within the district you and your child will tour and rank schools in the fall of 5th grade. The schools will also look at many aspects of your child and there will be a computer match. At the high school level there is city wide choice.

At all levels there are also a number of other choices, charter schools, gifted and talented programs, magnet schools and schools that are below capacity and may accept children from outside of their zone or district. I give an overview of many of these choices and the registration procedures for elementary school in my "Intro to Public School: Prek and Kindergarten" talks. I speak about middle school and high school in the spring and summer.

international school of brooklyn’s new address

International School of Brooklyn is moving to Carroll Gardens in the fall of 2010. They have much larger digs at 477 Court St. in Carroll Gardens (that is the corner of Nelson St.). The whole school will be moving to the new location and they anticipate enrollment to be 180 students in nursery through 4 th grade. They will have enough space at this location to continue to grow each year through middle school which is wonderful news for parents interested in a strong language program. They will launch their middle school in 2012. International School of Brooklyn is an independent school following the International Baccalaureate curriculum that has language immersion beginning at age three in Spanish or French.

With the popular dual language French program at PS 58 on Carroll St. and Hands on World just down Court St. Carroll Gardens is beginning to have a distinctly French flavor.

New Charter School in Prospect Lefferts Gardens

I just got the exciting news from Hawthorne Street that the proposed District 17 Lefferts Gardens Charter School that will be partnering with the Botanic Garden has the go ahead for fall of 2010. They are waiting on a location but the school hopes to be housed close to the park. Whether you are pro charter or not, this is another option for local families and it answers a need in the community.

"the school will feature an environmental-science program that spans across disciplines. The over-arching idea is that the learning will be "experiential"—meaning that teachers will try to connect what goes on inside the classroom (and out) to children's daily lives. The school plans on working with the Brooklyn Botanic Gardens and the Prospect Park Audubon Center as part of its curriculum." - Hawthorne Street

Parents of NY Teens

I follow the neighborhood yahoo groups of parents of young children to answer questions about nursery and elementary school, but I occasionally yearn for a group of older parents. I need friends who will talk to me about tutors and teen break ups and how to handle the coed sleepover. I have been an avid member of the yahoo group, parentsofnyteens. It is smallish and chocked full of great parents that I actually know, who are funny and generous and very, very supportive.

Just two days ago, Rachel, the moderator, did us all a wonderful service and started the Parents of NY Teens blog where she is compiling information and resources that the yahoo group members have been supplying.

Now a place for us to go! - to find about the emotions and college tours and ...(a couple of months ago there was a lively discussion on the yahoo group about how to inform your son that it was time to take a shower). I recommend that you sign up for the group, and use the information on the blog early and often!

International School of Brooklyn and Dual Language at PS 84

It is a big news day for you language immersion and dual language fans!

The International School of Brooklyn which is an independent school, (currently nursery through 3rd grade) has a language immersion program in Spanish and French is moving to a big new location. They will be moving their whole school to a former Catholic School building in Carroll Gardens next year. The new location will triple their current space and allow them to launch their middle school in 2012. They anticipate almost doubling their enrollment for the 2010 school year.

Are you interested in Dual Language Spanish or Dual Language French in a public school?

Check out PS 84 in Williamsburg. Not only do they have a new principal, Jake Hobson, they have just announced that next year they will be rolling out a new dual language French program to join their Spanish program. A large number of local families have been working to organize this program over the last year.

They will have a meeting for parents on Thursday, Oct. 22 at 6pm at the school (wine and cheese courtesy of the French Embassy).

They will also be screening a French cartoon + snacks on Sat. Oct. 24 at 11am. Bring the kids and tell your friends to show local support for this great new neighborhood program. Everyone is welcome.

RSVP frenchinwillburg@gmail.com

Prospect Park West Contest Winners

Congratulations Amy and Roberta you won! My husband tried to enter.

His entry:

"Name of your child's current school: Peter Stuyvesant HS

Thing you love: Go Peg Legs! (that is really the name of the football team)

One challenge that the school faces: The spelling of its name...does it end in 'ant' ,'ent', 'end'?

Keep that book in the family!"

I have disqualified him and he is not allowed to read the book. He thinks that "Sex in the City" is a documentary and he would never be able to do his coop sift in peace again.

I think the new neighborhood parlor game should be who will play "you" in the movie. Heh, Sarah Jessica, I am not in the book, but I would like to be played by Laura Dern and my husband is Colin Firth. Your turn.

Thanks for all the entries.

