Chalkbeat

Advocates push Newark school board to cut ties with food vendor that supplies controversial ICE facility

2026-03-06T11:00:01+00:00

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As Newark Board of Education members, parents, and students shuffled into Sir Isaac Newton Elementary School in advance of the board’s February meeting, they passed a small group of activists protesting on the sidewalk.

Chatting quietly with each other, some eight activists stood along the school fence and held handwritten signs saying, “I prefer crushed ICE” and “ICE out of New Jersey!!!”

The advocates, members of local groups like Cosecha, Democratic Socialists of America, and Eyes on ICE, were gathered as part of “Ditch Driscoll Foods,” a campaign to pressure the school board to end its relationship with a food vendor that services a controversial immigration detention center.

“We don’t want the school system doing anything that is going to contribute to the current climate of fear that’s going on in our neighborhood,” said Amy Brown, a member of the campaign and a parent at Oliver Street School, where the majority of students are Latino. Many of her daughter’s classmates and their parents, she said, live in fear of ICE.

Amy Brown, a Newark parent speaks during the Newark Board of Education meeting.

Last summer, volunteers photographed a Driscoll Foods truck exiting the Delaney Hall ICE detention facility near Newark. The photo sparked a series of public records requests, which revealed the details of multiple contracts between Newark public schools and Driscoll Foods authorizing the district to spend up to $12 million with the vendor.

The contracts are set to expire on June 30, and advocates hope to pressure the Newark Board of Education to choose a different vendor for the upcoming school year. Advocates testified at the January Board of Education meeting; since then, they say, board members have ignored their repeated requests for comment and information.

“How is it possible that the school district is contracting with a company that already has a history of providing terrible quality food, not only to students but now also in immigration detention centers?” Carlos Castañeda, a member of the immigrants rights organization Cosecha told Chalkbeat, in Spanish. “We are demanding that the school district stop the contract.”

A parent of a 4-year-old girl at Sir Isaac Newton Elementary School spoke with the activists as he left the building before the board meeting.

“I don’t think we should be using our tax dollars, our education dollars to support companies that are getting rich off of feeding inmates bad food. Companies that are supporting essentially concentration camps,” the parent, who declined to share his name, told Chalkbeat. He had not been aware of Newark schools’ connection with the ICE contractor.

“I don’t want my tax money going to that and I hope the Board of Education takes that seriously,” he said.

Advocates want Newark schools to cut ties with Driscoll Foods

Delaney Hall, the privately-run ICE detention facility operated by the GEO Group, the largest prison operator in the United States, has faced a stream of complaints around detainee treatment since it opened last May. Detainees have reported abusive treatment, from frigid temperatures to vindictive guards to missing essential toiletries. In December, Jean Wilson Brutus, an asylum seeker from Haiti, died one day after being detained at Delaney Hall.

Detainees at Delaney Hall also say they have been served rotten and spoiled food, often at irregular times and in insufficient quantities. Last June, dozens of detainees protested the conditions at Delaney Hall, focusing on the quality and quantity of food they were provided.

“The same food that you’re giving to the detained people at Delaney Hall who haven’t gotten their due process, you’re giving to felons and people in jail at Essex County jail. That’s crazy that you’re serving that to elementary school students,” a Newark public school elementary teacher told Chalkbeat. The teacher asked not to share their name because they feared retaliation from the district.

“It kind of says a lot about what you think about the students in Newark,” the teacher said. “They deserve the best. These are children we’re talking about.”

In response to a question from Chalkbeat about the food quality at Newark schools, Hasani Council, president of the school board, said “That's something that we are working on."

Driscoll Foods has also come under criticism for its work in New York City. In 2024, then-Comptroller Brad Lander found the company had overbilled New York City’s Department of Social Services by $9 million, according to reporting at the time from The City.

Driscoll Foods did not reply to a request for comment.

During the school board meeting’s public participation period following reports from the superintendent and board members, advocates associated with the “Ditch Driscoll Foods” campaign spoke against Newark Public Schools’ ties to the company. Some read statements written by undocumented parents of Newark schoolchildren.

They repeatedly expressed frustration that the board had not responded to their messages or requests for information.

Teresa Yi-Bourdett, an activist with “Ditch Driscoll Foods,” urged board members to take action. “They are not a responsible supplier to work with,” she said. “So just remove them from competition, right?”

“That’s not how that works,” a board member said. Other board members appeared to be on their phones as advocates testified.

Teresa Yi-Bourdett, an activist speaks during the February Newark Board of Education meeting.

The presentations were followed by enthusiastic claps from the advocates and some attendees, including high schoolers who’d attended the meeting to push for better mental health support.

Some speakers at the meeting, unaffiliated with “Ditch Driscoll Foods,” called attention to what they said was the poor quality of food served to Newark public school students. Others questioned why the coalition was not advocating for the Newark school board to cut ties to suppliers to Essex County prisons.

“We’re serving a community where most of the students that make up that community are predominantly immigrant students,” the Newark teacher said. “I would think that we wouldn’t want to support a harmful company in that way.”

In response to a series of testimonies, board members repeatedly emphasized that they are required to follow procedural rules in selecting contractors.

Following the public comment period, School Business Administrator Valerie Wilson read a statement that addressed the selection of Driscoll Foods in the previous cycle.

“Vendors must be selected through a competitive procurement process to ensure fairness, compliance, and continuity of service. Does the district endorse all business practices of its vendors? No,” Wilson said. “We have a responsibility to ensure uninterrupted access to nutritious, compliant meals for students while adhering to public contracting law.”

Some advocates were not convinced.

“I just thought [the board members] were advocating for the quality and the nutritional value of the food, but the food isn’t that great,” the Newark teacher told Chalkbeat. She cited several occasions when students have been served expired food, and criticized the uniformity, cold temperature, and insufficient portions of breakfasts.

In response to a question from Chalkbeat about the food quality at Newark schools, Hasani Council, president of the Newark school board, said “That’s something that we are working on and we want to continue to work on and train our staff.”

The choice of food supplier, he added, was not in the power of Newark school board members to decide.

Board members, he said, only have final voting approval on the bid once it has already been awarded after a public bidding process. In response to a question from Chalkbeat about how he would vote if the superintendent were to recommend renewing Driscoll Foods’ contract, Council said, “I don’t know yet.”

Newark board member says superintendent contract approval was ‘dangerous’ and ‘reeks of impropriety’

2025-11-26T17:59:31+00:00

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In the wake of Newark Superintendent Roger León’s controversial contract extension, a lone board member spoke out Tuesday night raising legal, ethical, and procedural concerns with the approval.

Board member David Daughety called the manner by which the board approved León’s contract extension “dangerous” and said it “reeks of impropriety,” potentially causing the board to be perceived in a “corrosive way.”

León’s contract was apparently extended after a board member said last month she would switch her vote from an abstention to a “yes” vote long after the initial vote failed in September and without any formal motion to reconsider or a notification to the public.

Melissa Reed, the board member who switched her vote, said Tuesday night she was under immense pressure, and her mental health has deteriorated in the weeks since the first contract extension vote was taken.

Board policy experts and education advocates have also called the extension approval into question.

“Unanimous consent of the board was never requested, nor was a motion properly made and seconded to allow such vote altering to take place,” Daughety said during Tuesday night’s board meeting. “The precedent that we have just opened ourselves up to, that any board member at any given time can change a vote from the past without a motion or express consent of the board, is dangerous and reeks of impropriety.”

Approving a superintendent’s contract and overseeing their work running the district are among the most important responsibilities a school board carries out. Since regaining local control from the state, Newark community members have called for more transparency around León’s contract extension requests. This latest confusing and last-minute approval perpetuates uncertainty and “fuels the perception of impropriety,” Daughety said.

Daughety said he attempted to request a second impartial legal opinion on the matter via an email to Board President Hasani Council in October and was denied. On Tuesday night, his public motion to request the second opinion was rebuffed by the board president and called “out of order” by the district’s general counsel.

“My renewed request for a second legal opinion is not personal. I’m not out to get anybody or obstruct anyone getting their contract. If the votes are there, then the votes are there. But this was not the legal or right order of getting it. This was not explained correctly on the record,” Daughety said.

Daughety’s concerns were met with some applause from the public in attendance.

District general counsel Brenda Liss said under the board’s own policy, requests for second opinions can only come from the board president.

“We’ve been violating board policy — be serious,” Daughety said in response.

León and Liss both said that any of Daughety’s concerns with the superintendent’s contract should have been brought to them privately as a privileged personnel matter, out of the public eye. The superintendent’s contract is a public document.

“It’s not that I don’t want the public to understand these issues, but to the extent that they are addressed to me, I discuss them with the full board in closed session,” Liss said.

Council told Daughety that León’s contract “has already been ratified and signed,” saying “the matter is closed at this time.”

“The state is watching. The county is watching. Our city is watching, our district is watching, and our students are watching. All eyes are on Newark right now,” Daughety said. “We need to act in the best interest of the people and this institution. We worked too hard for local control to finally achieve it, but see it perceived in such a corrosive way.”

Melissa Reed, the member who changed her vote, said Tuesday night her mental health “has not been the best” since the contract vote. She said her decision to switch her vote was “not made lightly” and “came after weeks of pressure, conversations, and a deep sense of responsibility” for Newark’s children, schools, “and the stability of this district.”

“Intentional or not, I felt myself being positioned as a scapegoat, the one who would carry the blame for a decision far larger than me,” Reed said. “My vote was not about agreement. It was about preventing harm, it was about preventing chaos.”

Reed said her decision to switch her vote does not erase her concerns about equity, accountability, and transparency in the district, and “it surely does not mean the work is done.”

Carly Sitrin is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Philadelphia. Contact Carly at csitrin@chalkbeat.org.

Why did Newark schools superintendent get a new deal?

2025-11-10T20:50:44+00:00

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New Jersey’s biggest school district, which gets more than $1 billion in state aid every year, pulled a sharp reversal by extending its superintendent’s contract in the middle of the night without public comment.

Hiring a superintendent may be the most important decision that a school board makes, but this decision wasn’t put on the public agenda. A board member who had abstained in September when this extension to 2030 was rejected said she’d had a change of heart and decided to vote yes, flipping her position to make a majority.

Why this urgency, with more than two years remaining on Roger León’s current contract?

It’s a question no one will answer – not the school board, not the mayor, not the state, and not León. That silence, along with the unusual procedural move that made this possible, has left critics outraged, charging that this was a backroom stunt designed to keep the public out of the discussion, a throwback to the days when the state ran the district from Trenton.

“You fight so hard as a community to get local control back, just to see the power not even be exercised,” said former South Ward Councilman Oscar James. “Americans are fighting to put food on the table and we’re talking about a man guaranteeing himself another two years, when we’re not even two years out from the end of this contract. It seems ridiculous.”

León was appointed superintendent in 2018 and has enjoyed solid support from the board. His standing in the community is harder to gauge. Turnout in school elections is at 3%. And students have struggled, with only 34% reading at grade level and 21% proficient at math, well below the average in the charter schools, which educate more than 1 in 3 Newark kids. Still, district scores have improved in recent years under León, as has the graduation rate.