My first impressions of Prospect Park West

I had a consult in Manhattan with a lovely family who is moving to the Slope so I finally had a chance to crack open Prospect Park West by Amy Sohn for a few quick stops on the F train. I howled through the first chapter, got off the train to talk about nursery programs and when I got back on the F the first thing I read was an abridged list of the schools that I had just recommended. Of course it wasn't accompanied by the well researched data and keen insight that I provide, but if I had been drinking milk at the time, it would have come out my nose. I am going to institute a new rating system. So far Prospect Park West gets 4 out of 4 individual serving organic, antibiotic free milk boxes.

The thing is that it has tons of realistic details as well as exaggerated characters. It is like having a famous author in the family. You were at the dysfunctional Christmas reunion. You know the people and what happened. You can gleefully enjoy the embellishments safe in the knowledge that as the boring third cousin, you won't be mentioned. We all know what we love about the neighborhood. We don't need to see that in print. It would be boring. Comedy is cruel and this is comedy set in a very familiar locale.

I have one request. I would like Simon & Schuster to come out with an indexed addition, "people and places that Joyce knows". Otherwise I am going to have to go through it with a highlighter.

There are still a few days left to submit entries for the "Win the Book Contest". Email me joyce@nycschoolhelp.com with the name of your child's current school, one thing you love and one challenge that the school faces. If your child is not in school yet, tell me what grade level you most fear and why. I will be picking an entry at random on Friday, Sept. 18 at 4pm.

Win a book!

I have a copy of Prospect Park West by Amy Sohn to give away. I am dying to read it. As soon as I finish updating all of my school data sheets with new progress reports (heck, they are all A's anyway!) I am going to take a "guilty pleasure afternoon" and crack it open.

Here's how to play:

drop me an email with "book" in the subject. joyce@nycschoolhelp.com

Tell me one good thing and one challenge that your child's current school is facing and tell me the name of the school. If your child isn't in school yet, let me know what grade level you are most anxious about. The deadline is Friday Oct. 18 at 4pm. I will pick an email at random and send you a book.

Thank you Simon & Schuster! I love giving things away. Feel free to send me more books anytime, and I will let you know what I think about the Prospect Park West in upcoming posts.

My kids are prepping for the SATs. Heh, Barron's or Princeton Review - they are happy to try out any test prep books that you are giving away!

Middle School: Part 3

So it is the first day of middle school, congratulations! This is what every sixth grade parent wants to hear as their darling comes in the door, "thanks mom and dad, that school is great! It is everything that I dreamed it would be over those long months last year, when we were waiting to hear where I would be placed." This is what you undoubtedly will hear, "It smells funny." That is if they are being kind.

This is what parents need to remember for the next two weeks. Your darling has not been in a new school since they were 5 years old. They have been the kings and queens of their elementaries. They knew everyone. They knew exactly what to expect. They knew all the teachers and it smelled familiar. But now they have to change classes in a building that they are afraid to get lost in. Even the sweetest teacher is putting on her mean face to keep the upper hand on the first day of middle school. The kids, whether they are giant and menacing 8th graders or not, are strange. Even kids they have known all their lives are coming back from the summer with breasts and different voices. How weird is that? It can't possibly be a good day.

So here is what you need to do:
First give them a protein filled snack. They probably had lunch at 10:30. Let them zone out for a while at the mindless activity of their choice.

Don't ask them how they liked school. You won't get the answer you want.
Just ask about facts. What color was your math teacher's hair? Do you have to climb stairs? How many minutes in between class? What do you want for lunch tomorrow?
In a couple of weeks they will start to say things like, "I met a nice kid today." "The science teacher is pretty funny." and you will finally get your rewards for dragging them on a million tours the year before.

And children...
have pity on your poor parents. They only want what is best for you. When they look at you pleadingly, hungry for any detail and praying that they made the right choice, say, "Mom, Dad, I love you anyway."

PS 133 at St. Thomas Aquinas School

The Brooklyn Paper reported back in June that PS 133 would be housed in the St. Thomas Aquinas School building while construction was done further north on 4th Ave. The school building has been underutilized for a few years now and I have watched in anticipation as the porta-potties and cranes moved in. I stopped by this morning and filled in a couple of details.
The DOE has the lease for at least 3 years. The building is very well built (as you can imagine considering its vintage) and the construction authority has been making an investment in it. A lot of good work has apparently been done to upgrade it. The work will be finished by Sept. for the first day of school. The building should also have a wireless network. I also inquired about any news on the new construction at the 133 building. I will be sorry to see the graceful old building and beautiful garden go. One new thing that I hadn't heard was that the architects where hoping to include as much of the old detail as possible in the new project. This certainly doesn't address the neighborhood's other many issues with the project.

What happens to the St. Thomas Aquinas school building in three or four years after 133 moves on? There has been talk of an art center there, which would be wonderful. I would love to see a public early childhood center that could relieve the PreK and K overcrowding that is happening all along the 4th Ave. corridor.