But the board, which employs the superintendent at an annual salary of $319,785, has very little leverage, critics argue, and this last-minute contract extension is a prime example.

Board members “deliberately vote against the interests of the community,” said Ade Kelly, a former Newark school board candidate. “They empower the superintendent to act as if he’s the boss of the public school district, when they are his boss.”

“I didn’t understand the urgency,” said Vivian Cox Fraser, president & CEO of the Urban League of Essex County. This superintendent had just gotten his contract renewed, she noted. So why such haste, without public notice?

“If I was aware of it, I would have probably tried to galvanize some people to go to the meeting and speak out against it,” said a recent city council candidate, Jhamar Youngblood. “That’s our culture in this city, to do backroom deals and not let residents and community activists know truly what’s going on.”

This board has no teeth to rein in a superintendent who acts like “a czar,” said Lamont Vaughn, a community activist who called these tactics very similar to what the city went through under former Superintendent Cami Anderson’s “regime” a decade ago, when the state had control.

“Just in a different name, a different color, and with a different mantra: That being, ‘Roger León is from Newark.’”

Top officials have no comment

Meanwhile, the people with the most political influence in the schools have all clammed up: State Sen. Teresa Ruiz, who represents Newark, Mayor Ras Baraka, and Councilman Anibal Ramos, all respected voices on education, are not commenting. Neither is the state Department of Education.

Critics note that the board member who switched to a yes vote, Melissa Reed, has a job with the county, and some suspect that may have influenced her vote. Reed did not respond to a request for comment and a spokesman for the district called any suggestion of impropriety “baseless, outrageous and insulting.”

“Everyone is connected to somebody or has some job that can be waved in their face, and their livelihoods can be put up against them, and they have to make decisions based on whatever the powers that be decide,” said Kelly, the school board candidate. “That’s really unfortunate.”

The board president, Hasani Council, had to abstain from this vote because of a nepotism conflict himself: His father works for the district. Council later insisted through a district spokesman that Reed “did not discuss her decision to change her vote with the board president or the superintendent before last night’s meeting.”

Kelly is not convinced. “What this looks like,” he said, “is that some folks had some conversations with her behind the scenes and she had to change her vote.”

Reed demanded one concession in return for her vote, a public commitment from the superintendent to release a report on the Newark School of Global Studies high school, which has been the subject of racism allegations, follow its recommendations, and improve transparency, among other issues. León did not give one. Yet she voted to extend his contract anyway, Chalkbeat reported.

The move on this contract, and the way it was done, has offered a ripe target to critics of the state’s funding system, which is heavily weighted in favor of urban districts like Newark.

“The wanton disregard by the Newark school board for just the base level of normal, ethical, transparent behavior is amazing,” said Sen. Declan O’Scanlon, a Republican, who notes that other districts are being forced to lay off teachers.

To speak at a Newark board meeting as a member of the public, you need to sign up five days in advance, he noted. The failure to put this late-night renewal on the agenda violates the spirit of the law requiring 30 days public notice, at least, and perhaps the letter of the law, experts say.

Superintendent contract extension has been target of criticism

Three years ago, León’s contract was automatically renewed with no public notice, and parents and activists loudly protested when they found out eight months later. When this latest extension was up for discussion in September, public reaction was mixed.

Critics point to low scores on state tests last spring: Only about 34% of Newark students are reading at grade level and 21% are proficient at math. Those scores have improved slightly, each by roughly three percentage points over the previous year.

The state designated Newark as “high performing” over the summer, but notably, some of the worst scores it got on that evaluation were for academic performance. While student test scores have been steadily improving since the pandemic, they started at a very low point, according to Paula White, executive director of JerseyCAN, who was formerly in charge of turning around failing schools for the state department of education.

Meanwhile, the district has been criticized for spending lavishly: Travel to conferences in places like Puerto Rico and Hawaii. Millions spent on legal battles with a charter school over a building the district sold years ago and is now trying to claw back with a failed lawsuit that a judge called “shameful.” And a “fun day” party for hundreds of main office staffers, an expense the state flagged as a violation, forcing the district to reimburse the state.

Parents complain about being left in the dark about secretive contract renewals and key reports while the district awards itself the highest possible scores on self-evaluations and what critics call deceptive advertising: For instance, at Chancellor Avenue School, where 80% of the kids can’t read on grade level, the district hung a banner declaring it a “Rising Blue Ribbon School.”

“We should be facing our problems head on instead of trying to mask them in these celebrations,” Youngblood said.

Now, among those crying foul is an expert who advises the National School Boards Association on procedure, Bruce Bishop, who called the Newark board’s justification for this late-night contract extension “simply incorrect.”

“They do this because they know they’re not going to get checked,” said Thomas Luna, a former Newark school board candidate. “For quite some time, our board has made decisions that are not aligned with policy and procedures because there’s no repercussion.”

And there’s plenty of blame to go around for that, O’Scanlon says.

“It’s incredible that the Murphy administration has not clamped down on them. It’s malfeasance,” he said. With Democrats still in power in Trenton, he adds, “it will be four more years of the same: Flushing New Jersey taxpayers down the drain of the Newark school system.”

Any member of the public who objects to this extension can file a complaint with the state ethics commission, the state department of education, or in state Superior Court, experts say. But if the board hasn’t done things properly, it shouldn’t be up to the people to fix it, said Fraser of the Urban League. It would be simple enough to just follow the law, provide notice, and hold another hearing.

“I would hope,” she said, “that the other board members who’ve been elected by the residents of Newark to represent the best interests of the children of this city would want to do what’s right.”

Julie O’Connor is the urban education writer at NJ Spotlight News. Email her at OConnorJ@njspotlightnews.org.

Newark superintendent’s abrupt contract extension raises ethics questions

2025-10-31T20:01:09+00:00

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Experts say the Newark Board of Education’s late-night move to extend Superintendent Roger León’s contract without public notice or debate was ethically questionable and potentially “totally improper.”

In a surprise move Thursday night, one Newark school board member suddenly requested to switch her abstention on a September vote on León’s contract extension, which failed last month, to a “yes” vote without any formal motion to reconsider.

Both the board president and board counsel said Thursday that this verbal switch constituted an approval for León’s contract extension, and he would remain in office through 2030. The district’s general counsel, Brenda Liss, who is the district and school board’s attorney, said the decision was made possible under Robert’s Rules of Order, a set of rules used by public bodies to conduct business.

The vote switch created confusion among members and the public and reignited familiar concerns about the district and school boards’ transparency. Community members have repeatedly demanded more transparency around León’s contract extension requests and have instead witnessed automatic renewals and limited public discussion.

And experts Friday said the officials’ explanations for why they proceeded without prior notice don’t add up.

Bruce Bishop, executive director of the national Parliamentary Procedure Institute, told Chalkbeat the board’s procedure was not in line with Robert’s Rules. While Liss’s assertion that board members may change their vote if there are no objections is correct, Bishop said, there is a time limit. Once the board moves on to other official business, the time to swap votes has passed.

Because the prior meeting where the original vote was taken had been adjourned, and then a new meeting a month later was called to order, minutes were approved, and a quorum was established, “then certainly by any definition, other business took place or was introduced, and it would be totally improper” and “totally unauthorized” for that board member to change her vote from an abstention to a yes.

“It’s simply too late to authorize that,” Bishop said.

Betsy Ginsburg, executive director of the Garden State Coalition of Schools and a longstanding school board member and board president, said while she doesn’t think “there’s anything illegal” about what the board did Thursday, “it’s not part of the orderly process by which you want a public body to conduct business,” she said. “If you’re going to do something that big, it should at least be an agenda addendum.”

Bishop did note that Robert’s Rules — or any parliamentary rules — create mechanisms by which board members could reconsider or rescind a prior vote. But that would mean giving proper notice and allowing time for debate or discussion in public.

“Absent a motion to reconsider, you can’t just reconsider something,” Bishop said. “If you’ve got an open meeting law, then it would require public notice that the board intends to revisit the issue that they considered last month,” he added. “None of that happened.”

Newark’s school board has quietly approved León’s contract extensions before

Decisions like these have underscored how the promise of community oversight and a more responsive leadership may differ from the reality of the school board and district’s governance. The board’s murky procedural practices also highlight how Newark Public Schools, New Jersey’s largest school system, is rebuilding its governance from scratch after 25 years of state oversight.

The contract extension makes León one of the longest-serving superintendents in state history.

Attempts to quietly move León’s contract extension to allow him to “accomplish the goals” laid out in his 10-year plan have happened before. Those attempts have been made with few opportunities for public input. In 2019, school board members added two years to León’s original contract at a sparsely attended board meeting, extending it to 2023.

School leaders were criticized in 2023 after reports that León’s contract had been automatically renewed because of a clause that extended his term by five years.

In August, Chalkbeat obtained León’s contract extension proposal only through a public records request. The district has also denied Chalkbeat’s public records request for León’s annual evaluations between 2018 and 2025, citing records laws that protect personnel documents.

The school board has also given little insight into other decisions it has made in the past.

In 2023, the board unanimously appointed a charter school teacher to fill a vacant seat, but after an unexplained delay to swear him in, the board eventually appointed someone else. In 2024, former member Dawn Haynes abruptly resigned from her role without a board explanation. Chalkbeat later found that Haynes resigned over a settlement with the district related to her daughters’ legal claim over alleged racist experiences at a Newark high school.

While parents and school advocates have raised concerns over how León addresses issues such as racism in schools, student achievement, and support for vulnerable students, others say extending his tenure to 2030 is necessary for “stability” of the school district.

During a September public hearing to extend León’s contract, Denise Cole, a longtime community advocate who fought for the return to local control, said keeping León on until 2030 is “a simple matter of stability, continuity, and fairness.” Parents raised a long list of complaints, but only a few opposed the extension, while others questioned why the board was considering it three years before Leon’s contract ends.

Ginsburg suggested upcoming elections may have added urgency to the contract extension request and underscored a need for stable leadership in an uncertain time.

The looming gubernatorial election could mean changes for Newark’s public schools, where more than 90% of students identify as Black or Latino, and just under half of district students require English language and special education support.

Republican candidate Jack Ciattarelli has said if he wins, the state’s education department may place more scrutiny on “underperforming” districts like Newark, impact funding for English language learners, and institute changes to the school funding formula that could devastate Newark schools’ budget.

The Newark school board also has an election next spring where four board members’ terms end. Among those whose terms are up is member Josephine Garcia, who was on the committee to appoint León as the district’s first superintendent under local control. Board president Hasani Council, Allison James-Frison, and newly appointed board member Melissa Reed — the member who switched her vote — are also up for election next April.

And while it can be easy to criticize Newark’s governing slips, Ginsburg said, she urged empathy and understanding for board members who are volunteers conducting business in a politically turbulent time.

“It is a scary time for board members all across the state, not just in Newark,” Ginsburg said. “The level of rhetoric has gotten so extreme that just about any decision that boards make that has some amount of impact is not just going to be criticized thoughtfully, it’s going to be criticized in irrational and emotional ways.”

Jessie Gómez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.

Carly Sitrin is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Philadelphia. Contact Carly at csitrin@chalkbeat.org.