Preparing for Middle School: 2

Are you worried that your sweet darling is going to turn on you without warning the minute puberty kicks in? I can't help you with that, but I may be able to warn you about a couple of things that may give you a slight edge in the situation.

Your 6th grader doesn't have to have instant computer communication with all of their friends. This communication does seem to be necessary when they are a bit older, but in 6th grade they need to figure out how to deal with their new life and time management. Too much unregulated access (and do you want to be the policeman?) is a giant sink hole of problems. If it is difficult for you to self regulate your time on Facebook (you know who you are), it is impossible for your child. You have the power to choose what comes into your home. I just advise that you make conscious choices at each step along the way. Consider whether it is wise to have a computer in their room. This is not necessarily a trust issue. How many times have you looked up from the computer and it was three hours later and you had no idea that time was passing (I am doing it right now!). The time will come when they will go to bed after you are long asleep, but right now they are the ones that really need the shut eye. They are so much nicer when they get it.

That brings up the fact that they look old, but in many ways they still have the same needs that they did when they were toddlers. Sleep, eat and read aloud should be your mantra. They grow when they sleep and they are growing inches every day. Studies show that US teenagers are chronically sleep deprived. I am mean when I am tired (really, don't cross me!) and they will be too. Why go there?

Feed them right away when they get home from school, something healthy with complex carbs or protein. They probably had lunch at 10:30. They are HUNGRY. Feed them before you ask about their day or they will bite your head off.

6th graders have a lot to deal with (more on that in the next "preparing..."). A funny thing happens to many of them. They occasionally take up a little baby language, they climb their giant 5' frames onto your lap, they form a sudden nostalgia for their "childhood". While they are desperately trying to be older, they are also uncomfortable with letting go of the familiar. This is why it is nice to stay friends with kids that are not going to your middle school. They have to be cool with their school friends, but they can be their old selves with their old friends. Don't get rid of all of the Legos or stuffed animals just yet.

They may not want to talk about their day when they get home. A parent can look pretty lame in the cold light of day, but at night, when they are cozy in bed and the lights are low, you look like their beloved moms and dads again. Everybody likes to be read aloud to. If you keep doing the bedtime reading (or start back up) you will be amazed at what happens. First the books just get better and better. But you may find that you don't spend much time on the books. You may end up just talking, and the longer you can keep that tradition going the better.

Happy reading!

Preparing for Middle School: 1

I always waited for the first day of school to get the teacher's list of supplies. Then I would go to Target or Staples and wait in an endless line for the last of the stray, wrinkled, stepped on notebooks that nobody else wanted. I wanted to go in mid summer when the pretty notebooks were out, but NYC starts school so much later than any other district that when I was on vacation in other states, the shelves were clear by mid July. I just went to Staples yesterday and got my gross of $.19 pocket folders and you can too, before they are all gone.

Here is a shopping strategy for the parents of rising 6th graders ready for their first year of Middle School. It is a tough call because your tween will want to wait to see what everyone else has. They may also want the giant binder with pockets and subject dividers for the first time. These will not go to waste even if their teachers don't require them. They will use them all sometime unless they become plastered with Jonas Brothers stickers which will render them "gross" and outdated in 6 months.

This is what you should get:

• the tried and true marble composition books one for each subject (and lots of extras)

• pocket folders for each subject

• spiral notebooks with perforations so that the pages can be torn out without the fringe

If you go shopping now you can find colorful (actually attractive) composition notebooks. Get them in different colors for each subject, red for ELA, blue for math, green for science etc. Then get the corresponding colored pocket folders and spiral notebooks for those subjects too. That way when the books are strewn all over the living room at 7am and your child only needs science and ELA that day, he can easily see what needs to go into the backpack. If they are all the same color or random designs imagine the horror (and notes home that he doesn't have his work in class).

• pads of graph paper for math (some have 4 sq. per in. on one side and 5 on the other so that you have all bases covered)

• lots of #2 pencils, a sharpener, and some mechanical lead pencils for math

• colored construction paper, glue sticks, markers of all kinds (you thought the projects would stop?!)

• extra poster board (white and in color) and a spare tri-fold card board display (thanks Felicity)

• lots of extra printer paper and many extra ink cartridges

Middle school is when the computer becomes a part of your child's body. I have a couple things to say about this. ALWAYS HAVE AN EXTRA INK CARTRIDGE IN THE HOUSE. Oh yes, you will use the last one and think, I will reorder that in a couple of weeks like I normally do, but a week later at midnight when the giant social studies project is due, suddenly there will be no ink, because your child spent the last week printing out multiple copies of different size pictures of civil war uniforms that they didn't use. Hear me now or suffer the consequences. Always have at least one extra cartridge and ream of paper in the house. Always.

Happy shopping!