Newark school board approves superintendent’s contract extension after member abruptly switches vote

2025-10-31T02:48:20+00:00

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In the dead of night and amid a flurry of confusion, Newark’s school board seemingly extended Superintendent Roger León’s contract through 2030 on Thursday — without an official motion or prior public notice.

Last month, the board failed to pass a proposal to extend León’s contract, which had been set to expire in 2028. Four board members voted in favor, two abstained, and two recused themselves due to conflicts of interest. One board member was absent.

A contract extension proposal was not officially on the board’s voting agenda on Thursday. But after the superintendent’s report during the meeting, one board member, Melissa Reed, who previously abstained on the contract extension vote, said she would consider changing her decision and vote for the extension if León were to make a “public commitment” to “fix equity” in the district.

In addition, Reed said León should release a report that details instances of racism and religious harassment at the Newark School of Global Studies. She also said León should implement recommendations included in the report, improve district transparency, and provide a concrete process to register every 16- and 17-year-old to vote, among other changes.

“Mr. Superintendent Roger León, if you’re willing to stand publicly with us on these commitments, then I will stand with you,” Reed said during the board meeting.

León, who was present at the meeting, did not publicly respond to Reed’s request on Thursday.

Board president Hasani Council then asked Reed to clarify if she wanted to change her vote from last month and vote in favor of the extension. “That’s correct,” Reed responded.

Council told Chalkbeat after the meeting that Reed’s decision meant that León’s contract extension through 2030 had been approved.

“She changed her vote from an abstention to a yes, which now allows the superintendent’s two-year extension to pass,” said Council, who recused himself from last month’s vote to extend León’s contract due to a conflict of interest under the district’s nepotism policy.

During Thursday’s board meeting, Brenda Liss, the district’s general counsel, said the board policies and bylaws “have no provision on this, so we look to Robert’s Rules,” referring to a set of rules commonly used by deliberative bodies to conduct business

“Robert’s Rules provides that a board member may change their vote at any time if there is no objection from the board,” said Liss. “If she says that she wants to change her vote, as a matter of courtesy in the past, this board has allowed any member to change their vote without question or without motion.”

Last month’s attempt to extend León’s contract failed to pass after parents and advocates raised concerns about student achievement, racism in schools, and inadequate support for the district’s most vulnerable students.

Jessie Gómez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.

Carly Sitrin is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Philadelphia. Contact Carly at csitrin@chalkbeat.org.

Newark Superintendent Roger León highlights equity efforts during Council of Great City Schools conference

2025-10-24T20:21:55+00:00

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Newark Public Schools’ approach to equity training “is quite simple,” Superintendent Roger León told a room full of superintendents and staff from the nation’s largest public school districts on Friday.

The strategy, León said during a presentation at the Council of Great City Schools conference in Philadelphia, involves forming leadership teams of principals, parents, students, and teachers that help identify challenges across schools and assess equity efforts.

Those teams serve as a way to “funnel” information from schools and help him “have a pulse of what is occurring in the organization.”

“Talk to me, tell me everything that’s wrong,” Leon said he had told a group of principals.

Newark’s approach also includes deploying equity resources to staff and soliciting expert help, León said during the session on equity training.

The district’s participation in the annual conference was significant as León spoke alongside representatives from public schools in Baltimore and Aurora, Colorado.

The conference convened superintendents and hundreds of employees from 81 of the country’s urban school districts. Superintendents and representatives from school districts in Philadelphia, Detroit, Chicago, New York, and Denver also spoke at sessions during the conference.

Matthew Brewster, Newark’s director of instructional staff development, who also spoke during the equity presentation, said the majority of the district’s professional development on equity comes from consultants.

“Because if you’re going to be a learner, you have to be a learner, right? You have to bring in someone else to help you do the work. Equity work that you’re not uncomfortable doing, you’re not doing right,” Brewster said.

Their comments come as the district continues to face criticism over complaints of racism at the Newark School of Global Studies. In 2022, Black students and teachers described ongoing harassment to the school board member, prompting the district to hire an outside consultant to assess the cultural dynamics of the school. The comments also drew heavy criticism from parents and advocates about the way the school and district leaders handled the situation.

León was also criticized for withholding a scathing report – whose details so far have only been reported in draft form by Chalkbeat — that detailed the problems with racism at the high school and recommended the district improve the effects of anti-Blackness.

In September, Newark school advocates demanded the release of the report and pleaded for a curriculum that challenges racial biases and promotes inclusivity.

Brewster, during Friday’s conference session, also said that the Office of Staff Development has shared a list of books, articles, and research studies with district leaders during professional development sessions. Some of those books include “The Equity & Social Justice 50” by Baruti Kafele, “Becoming the Educator They Need” by Robert Jackson, and “Principal Leadership for Racial Equity” by Raskin, Krull, and Felix.

After the issues at Global Studies came to light, two former teachers sued the district, alleging they suffered “severe emotional problems” as a result of the incidents they experienced, they said. The lawsuit is ongoing.

The controversy also led one of Newark’s longest-serving school board members to step down as part of a settlement with the district after her daughter – a former Global Studies student who said she faced racial harassment at the school – threatened to sue the district.

Newark, New Jersey’s largest school system, is home to 41,000 students, with more than 90% of students identifying as Black or Latino. This school year, Hispanic students represent the largest student group in the district. Since 2019, the number of Black students has declined as Hispanic enrollment has steadily increased.

Jessie Gomez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.

Newark school board fails to approve Superintendent Roger León’s contract extension after public pushback

2025-09-26T03:43:24+00:00

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A proposal to extend Newark Superintendent Roger León’s contract failed to pass late Thursday after parents and advocates raised concerns about student achievement, racism in schools, and inadequate support for the district’s most vulnerable students.

Four board members voted in favor of extending León through 2030, two abstained, two recused themselves due to conflicts of interest and one board member was not in attendance. The proposal required a majority vote, at least five, to pass.

León’s current contract is set to expire June 30, 2028. The vote Thursday does not necessarily mean an extension is off the table. The board may revisit the issue at a later date.

During Thursday’s heated public hearing, dozens of Newarkers packed Ann Street Elementary School to weigh in on the proposed extension. Those in attendance endured the humidity inside the school’s auditorium as some waited more than an hour to speak for only three minutes.

Parents, teachers, and advocates raised concerns about school lunches, racism, bullying, student achievement, parent engagement, overcrowded classrooms, and support for English language learners and students with disabilities.

Community advocates also demanded the release of a report — whose details so far have only been reported in draft form by Chalkbeat — documenting problems with the cultural climate at a city high school. Advocates also pleaded for a curriculum that challenges racial biases and promotes inclusivity.

Carlos Castañeda, an organizer with Movimiento Cosecha, which advocates for immigrants’ rights, said he opposed the proposed extension because “the process lacks transparency.”

“The public was given a short window to respond, yet the board is considering a decision that will shape our schools for the next five years,” Castañeda said during Thursday’s hearing. “Our families deserve a superintendent that tackles inequities head-on.”

He was joined by a group of Spanish-speaking mothers from the grassroots group New Labor, who also demanded that the board address issues raised instead of deciding on an extension.

Others like Denise Cole, a longtime community advocate who fought for the district’s return to local control, said she was “in strong support” of extending León’s contract and believes the extension would allow him to complete his 10-year plan for the district.

“It’s a simple matter of stability, continuity, and fairness,” Cole added.

After public comment, school board members met for more than an hour behind closed doors to discuss personnel matters. The board voted, without discussion, when it reconvened in public. León did not give a statement about the contract extension or the vote.

Two board members who have relatives who work for the school district recused themselves from the vote in accordance with the board’s nepotism policy.

The hearing lasted nearly five hours and was supposed to be followed by a full school board meeting, which instead was postponed to Sept. 29 at the district’s central office.

León, who became superintendent in 2018, is the first to lead the district under local control and the first Latino to helm New Jersey’s largest school system.

Thursday’s meeting marked another contentious moment between Newark’s school community and district leadership, highlighting growing public scrutiny as the district enters its fifth year under local control and faces questions about whether it has delivered on its promise of a better education for Newark students.

Those in support of the extension pointed to initiatives launched under León’s leadership, including his 10-year plan meant to improve the district by 2030, increased graduation rates, and his commitment to Newark schools after working in the district as a teacher and principal.

But critics said more work needs to be done to improve student reading and address bullying and harassment against students.

This isn’t the first time community members have called on the district to address school issues or provide more transparency into their decision making.

León’s salary this school year is $319,785 according to the district budget.

Victoria Grant, a senior at North Star Academy, a charter school, spoke last and was the only student who spoke during Thursday’s public hearing. Instead of opposing or supporting the extension, she encouraged León to “soak in” the concerns raised.

“What is the school board or superintendent doing to address students’ concerns individually?” Grant added.

Jessie Gómez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.

Newark quietly schedules Sept. 25 public hearing, vote to extend superintendent’s contract

2025-08-27T19:02:38+00:00

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The Newark Board of Education has quietly scheduled a public hearing and vote to extend Superintendent Roger León’s contract to 2030, according to a public notice posted online over the weekend.

The public hearing, meant to give the community a chance to weigh in on the proposal to extend León’s contract, is set for 5:30 p.m. on Sept. 25 at Ann Street School, just half an hour before the scheduled board meeting that day. As of Wednesday, the public hearing had not been listed on the district calendar on the board’s website.

At the board’s August meeting, community members called for more transparency and public input after news about the board’s plan to extend León’s contract was first reported by NJ.com and Chalkbeat.

State law requires school boards to provide the public with at least 30 days notice before voting on a superintendent’s contract, in addition to a public hearing before the vote, with at least 10 days notice of the hearing.

Essex County Superintendent Joseph Zarra first approved the district’s request to extend León’s contract to 2030 in July, according to letters obtained by Chalkbeat. Zarra also authorized an additional three months at the end of León’s proposed term, pushing the extended end date to Sept. 30, 2030.

The proposal requires board approval, and if passed, it would make León one of the state’s longest-serving superintendents.

This isn’t the first time community members have called for more involvement in the process to renew León’s contract since he was hired in 2018 under a three-year contract. In 2019, the first year of his contract, the school board, at a “sparsely attended” public hearing, voted to add another two years to that contract, extending it to 2023. There was also no notice of a public hearing ahead of that decision on the district website.

León’s current contract took effect on July 1, 2023, after public scrutiny over reports in 2023 that his contract was automatically renewed the year before. It is set to end on June 30, 2028, according to a copy of his 2018 contract that allowed for an automatic, five-year renewal at the end of it.

León’s appointment in 2018 made him the first Latino to lead the district and the first superintendent since the city regained control of its schools. After his appointment, León and his team created a 10-year plan for the district known as “The Next Decade,” which will be in its fifth year this upcoming school year. The plan spans from 2020 to 2030 and is Leòn’s vision to improve district schools following 25 years of state control.

During the 2024-25 school year, León’s base salary was $308,971, according to the district’s budget that year.

Jessie Gómez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.

Newark residents call for more transparency in superintendent contract discussions

2025-08-23T00:19:07+00:00

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More transparency and community input.

That’s what Newark residents demanded from the Board of Education at a meeting Thursday as the board has quietly pursued a new five-year contract for Superintendent Roger León.

The drastic move by the board could set him up to be among the longest-serving superintendents in the state.

León’s current five-year contract has three years remaining, but last month, Board Attorney Brenda Liss requested the Essex County superintendent of schools, a proxy for the New Jersey Department of Education, approve a proposed new contract for him that would run from July 1 to June 30, 2030.

The request and subsequent approval from County Superintendent Joseph Zarra were obtained by Chalkbeat through a public records request.

Zarra’s approval notes an additional three months to the proposed contract with an expiration of Sept. 30, 2030. Further details of the proposed five-year contract could not be made available as it is a draft document, which is exempt from public records requests, per state law.

The proposed new contract for the superintendent has not been publicly announced or discussed by the Newark school board.

State law requires school boards to give the public at least 30 days notice prior to voting on a superintendent’s contract, in addition to a public hearing before the vote, with at least 10 days notice of the hearing.

Though Liss’ correspondence with Zarra stated the board would consider León’s contract at its meeting on Thursday, the contract was not listed on the agenda for that meeting nor was it publicly discussed by the board.

Several community members, including former district students, urged the board to gather public input before taking further steps on the contract for León, who has been at the helm for seven years.

“While the decision has not yet been made, it is crucial that this process remains fully transparent and that the community has a genuine opportunity to engage before action is taken,” said Yasmina Ouedraogo, a Newark Public Schools graduate, during the public comment portion of the meeting. “Extending the superintendent’s contract right now is not necessary.”

Word of the board’s steps to start the process of extending León’s tenure to 2030 came earlier this month through news reports by NJ.com and Chalkbeat.

Before it could vote on a new budget for the superintendent, the board would need approval from the county superintendent, according to state code, which it obtained through the correspondence between Liss and Zarra in July.

“For a school district that manages a budget larger than our city’s, we need transparency about spending,” said Mark Pinkney, a Newark Public School alum and city resident, who also spoke during public comment. “We don’t yet know if district improvements are happening. We deserve a transparent community-driven process.”

The City of Newark’s budget last year was about $968 million, about $600 million less than the school district’s $1.57 billion budget for the upcoming year. About $1.3 billion of the district’s budget comes from state aid.

Decisions to extend León’s contract since he was hired for the position in 2018 — when the district began its transition to local control after 25 years under a state monitor — have consistently been made with little to no public input.

In 2019, a year into his initial three-year contract, the school board voted to tack on another two years to that contract, extending it to 2025. There was no notice of a public hearing ahead of that decision on the district calendar of the board’s website and the meeting was sparsely attended, though a district official at the time said they had alerted the public using other methods.

A few years later, León’s contract was automatically renewed without any public discussion or notification due to a renewal clause in his contract. That clause allowed for an automatic five-year renewal in May 2022, more than a year in advance of when the contract was set to expire on June 30, 2023. Board members would have had to alert León by May 15, 2022, per the clause, if they planned not to renew the contract.

After news surfaced in January 2023 of the quiet renewal that had taken place months earlier, school community members expressed disappointment in the board and urged for more transparency.

“Each time, the community was left in the dark,” Ouedraogo said during her three-minute public comment on Thursday.

“What’s happening right now in Newark mirrors troubling patterns we’ve seen on the national stage, where leaders like President Donald Trump and his administration have been accused of bending rules and undermining public trust to maintain power,” Ouedraogo added. “In both cases, the people’s voice is pushed aside for political maneuvering.”

Board members with conflicts of interest stayed out of executive discussion

At Thursday’s meeting, the board went into an executive session for about 40 minutes to discuss matters that fall under attorney-client privilege, they said.

Board members Kanileah Anderson and Louis Maisonave Jr. stayed out of the executive session. The two are among three board members who have relatives working for the school district, connections that are a conflict of interest that could prevent them from weighing in on the superintendent’s contract.

Board President Hasani Council, who also has relatives working for the district, was absent from Thursday’s meeting.

León’s last eight years at the helm of New Jersey’s largest school district has been entangled in controversies — allegations of anti-Black racism and religious bias at the Newark School of Global Studies; worksite issues and construction delays at a new trade high school; and alarmingly low literacy rates that put the district under state review for two years.

The district was also ordered last year to return almost $34,000 to the state for misusing public funds for a “Staff Fun Day.” The event cost the district about $44,000 and spurred an investigation by the state Education Department. The department found that taxpayer money was inappropriately spent for the outdoor party, which included a DJ and four inflatable carnival booths.

Citing that misuse of funds and spending for travel to conferences, some Republican lawmakers have called to put the district under a fiscal monitor.

Dante Howell, a Newark resident who also spoke at the meeting on Thursday, said that he wants the board to ensure that “visions are aligned” for the “good of the community” before a decision is made to extend León’s tenure.

“Before approving contract extensions, I encourage the board to hold community meetings at schools and gather input from staff and parents,” said Carlos Merino, a community member who also spoke during public comment. “Leadership decisions should be based on measurable results, not just presentations.”

Catherine Carrera is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Newark. Contact Catherine at ccarrera@chalkbeat.org.

Newark Board of Education will consider extending Superintendent Roger León’s contract this month

2025-08-07T00:03:41+00:00

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Newark Superintendent Roger León’s contract would be extended to 2030 under a proposal approved by Essex County Superintendent Joseph Zarra, according to letters obtained by Chalkbeat.

The proposal, outlined in the district’s letter requesting Zarra’s approval obtained by Chalkbeat, will be considered by the Newark Board of Education at its Aug. 21 meeting. If approved, it would put León at the helm of New Jersey’s largest school district for 12 years, making him one of the longest-serving superintendents in the state.

State law requires school boards to hold a public hearing before voting to extend a superintendent’s contract and provide at least 10 days notice before holding the hearing.

León’s current contract took effect on July 1, 2023, after public scrutiny over reports that his contract was automatically renewed the year before. It is set to end on June 30, 2028, according to a copy of his 2018 contract that allowed for an automatic, five-year renewal at the end of it.

Zarra approved the extension and authorized an additional three months at the end of León’s term, pushing the end date to Sept. 30, 2030, according to a copy of Zarra’s July 21 response to the district’s attorney, Brenda Liss. Any changes to the terms of León’s contract must be reviewed and approved by the county before the required public notice and hearing of such changes, according to Zarra’s letter.

During the 2024-25 school year, León’s base salary was $308,971, according to the district’s budget that year.

The Newark school board has not yet posted the agenda for its Aug. 21 meeting, the first of the school year after a virtual retreat on Aug. 16. The district also has not publicly announced its plans to consider extending León’s contract.

León was appointed as Newark’s schools chief in 2018 –– making him the first since the city regained control of its schools and the first Latino to lead the district. At that time, he was hired for a three-year term that extended to June 30, 2021, according to board documents

Newark Public Schools Communications Director Paul Brubaker and school board President Hasani Council did not confirm on Wednesday whether the board plans to discuss León’s contract extension at its Aug. 21 meeting. The district also denied Chalkbeat’s public records request for León’s annual evaluations between 2018 and 2025, citing records laws that protect personnel documents.

So far, the proposal has elicited mixed reviews from community members.

Newark Teachers Union President John Abeigon praised the proposed extension during a call with Chalkbeat on Wednesday, saying that “longevity has its place” and comparing it to how a teacher’s skills improve with experience over time.

“We like longevity in the education field. And I think that the same thing applies for superintendents,” Abeigon said. “Communities have to give a superintendent an opportunity to be successful. Some of them are going to be greeted amicably by the community. Some will not, but the proof is going to be in the pudding.”

Fatoumata Bah, a rising senior at Science Park High School, said the decision to extend a school superintendent’s contract should be driven by public input.

A big decision like that should “not just be made behind closed doors,” especially when families and students have been critical of the leadership, said Bah to Chalkbeat on Wednesday.

A Newark Public Schools student since seventh grade, Bah said she would like to see better communication between the superintendent, schools, and students, a responsibility that she feels should be spearheaded by León. The rising senior said providing more mental health resources for students is important to her, and although the district has created initiatives such as this year’s mental health summit at Montclair State University, Bah doesn’t always receive the information.

“I didn’t even know about the [mental health summit] that they had, but upon further research, I found out about it. So I think that says a lot about … the communication with the students … that they serve,” Bah added.

Extension could make León one of NJ’s longest-serving superintendents

This is not the first time the district has sought to extend León’s contract. In 2023, school leaders were criticized after reports that León’s contract had been automatically renewed in May 2022 due to a clause in his contract that extended his term by five years. The clause said that board members needed to alert León by May 15, 2022, if his term, set to expire on June 30, 2023 at the time, would not be extended the following year.

That move prompted dozens of Newark parents, teachers, students, and advocates to attend a board meeting in January 2023, where they raised issues affecting public school students at the time. Current and former students at Newark’s School of Global Studies brought up concerns over allegations of racist harassment at the school that former students said were unaddressed, high school teachers shared their worries over the lack of bilingual teachers supporting English language learners, and advocates criticized the board’s handling of the superintendent’s contract renewal.

Under state law, boards of education are not required to provide public notice or hearings for new contracts, including contracts that replace expired contracts for tenured and non-tenured employees. But according to that same law, a 10-day public notice on a hearing is required for extensions, amendments, or other alterations to the terms of existing contracts, along with a 30-day notice prior to a school board’s action to alter a contract.

Lisa Gray, a former social worker in the district’s Office of Early Childhood, called the proposal to extend León’s contract a “nightmare.” Gray, who left the district last fall after more than a decade because of issues with her supervisors in the workplace, said she is concerned about test scores, diversity in schools, and teacher retention under León’s tenure.

“Another thing that I was disappointed about with was [León’s] 10-year plan, because people are saying ‘oh he wants to stay on to finish his 10-year plan’ but I’m concerned that there is no plan to desegregate the schools,” Gray told Chalkbeat on Wednesday. “It’s time for us to thank Roger León for his service and move on to another administrator.”

León’s 10-year plan, known as “The Next Decade,” is in its fifth year this upcoming school year. It spans from 2020 to 2030 and is Leòn’s vision to improve district schools following 25 years of state control.

The Newark school board will consider extending Superintendent Roger León's contract to 2030 at its Aug. 21 meeting.

If the board approves León’s contract extension, his tenure would rival other long-serving superintendents in the state.

Mark Toback was the superintendent of Wayne Township Schools for 11 years from 2014 to roughly 2025. Charles T. Epps Jr. led Jersey City Public Schools for 11 years, from 2000 to 2011. But it’s Murray A. Chittick, former superintendent of East Brunswick Schools, who may hold the longest tenure in New Jersey, serving for 28 years between 1929 and 1957.

The Newark school board will meet twice this month, first virtually on Aug. 16 at 6 p.m. for its retreat meeting and then again on Aug. 21 at 6 p.m. at 765 Broad Street for its first regular school board meeting of the year.

Jessie Gómez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.

Newark residents outraged over removal of teen novel as board changes policy for controversial books

2024-01-29T23:52:33+00:00

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Leer en español.

Newark school officials’ removal of a teen book about a 12-year-old Palestinian boy from its curriculum spurred a public outcry at a recent school board meeting. Moments later, the board axed the superintendent’s power to make decisions on controversial reading materials.

A school board spokeswoman says the policy change is unrelated to the book removal, which drew dozens of community members to a board meeting last week. Educators and parents, outraged over the district pulling the book from the sixth grade curriculum, said the decision evokes book bans, which have been on the rise in recent years amid culture wars and campaigns for censorship over social justice issues.

After an hour and a half of public comments that at times became fiery, the nine-member Newark school board, which had just appointed two new members, voted to update its policy on books and other classroom materials that receive complaints from the public.

The policy originally assigned the superintendent to make final decisions on what happens to those materials that are challenged, but, with the amendment, that power transferred to the school board. Deering said the amendment came as a recommendation from the state School Boards Association.

Though the board says it’s unrelated, the policy change occurred as controversy brews over the fictional book, “A Little Piece of Ground” by Elizabeth Laird, and how or why it was removed from the curriculum.

The book, about a 12-year-old Palestinian boy navigating his life in the Palestinian city of Ramallah, with war and conflict at the center of his struggles, was in sixth grade classrooms across the district beginning the fall of 2022, district spokeswoman Nancy Deering confirmed in an email.

In the summer of 2023, district school officials removed the novel, which was first published in 2003.

Educators and parents who spoke at the Jan. 25 meeting questioned why the book was removed from the sixth grade curriculum. They talked about its importance and relevance for students trying to understand the Israel-Hamas war and the violence in Israel and the Gaza Strip, even though the removal occurred before the war began on Oct. 7.

They also questioned whether the district had been influenced by outside organizations to remove the book. A recent announcement from the Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest NJ, a nonprofit organization and the local arm of a larger national group, spurred community members to go to Thursday’s meeting and demand answers from the board.

The Jewish nonprofit says it lobbied Newark Public Schools officials, including board members, and city and state officials, for a year to get the book off Newark’s classroom shelves.

“It is a rare event for us to weigh in on curriculum issues, much less try to get a book removed from classroom study,” said Dov Ben-Shimon, the organization’s CEO, in a statement last month. “But the stakes were too high for us to ignore this one.”

Ben-Shimon also said in that statement that his team tried to meet with “educators and civic leaders” but “were often met with closed doors, unreturned phone calls and outright hostility.” But, he added, “lay leaders and major donors who had deep connections within the City of Newark” supported their efforts “ultimately leading to a successful outcome.”

Still, Superintendent Roger León said, the district did not “ban” the book, but rather it was removed as part of a curriculum update.

“No student or staff member has been forbidden from reading any material or any literature,” León said.

Some school board members said they were concerned that the book was removed from the curriculum without their knowledge and disappointed that they were not consulted before the decision was made.

“It is a disservice to our community. It is a disservice to the Muslim community. It is a disservice to the sixth grade parents. And it is a disservice to anybody who had to take their time with 53 speakers to come and talk about a book ban that we did not authorize,” Board Co-Vice President Dawn Haynes said at the meeting, which was held at Newark Vocational High School.

Haynes said the decision to remove the book was not reflected in meeting minutes over the last year for the program and instruction committee, which oversees curriculum decisions in the district.

Newark Mayor Ras Baraka’s press secretary Susan Garofalo said the Baraka administration is “unaware of any meetings” held with the Jewish Federation and city officials about the removal of the book.

“Mayor Baraka has not read the book in question to determine the veracity of claims that it is anti-Semitic,” Garofalo said. “However, as a general principle, the mayor’s stance is against banning books.”

The Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest NJ declined to comment.

Threat of book bans spark policy changes

In the fall, the Essex County school board association passed legislation on county book bans called the Protect the Freedom to Read act. The resolution addresses the book bans popping up around the county at local school boards and aims to protect academic freedom, the board said.

Last month, the Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest NJ issued a statement that outlined its efforts to ban “A Little Piece of Ground” in the Newark Public Schools and its recent success in that effort.

“After over a year of intense lobbying efforts on the part of our Jewish Community Relations Council, I’m pleased to let you know that a deeply troubling and prejudicial book which had been assigned to sixth graders in the Newark Public School system for the last year, has just been pulled from 200 classrooms across the city,” said the organization’s CEO Ben-Shimon, in a blog post on its website on Dec. 29.

That blog post, shared widely on Facebook and first reported by The Star-Ledger, drew dozens of parents and educators to Thursday’s board meeting.

“While I understand that reading lists change over time based on the decisions made by trained educators, I see the removal of ‘A Little Piece of Ground’ as being a clear example of a book ban,” said Karl Schwartz, a longtime Newark resident who spoke at the meeting.

Schwartz quoted from Ben-Shimon’s statement and said it’s worrisome that any organization would influence the district to remove the book.

“It’s very concerning when a private group is able to do something like that and have outside influence on the curriculum,” he said.

Whitney Strub, a longtime Newark resident and professor of history at Rutgers University-Newark, said he too is opposed to the book’s removal.

“It’s extremely upsetting and disturbing to see my own hometown of Newark walk right into an incredibly avoidable error of an egregious case of censorship,” said Strub, who added that he focuses on censorship in his academic writing. He and others who spoke against the removal of the book said the novel is not anti-Semitic.

Sarah Alaeddin, a Palestinian American and member of the Newark Teachers Project program at Montclair State University, said she had to recently explain to her students that book bans can happen anywhere. “Even here in Newark, a city that is so progressive and deeply, richly diverse,” she added.

Haynes addressed the public at the meeting, defended the school board, and said it was not aware of the decision to remove the book.

“None of the members had anything to do with a book banning here in the city of Newark,” she said. “We do not agree with book banning at all, specifically one that talks about a community of oppressed people.”

Book bans have been a contentious issue in recent years across the country and state. Last week, New Jersey state lawmakers introduced the Freedom to Read Act to set guidelines for evaluating book removals from libraries across the state.

The Newark school board’s amended policy, titled “Complaints Regarding Instructional Materials’' and adopted in 2019, had a first reading on Tuesday at the board business meeting. A key change to the policy states that the final decision on “controversial reading matters” will rest with the Board of Education, whereas the original policy stated it would rest with the superintendent.

Another change in the policy stipulates that the superintendent should develop procedures for requests, suggestions, or complaints about instructional materials. The original policy did not include the need to develop a procedure for such requests.

Catherine Carrera is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Newark. Reach Catherine at ccarrera@chalkbeat.org.

Judge to review Global Studies report as part of Newark Teachers Union’s open records lawsuit

2024-01-24T22:25:25+00:00

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Newark Public Schools officials have two weeks to provide a state Superior Court judge with a copy of the report on the cultural dynamics at the Newark School of Global Studies to determine whether it can be released publicly.

The scathing report, which the district has not made public, was commissioned after incidents of racial harassment against Black students and staff at the high school surfaced more than a year ago. The Newark Teachers Union sued the district in November for access to the report after its public-records request was denied.

Judge Mayra Tarantino on Tuesday ordered the district to submit the document by Feb. 6 for the court’s private review. The judge also called for both sides to submit arguments on whether the report should be public record and whether any materials held by Creed Strategies, the consulting firm that compiled the report, are also subject to the Open Public Records Act.

Raymond Baldino, an associate at the Zazzali law firm representing the teachers union said the union requested the court’s private review of the document “rather than accept the district’s claim at face value that the report cannot be made public.”

The next hearing for this case hasn’t been scheduled, Baldino said. The district could appeal the judge’s order, he said, but attorneys have not had any discussions about that or a settlement.

Nancy Deering, the district’s spokesperson, and Craig Novak of the Taylor Law Group, who represents the district on the case, did not respond to requests for comment on Wednesday afternoon.

In documents submitted to the court in December, Superintendent Roger León argued that releasing the report would have a “chilling effect” on discussions about racial dialogue and sensitivity practices at Newark School of Global Studies and districtwide.

The new court order comes amid persistent tensions between the community and the district over the lack of solutions and transparency on the issue after incidents of harassment against Black students and staff at the high school first surfaced in late 2022. The issues sparked heavy criticism from the community about the response from school and district leaders, who had known about the problems months before they became public.

The situation resulted in at least half a dozen Black students requesting transfers out of the high school and two Black teachers resigning. The former teachers have also filed legal claims with state and federal offices, alleging they experienced harassment and racial hostility from students and supervisors.

In early 2023, the Newark school board commissioned a report on the cultural, religious, and racial dynamics at Global Studies High School. But later that year, León said the report would not be released publicly despite requests from members and community leaders. The district last fall shared only parts of the report that contained three recommendations for the district.

The union filed a public records request for access to the full report on Sept. 29, 2023, arguing that it has an interest in the release of the report and in knowing of any changes or recommendations to the district’s approach to handling student and staff issues related to “anti-Blackness” or “cultural sensitivity,” ultimately affecting teachers in the district.

The district denied the request, citing a legal exemption that allows some draft documents or advisory documents to be withheld from the public. Other parties, including Chalkbeat Newark, have also requested access to the report.

The recommendations released in the fall called on the district to assess the effects of “anti-Blackness” on the school system, foster conversations about racial issues, build school staff capacity to identify cultural gaps, and create an environment that is racially conscious and inclusive.

The recommendations came as the high school’s vice principal, Hoda Abdelwahab, left the district. She was among those called out by community leaders during board meetings and in legal claims filed by former teachers at the high school for handling the issues poorly.

Jessie Gomez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.

Newark schools chief retracts promise to give teachers two days off, says learning loss too great

2023-05-12T19:10:01+00:00

Newark Superintendent Roger León backpedaled on a promise and rejected the teachers union request to extend the upcoming Memorial Day break by using two extra in-session days that were built into the 2022-23 academic calendar.

School board members, a community member, and Newark Teachers Union President John Abeigon pressed the chief of schools at a board meeting Thursday to follow through on his promise to end the year early if no days are used for emergency closings due to inclement weather.

Abeigon and the others suggested an extended break before or after Memorial Day would suffice if it’s too late in the year to move up the last day of school by two days.

But León didn’t budge.

“The answer to extending it would be no,” he said, pointing to concerns about students’ low performance in reading and math standardized tests and a rise in chronic absenteeism.

He also said that state standardized testing will be ongoing through the end of the month, which would make it “humanly not possible at this time” to take days off before or after Memorial Day on May 29.

The math, reading, and science standardized tests are scheduled for May 1 through May 26, the Friday before Memorial Day, according to the state testing schedule. Makeup dates are scheduled for May 30 to June 2.

Even so, numerous school districts statewide have opted to extend the holiday weekend with unused snow days, including West Orange, Bloomfield, and others in Essex County.

Though New Jersey schools are required to be in session for 180 days to receive state aid, many districts tack on additional days in the annual academic calendar to allow for sudden closures due to inclement weather or other emergencies.

When the additional days aren’t used, many districts will extend holiday weekends, spring breaks, or allow for an early end to the school year.

The Newark Public Schools 2022-23 school calendar has 182 days, two days more than the minimum 180 requirement. The Newark Teachers Union contract also stipulates a maximum of 182 instructional days, though there can be less than that total. With very light snow this past winter — the state saw record-low snow totals — the district didn’t use the extra two days for emergency closures.

‘Accountability is important’

State code permits school boards to determine the dates schools are open in their districts.

Abeigon asked the school board members at the meeting to make a motion to amend the current school calendar to include two extra days off.

No board members took him up on his suggestion, but two pressured León to explain why he backtracked on his word.

At Newark’s annual convocation on Aug. 30, just before the start of the school year, León told district employees that as a show of appreciation for their work, he would end the school year on June 21 instead of June 23 if the extra two days are not used.

“You know how I said you were valued. You saw how I said we were appreciating you. And you saw that we’re doing it not only with our word but through actions, right?” León said at the convocation, according to a video recording that the union posted on its YouTube channel. “If in fact we do not have any weather inclement reasons to close schools, we will actually close school at the 180th day — June 21.”

But as the school year went on, grim test results showed students struggling in math and reading and the chronic absenteeism rate going up.

“If, in fact, the realities today were any different, we would be making obviously different recommendations,” León said on Thursday. “That is not the recommendation that we are moving forward right now.”

In an email to union members on Tuesday, León also said that “maximizing instructional time for all of our students must be our highest priority” and that deducting two days from the academic calendar would “detract” from that priority.

Though learning loss is evident, it’s hard to see how it would be exacerbated by an additional two days off, said Allison James-Frison, the newly elected board member who was sworn in at the board meeting Thursday.

“And accountability is important,” James-Frison said. “The superintendent stated that he would do it and I think he should be held accountable to what he stated months ago.”

Board member Crystal Williams said she agreed with James-Frison and suggested giving staff and students half days if two full days off is not feasible.

“You can’t tell someone you’re going to do something for them and then don’t follow through,” said Denise Cole, a longtime resident and education advocate, during the public comment portion of the meeting. “That’s not leadership.”

Abeigon said the district’s decision to not go through with the extra two days off could have other ramifications.

“This doesn’t help the teacher retention problem one bit because it will discourage teachers from coming to the district and, in some cases, it will be the last straw for some of our teachers who feel they can’t work in a district where they can’t trust the superintendent,” Abeigon said.

Union leaders raised the issue with district officials at three separate meetings since March, said Michael Maillaro, the union’s spokesman.

The Newark Teachers Union also has support from the state chapter of its union to push for the two days off.

“As a way to show appreciation for the jobs they did all year, it would certainly mean a lot to them if the district recognized their efforts by keeping their promise and not have them go to school for the two snow days they didn’t use,” said Donna M. Chiera, the president of AFT-NJ, in an email. “Those two days at the end of June will not have a significant or any impact on student achievement.”

Catherine Carrera is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Newark, covering the city’s K-12 schools with a focus on English language learners. Contact Catherine at ccarrera@chalkbeat.org.

Newark school board blocks attempt to stop superintendent’s contract renewal

2023-01-27T04:23:05+00:00

A Newark school board member’s attempt to stop Superintendent Roger León’s contract renewal and to allow public input went nowhere Thursday, following continued questions about transparency of the process.

Board member Crystal Williams, who was elected last year, introduced a motion to issue a letter of nonrenewal to León before Jan. 31 “in order to reassess his contract” and “give the public the opportunity to voice their concerns.” But the motion died for lack of a second by any of the other eight members of the Newark Board of Education.

Williams’ motion was the first challenge by a board member since last week’s revelation that León’s contract was quietly renewed in May 2022. Once that renewal takes effect on July 1, 2023, León’s term will extend to June 30, 2028, according to his contract.

“The voice of the community is paramount,” said Williams as she introduced the motion. “Let’s take their concerns seriously and do this the right way; there’s no reason to go around it.”

Dozens of Newark parents, teachers, students, and advocates filled the room during Thursday’s board of education meeting and raised a range of issues affecting public school students. Current and former students at Newark’s School of Global Studies brought up concerns over patterns of racist harassment at the school, high school teachers shared their worries over the lack of bilingual teachers supporting English language learners, and advocates criticized the board’s handling of the superintendent’s contract renewal.

Newark school leaders have been under fire after reports that León’s contract was automatically renewed due to a clause in his previous contract that said board members needed to alert him by May 15, 2022, if his term wasn’t going to be extended the next year.

During the public comment portion of the meeting, Deborah Gregory Smith, president of the Newark chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, pointed to the community interest in holding the board accountable after it regained full control of the district from the state.

“Since the return to local control, those of us who fought to have it reinstated have not dropped the ball or stopped being involved,” Smith said. “You have not been listening to the community and as a result have not been transparent or accountable for your decision.”

Others like Newark resident Deanna Harrell said they felt compelled to attend Thursday’s meeting because of the concerns over León’s contract renewal.

“I’m not normally here at these meetings, but hearing about things like that made me want to be here at these meetings and I will be here going forward,” Harrell said.

Following Williams’ motion, board member Flohisha Johnson, who was part of the board that approved León’s initial contract in 2018, defended the contract renewal and process.

“I stand behind my superintendent because you know why? I elected him into this office and we appointed him as a board, as a whole, and we don’t have a problem with him,” said Johnson, who was first elected to the board in 2017.

She also read a state law that does not require boards of education to provide public notice or hearings for new contracts, including contracts that replace expired contracts for tenured and non-tenured employees. According to the law, a public notice and public hearing are required only for renegotiations, extensions, amendments, or other alterations to the terms of existing contracts.

John Paff, a longtime advocate for government transparency and a member of the New Jersey Foundation for Open Government, said the state law surrounding superintendent contracts should be amended to ensure the public is aware of contract renewals and decisions.

“This whole problem is nothing but lousy public policy. Nothing like this should be automatically renewed,” Paff said. “The average member of the public is not informed enough and shouldn’t be responsible to be involved enough to pay attention to statutes like this.”

New Jersey state leaders should review the mandates set by law to ensure the public’s protection, he said.

“The Legislature should repeal the statute and change it so that a public hearing provision is included prior to the end of a contract. That’s the only way the public could be protected,” Paff said.

The groundwork for the terms of the automatic renewal was set during a “sparsely attended” public hearing held before a regular school board meeting in 2019, as Chalkbeat Newark reported at the time. After the hearing — which was not advertised online ahead of time —the board extended León’s contract by two extra years and added the renewal clause.

León, a former principal and lifelong Newark resident, did not address the controversy at the meeting or at Saturday’s board retreat. Instead, he addressed questions about his contract during an interview on “Chat Box” that aired on YouTube and NJ PBS on Thursday.

“The fact that people didn’t know is really an important factor and just educating the community and having conversations with them is something that we obviously think is important … and will be doing as we get through the end of the term of this contract and as we begin the next one,” León said when asked about the public scrutiny the district is getting in light of the quiet renewal.

He was hired in 2018 for a three-year contract that extended to June 30, 2021, according to board documents.

“I was part of this board when we gained back local control,” Johnson said during Thursday’s meeting. “I was part of this board when we voted the superintendent in, who I think is doing an awesome job.”

Jessie Gómez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.

Newark school board president defends Superintendent Roger León’s contract renewal

2023-01-21T20:48:45+00:00

School board members for New Jersey’s largest school district defended the renewal of Superintendent Roger León’s contract, saying it was not hidden from the public.

During Saturday’s Newark Board of Education retreat meeting, Board President Dawn Haynes suggested that reports that León’s contract was automatically renewed in May and community questions about the process were a misunderstanding of actions taken at a public meeting in 2019.

“I just want to make it extremely clear that whatever miscommunication or talk that’s happening in the media, that is what was stated,” said Haynes about the contract approval process during the meeting. “That is what happened according to our timeline and what we know to be true.”

León, a former principal and lifelong Newark resident, did not address the controversy at the meeting. He was hired in 2018 under a three-year contract that originally ended on June 30, 2021, according to board documents. In 2019, Chalkbeat Newark reported that a “sparsely attended” public hearing – which was not advertised online ahead of time – was held before the regularly scheduled August school board business meeting to discuss León’s contract renewal.

During that meeting, board members unanimously approved an amendment that added two more years to León’s original five-year contract in order to “accomplish the goals” in Newark’s 2020-30 strategic plan. This action extended his contract through 2023.

Both the original contract and the extensions had renewal clauses for the superintendent’s employment, Haynes said. District spokeswoman Nancy Deering was quoted in the Star-Ledger saying that “the contract automatically renewed in May.” It remained unclear Saturday why the contract would have been renewed before the 2023 expiration.

León’s 2018 and 2019 employment contracts have not been made publicly available. Deering has not replied to multiple requests for comment and to see the contracts from Chalkbeat.

Haynes also addressed Leon’s salary increase, which was a result of cost of living adjustments, she said.

In 2019-20 and 2020-21, he was paid $260,000, according to state school salary data. After a cap on superintendent salaries was lifted in 2019, León’s salary went up as superintendents’ salaries did in most districts throughout the state. In 2021-22, León’s salary was $282,425 and in 2022-23, that went up to $290,050.

Meanwhile, board member A’Dorian Murray-Thomas introduced a resolution to secure a separate counsel for board members, which passed with four yes votes and five abstentions. Currently, the board shares counsel with the district.

More than a dozen community members showed up to Saturday’s board meeting, but after the meeting stretched for several hours plus a lengthy recess, some residents opted to leave before the public comment portion. Several stayed to question León’s contract renewal process and pressed board members about the district’s transparency.

“What it looks like is our community is being kept in the dark. What it feels like is that I am not being trusted as a community member in doing my part in supporting you. And what it sounds like is unethical practices,” said Shennell McCloud, chief executive officer of Project Ready.

Some members of the community were upset that they didn’t know about the public hearing on León’s contract in 2019.

“I do not recall any public participation about your contract. But we need to know how it was an automatic renewal. I don’t know how that happened,” said Dr. Viva White, a Newark parent.

Others wondered why the superintendent’s May renewal wasn’t presented to the public.

“The superintendent’s contract may have automatically renewed but you all still have to write a contract. You still have to present that contract before us to comment. I comment now,” said Denise Cole, a longtime education advocate.

While León did not address his contract renewal, he gave an hour-long presentation on the district’s accomplishments, projects and department reinstatements since he took the job in 2018.

The Newark Board of Education will meet on Jan. 26 at 6 p.m. for its regularly scheduled school board meeting.

Jessie Gomez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org

Newark parents, advocates demand answers on superintendent’s contract renewal

2023-01-20T01:31:18+00:00

Newark education advocates plan on showing up to Saturday’s school board retreat to question why Superintendent Roger León’s contract was reportedly renewed in secret last May.

The Newark school board renewed León’s contract for five years at an annual salary of about $290,000, according to The Star-Ledger Editorial Board, which first reported the news in an opinion piece published Thursday on NJ.com.

District spokeswoman Nancy Deering was quoted in the article saying that “the contract automatically renewed in May.” She also added that the district doesn’t normally comment on staff performance but that Leon received “a positive evaluation of his performance.”

An email, phone call, and text to Deering inquiring about contract details were not immediately returned.

A Chalkbeat review of school board documents from four meetings that took place in May did not find any approvals by the board that reflected the superintendent’s contract renewal, which signals that the contract was renewed without any public notification or hearing.

Whether public notice or a hearing was required remains a question. But extending León’s contract for five years without any discussion with the school community has raised questions about the Newark Board of Education’s promise to be transparent.

Residents, education advocates, union members, and parents were upset when reached Thursday to hear they weren’t informed by the nine-member elected school board about the quiet contract extension.

“I am upset at what took place,” said Denise Cole, a longtime education advocate. “I don’t like when my rights are violated.”

Even if state law and contract stipulations permitted the school board to renew León’s contract without any public announcement, the board still should have informed the community, Cole said. Not doing so, she added, took away her right to voice her concerns prior to the renewal.

“You’re not paying attention. You’re not listening. You’re not doing the job that you were elected to do for the community,” Cole said in a phone interview Thursday, directing her message to board members.

State code stipulates that when an initial contract term ends, “the superintendent shall be deemed reappointed for another contracted term” of the same length, unless the board reappoints a superintendent for a different term length or not at all.

While León initially had a three-year term, the board extended it for two more years in 2019. The renewed contract is for a five-year term.

Janet Bamford, the chief public affairs officer for the New Jersey School Boards Association, noted in an email that the state code does not mention a board vote or discussion on a contract renewal for superintendents.

“It is our understanding that the public notice and public hearing requirements … would be triggered when the board discusses and votes on changes/updates to the superintendent’s contract,” Bamford wrote.

Leon was hired in 2018 by the board when the district regained local control after 22 years under state control. As a former principal and lifelong resident of Newark, he had supporters throughout the city, including politically powerful elected officials such as Mayor Ras Baraka and Sen. M. Teresa Ruiz, the state Senate majority leader.

Calls and emails to the offices of Baraka and Ruiz were not returned.

Leon’s salary has gone up by about $30,000 over the last four years. In 2019-20 and 2020-21, he was paid $260,000, according to state school salary data. After a cap on superintendent salaries was lifted in 2019, the salary for the district leader shot up, as it did in most districts throughout the state. In 2021-22, León’s salary was $282,425, and in 2022-23, that went up to $290,050.

Parents and others in education said the renewed contract for the superintendent is consequential and worthy of public notice.

“It is their duty to preserve and protect the interests of the constituents who put them in office,” said Jasmine Morrison, a lifelong Newark resident and parent advocate. “Maybe you didn’t legally have to inform the families, but understanding where we have come from and just getting back local control, it would have been the right thing to do.”

Morrison said she plans on attending the school board retreat meeting, which is open to the public, from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. on Saturday on the sixth floor of the district’s central office at 765 Broad St. in Newark.

“I think it just shows a lack of respect for the residents in the city to renew a contract that is so significant and will have a lasting impact on the future of our city,” Morrison said.

Maggie Freeman, another parent and longtime resident of Newark who previously ran for school board, said she thinks it’s time for families to demand more transparency from the board.

“We may have to come together as far as advocates in the community and figure out the best way to approach this because it’s not right,” Freeman said.

“It’s despicable,” said John Abeigon, president of the Newark Teachers Union.

“They came in promising transparency and that it would no longer be business as usual. They made that commitment to taxpayers and stakeholders,” Abeigon said of the school board. “This is insulting.”

Catherine Carrera is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Newark, covering the city’s K-12 schools with a focus on English language learners. Contact Catherine at ccarrera@chalkbeat.org.

As Newark moves to virtual learning, special education is an especially ‘heavy lift’

2020-04-15T22:15:24+00:00

While the transition to remote learning has been a challenge for many families, it may be especially difficult for families of students with special needs in Newark, a district that has sometimes struggled to provide adequate services for them.

For the first time, most students are being educated online instead of in person due to school building closures tied to the coronavirus, and special education services are allowed to go virtual, too, under a new state rule. Remote coursework needs to be modified for students with disabilities, and special education meetings may need to be scheduled during a time of great upheaval. Some Newark parents feel they are being asked to meet their children’s educational needs in a way they haven’t before.

Diana Autin, executive co-director of the Statewide Parent Advocacy Network, acknowledged it’s a “heavy lift” for a district the size of Newark — where more than 6,000 students out of 36,000 require special education — to make this relatively rapid switch to virtual learning. But it’s a lift the district must make to comply with federal and state laws for the foreseeable future, as schools remain closed for several more weeks, if not months.

“It takes a while to get these things in place, especially when you have as many students as Newark does,” Autin said. “It’s different when you are trying to do virtual learning for students who are low income, don’t have access to the Internet, and don’t speak English. Challenges are greater for districts like Newark.”

🔗What the law requires

Even though students are now learning at home, students with special needs are still entitled to all of the services they would usually receive.

This week, state lawmakers passed a law requiring districts to provide special education students with the same virtual learning opportunities during a public health emergency as general education students “to the extent appropriate and practicable,” and the state board of education approved the delivery of services like speech and occupational therapy through video conferencing or phone calls two weeks ago. But some parents say their children are still not receiving them.

Federal law also requires individualized education program, or IEP, meetings for all students with disabilities that experience a change in placement. Since students have been learning at home for a month now, some haven’t received services for more than 10 days — a situation that constitutes a change in placement that requires an IEP meeting. Autin says some parents aren’t being offered the meetings and don’t realize that they’re still entitled to them, even while schools are operating virtually.

“You can’t change their placement without an IEP meeting,” she said. “The U.S. Department of Education made it clear a week ago that virtual IEP meetings should be held now, even if not in person.”

Special education lawyer John Rue said requirements for what schools should be providing to students with special needs have not changed, and the most important thing is that students should still be receiving services virtually.

“There’s no fundamental change to the law … but there will be some bumps in the road,” he said. “We’re in a public health crisis, and districts don’t have an endless supply of resources.”

Parents’ experience with IEPs seem to differ from school to school. Kanileah Anderson attended an IEP meeting for her daughter, who attends Central High School, by phone on March 30. Besides having to make time in her work day for it, she said everything proceeded normally.

But board of education member Shayvonne Anderson, whose son attends a charter school and has a mood disorder, said while she knows she’s still entitled to an IEP meeting, “it’s going to be a little more challenging right now,” so she’s planning to wait until schools are open again to request one.

🔗What remote learning looks like

At-home coursework and teacher interaction for special education students seems to also vary depending on where children go to school. Some parents report interacting with their child’s teacher everyday, while others say they feel they’ve been left to educate their child on their own.

District and charter schools in Newark largely relied on paper packets during the first few weeks of at-home learning, and teachers were instructed to make modifications to the packet work for students with disabilities.

While some parents did receive packets with changes made to accommodate their child’s disability, others did not. McKinley Elementary School parent Jainette Tubens said her son was given a “regular package, not one with what he knows.”

“I can’t really help,” she said. “I try, but it’s frustrating for him and myself.”

Now with work moving mostly online, parents are now figuring out what allowances will be made in remote coursework for students with disabilities.

Iris Pinkney’s youngest son, North Star Academy charter school 3rd grader Josiah Tomlin, is allowed extra time on his work because of his attention deficit hyperactivity disorder diagnosis. His school is using a combination of packet work and online learning — to complete the packet, he has to go online and watch lessons. Though his work is due on Thursday at noon each week, Pinkney said her son’s teachers allow him to turn in his work by Monday, and if he needs extra time, she said they accommodate him.

Nina Page has also had a positive experience with her son’s teacher. Page, whose son Kristopher has autism and is an 8th-grader at Ivy Hill, said Zainab McDowell, her son’s teacher, has reached out to her everyday, sending vocabulary words and math work.

McDowell said teachers at her school have been encouraged to check in regularly with their students’ families, but owes the easy communication between herself and her students’ parents to a “good rapport with them.”

Some parents don’t have that relationship, however: Newark Special Education Parent Advocacy Council leader Saafir Jenkins said parents who have reached out to him have mostly complained that their children’s teachers are not interacting with them or their students at all.

“That’s a problem,” he said. “It’s already traumatic enough of a situation. For students to not have any interaction whatsoever … it makes matters worse.”

At a webinar hosted two weeks ago by Newark’s Abbott Leadership Institute, Superintendent Roger León said increasing parent engagement during this time is a priority, and that the district is aware that students with special needs in particular continue to need counseling services and other equipment. He recommended parents speak to their child’s case manager and teacher about their concerns, so the district can continue “to meet all needs in that IEP.” (Newark school officials did not respond to requests for comment.)

🔗What challenges lie ahead

Certain disabilities are proving harder to serve remotely, like ADHD, or students who need to have occupational or physical therapy, which are harder to provide effectively over video conferencing. One way is to tell parents what exercises to complete with their children, but that puts more responsibility on parents who may be unprepared and also juggling their careers and health concerns.

“Parents are being expected to be instructors without getting support and information they need,” Autin said. “They’re kind of being told, ‘This is what your child needs to do,’ without getting a teacher to provide some virtual learning.”

Jenkins also said he’s spoken to parents whose children still don’t have the technology they need to complete school work. Newark schools distributed laptops to students a few weeks ago, but he said some parents are only now realizing their family’s need. Others are struggling to navigate the programs teachers are using.

“There’s little support by way of technology for parents that have not used Google Classroom before,” he said.

With no end in sight, there are still a number of challenges that must be addressed for distance learning for students with disabilities to be sustainable, though Autin said the situation in Newark requires a little more patience than others.

Shayvonne Anderson, the school board member, stressed that this is a time of learning for both parents and teachers, and that there’s frustration on both ends. She said that overall, it’s important to recognize that this is an unprecedented time that Newarkers are all working through together.

“The kinks are not worked out yet. This has never happened before,” she said. “I get it — everybody’s frustrated. So it’s all about working together instead of working against one another.”

Mayor Baraka: ‘More than likely’ schools will need to reschedule prom and graduation

2020-04-02T00:10:08+00:00

With school buildings shuttered indefinitely due to the coronavirus pandemic, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka is warning high schoolers that cherished senior-year traditions are likely to be disrupted.

In his daily coronavirus briefing Tuesday, Baraka said it was “more than likely” that senior prom and graduation ceremonies will not happen this spring as scheduled. However, he assured the class of 2020 that officials will come up with alternatives, which he said could include rescheduling the events, organizing virtual celebrations, or even hosting a citywide prom sometime later.

“If all the seniors missed out on graduation and prom this year, we’re going to promise that the city, Newark Public Schools, we’re going to get together and do something major, incredible, for all our seniors that are graduating,” Baraka said. “We’ll figure it out, but we’re not going to let you miss out on that day.”

The coronavirus is continuing to rip through New Jersey, with the state announcing Wednesday a total of more than 22,000 cases of the virus and 355 deaths. In order to reduce infections, Gov. Phil Murphy has ordered non-essential businesses and all schools to close and residents to stay home. Newark police this week began shutting down businesses and ticketing people who violated the lockdown order.

In an interview Wednesday, Baraka told Chalkbeat that the “worst-case scenario” is that residents may need to remain home and schools shuttered through June, which would likely force the cancellation of senior-year ceremonies.

“Graduation and prom are important, but they’re not more important than your health or the health of your family members,” the mayor said, before repeating his promise to help reschedule the events. “We’ll try to put something together, because they deserve it.”

School and district leaders are also planning for the possibility of disruptions. The principal of Bard High School Early College told 12th graders during a virtual meeting Wednesday that prom and graduation ceremonies could be rescheduled for August if necessary, a student said.

Last week, Superintendent Roger León said schools will share revised prom plans with students “if and when necessary.” But, in contrast to the mayor’s message that students should brace themselves for the likelihood that prom and graduation will be disrupted, León emphasized the possibility that they could still proceed as planned.

“Let’s keep our fingers crossed,” León said during an online school board meeting. “Hopefully this will all begin to move behind us and we can celebrate graduation ceremonies as we originally designed.”

León will hold a virtual meeting with 12th graders on Friday, where he could go into more detail about any contingency plans for senior-year events. Roughly 2,500 seniors attend district high schools.

The pandemic has scrambled students’ lives nationwide, separating them from friends and forcing them to learn from living rooms instead of classrooms. But 12th graders have been under added strain, agonizing over the potential loss of senior-year rites of passage that many have spent years awaiting.

In Newark, planning was well underway for the events, with some students already putting down deposits for class trips and graduation caps and gowns. Kutorkor Kotey, a 12th grader who is on Bard’s prom committee, said the school had booked a hotel for the occasion and she had lined up three potential dresses to wear, all matched to the prom’s color scheme of royal blue and gold.

“We were ready to go,” she said. “A month ago, we never thought we might not have a prom.”

Even more dismaying is the potential loss of a graduation ceremony where students walk across a stage and have their hard work recognized by teachers and family members, Kotey said.

“That’s something we’ve been prepping for, what we aspire to have,” she said. “And then all of a sudden this thing just came out of nowhere and that’s just been taken away from us.”

Kotey said students were open to the suggestion by Bard’s principal Wednesday that prom and graduation might need to be moved to August.

“She explained that in these circumstances the best thing would be to reschedule, and we understood that,” Kotey said. “At least we’ll still have a celebration.”

A Newark Public Schools spokeswoman did not answer questions Wednesday about the district’s plans if prom and graduation cannot occur this spring. She said she could not confirm that rescheduling the events for August is one option under consideration.

“Parents and students will be notified of any changes to the school calendar,” said spokeswoman Nancy Deering.

One person who will be watching closely for any changes to the calendar is Flohisha Johnson, a Newark school board member whose son is a senior at Bard. At last week’s school board meeting, she echoed the mayor and superintendent, promising to do whatever she can to make sure the class of 2020’s accomplishments are still celebrated one way or another.

“We are going to make sure that you guys get all that you deserve,” she said.

Amid coronavirus crisis, Newark school board votes to suspend policies, empower superintendent

2020-03-27T20:33:15+00:00

In an extraordinary move responding to the raging coronavirus pandemic, the Newark school board will suspend certain policies and grant sweeping authority to the superintendent.

The elected board voted unanimously Thursday to temporarily waive any “bylaws, policies, and procedures” as needed so the board can continue conducting business during the public health crisis, which has led to a statewide school shutdown in New Jersey that Gov. Phil Murphy said could last “weeks to months.”

The board also authorized Superintendent Roger León to take “any and all action necessary and appropriate” to continue operating the district during the crisis, according to the motion the board approved Thursday, which states that León’s actions are still subject to board approval.

“We do not know when this is going to be over,” said board President Josephine Garcia at Thursday’s online board meeting, where she proposed the measure. “What we can forecast is that it’s not going to be over anytime soon, so we need to allow the superintendent to run the district to his best ability.”

New Jersey now has the second highest number of confirmed cases of COVID-19, with more than 8,800 confirmed coronavirus infections and 108 deaths as of Friday. In Newark, which had 155 confirmed cases on Thursday, the district shuttered school buildings earlier this month and said they will remain off limits “until further notice.”

Some school boards across the country have recently granted emergency powers to superintendents so they can continue managing their districts during the crisis, which has forced students to learn from home and teachers to work remotely.

While Newark’s board empowered the superintendent to take any actions he considers necessary, some other boards appear to have handed over more limited authority, such as the ability to pay employees and purchase supplies without board approval. Other boards specified that the superintendent must notify members before taking action.

School boards should research relevant laws and think through the consequences before suspending their policies or granting extra powers to superintendents, said Francisco M. Negrón Jr., chief legal officer of the National School Boards Association. He noted that certain board policies and powers, such as those that involve purchasing or serving students with disabilities, stem from federal and state laws and cannot be waived or transferred.

“Some of those statutorily assigned rights really can’t be delegated,” he said.

If boards decide it is necessary to hand over some of their authority to superintendents in emergency situations, they should clearly explain why this is necessary and ask superintendents to report back whenever they use those special powers, Negrón added. Boards should also remember that they remain responsible for any actions taken in their name.

“The liability never shifts from a school board,” he said. “So while they may delegate powers and duties for operational efficiency, they don’t shift the legal liability.”

The emergency measure that Newark’s board approved was a motion that Garcia put forward, not a board resolution. Because it was not a resolution, it was not listed on the board’s public agenda and the text is not currently available for the public to read.

Before the board voted on the motion, member Reginald Bledsoe asked several pointed questions. He said he knew Garcia had good intentions in proposing the measure, but wanted to be sure it adheres to state law and board guidelines. He also asked whether the idea was to waive all board policies or just a few.

“Are there certain policies that we’re temporarily suspending,” he asked Garcia, “or we’re just throwing everything out the window?”

“We’re suspending all of them,” Garcia responded, saying that one reason is to allow the board to continue meeting virtually, rather than in person, to prevent the spread of the virus.

It is not clear why the board needed to suspend its policies to allow for virtual meetings. The state legislature passed a bill last week, and the state government issued guidance, allowing public bodies to hold meetings online or by phone during emergencies.

Garcia did not respond to questions Friday.

Board member Tave Padilla told Chalkbeat the motion is meant to allow León to do whatever is necessary to meet students’ needs during the crisis.

“This is a worldwide pandemic,” he said. “I don’t think we should tie anybody’s hands right now to move the district forward.”

School officials say Newark will move to mostly virtual learning by April 6

2020-03-27T20:31:51+00:00

Newark is planning to vastly expand online learning in a few weeks, school officials said Thursday during their first public comments on the widening coronavirus crisis at Thursday’s virtual board meeting.

When students were first sent home two weeks ago, the district distributed paper packets of classwork to accommodate students with limited technology at home. But teachers have increasingly posted assignments and lessons online, using applications like Google Classroom.

Now Superintendent Roger León says all coursework will be online by April 6, beginning the next phase of home learning, though a district spokesperson said paper packets will continue to be available for students who need them. But some unanswered questions remain, including how many devices have been handed out and also how the district plans to handle high school graduation.

“On April 6, we will begin what I am calling ‘phase two’ of the learning at home plans, which will be all online,” León said during the meeting. “Schools are reaching out to identify families in need of free online access or technology, or both, and we’ll make sure everyone has what they need.”

After a recent district survey found that 7,000 Newark students lack internet-equipped devices, the district has been loaning laptops to families who need them and making sure they have internet access to facilitate the shift to mostly online learning, León said at the meeting.

Some school employees have even driven to students’ houses to distribute Chromebooks, the superintendent said. Though asked by board member A’Dorian Murray-Thomas for an exact count, León could not put a number on how many laptops had been given out.

“It varies by location. Each school is strategically addressing their needs,” he said. “The number is quite fluid.”

Board members and the superintendent also tried to reassure families and the public during the meeting that they’re taking steps to keep families safe and students learning during this time.

León and board member Flohisha Johnson recognized that this time might be especially difficult for high school seniors who could miss out on prom and graduation due to school closures.

“We’re going to push through and make sure you get all you deserve,” Johnson said. “You’re not going unnoticed.”

The superintendent said he hoped the district could “move beyond this and celebrate graduation as originally designed,” but didn’t definitively say whether the events would proceed as normal or be cancelled.

“Let’s keep our fingers crossed,” he said.

Director of Health Services Marguerite Leuze said her team has been communicating with the city health department on a daily basis, and the district has contacted families to provide guidance, including those with students with significant medical issues. School nurses are also helping test Newarkers for coronavirus. She said district employees are continuing to follow updates and guidelines from the state and city health departments as well as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

A district spokesperson told Chalkbeat that some individuals in Newark Public Schools have tested positive for coronavirus and the district has notified relevant parties. The district didn’t provide any more details.

Steve Morlino, executive director of facilities management, said schools are being deep-cleaned, and as the pandemic has escalated, employees have started using N-95 masks. Additionally, school meal sites are continuing to be cleaned.

“Everyone understands the gravity of the situation,” he said.

More than 44,000 meals have been distributed to students through the district’s meal sites since schools were closed, said Tonya McGill, executive director of food services. The sites will continue to serve breakfast and lunch from 9:30 until 11:30 a.m., and any changes will be posted on the district’s website.

District officials made it clear at Thursday’s meeting that the crisis is far from over and schools are closed “until further notice.” New Jersey’s positive coronavirus cases continue to skyrocket. Today, a surge of 1,982 new cases were announced, bringing the statewide total to 8,825. León stressed that students should follow state COVID-19 guidelines and stay at home.

“While we may not be able to predict the future well, we can plan to be able to address it in the best way possible,” León said. “That is what we have done and will continue to do.”

‘It becomes a battle’: Newark school officials struggle with how to involve more parents

2020-02-27T20:58:51+00:00

When Yolanda Johnson attended Camden Street Elementary, her grandmother, who raised her, helped lead the school’s parent organization. While keeping tabs on the school, her grandmother also kept an eye on Johnson’s performance in the classroom.

“If she wasn’t involved, I don’t know what I would’ve done,” she said.

Today, as the mother of a University High School student, Johnson believes so strongly in the benefits of her grandmother’s involvement that she champions for increased family engagement in education and is involved in University’s parent organization.

Research backs up the importance of parent groups. Students’ grades and graduation rates can increase when their families are more involved in their education.

But a Chalkbeat records request for all current, active parent organizations in the district shows that 14% of Newark schools don’t have official parent organizations as of November 2019. January school board minutes show the district is still trying to get a current count.

How to get parents more involved in educating their students and giving input into district policy has been a standing topic on the board’s agenda for months. A continuous thread in Superintendent Roger León’s strategic plan is to involve more parents and create parent organizations in every school. He also wants to establish a districtwide council of parents that pulls from those organizations.

However, some parents still don’t think the district is doing enough to involve parents, and they don’t understand how much input León wants them to have in decision-making.

“I know the district has pushed for more parent involvement … but it’s just not enough,” Johnson said. “It needs to be more aggressive.”

Work responsibilities, no access to transportation, and poor lines of communication between schools and parents can create barriers to parental involvement in schools.

Peshine Avenue School has a parent organization that could set an example for other schools. The group meets three times a month — once as a whole, once as an executive board, and once with the school administration.

This past November, the organization fed more than 50 people during its Thanksgiving Drive and gave Christmas toys to the school’s younger students in December.

“We stayed there from 7 a.m. in the morning until 7 p.m. that night wrapping gifts,” President Kimberly Charles said, noting that they have several more fundraisers and bake sales planned, as well as events during Teacher Appreciation Week in May. “We try to stay as involved as we can and make ourselves accessible.”

Charles thinks the district-wide parent council “would be great. The more parents we can get involved will not only make schools stronger, but the community stronger.”

“If we could interact with other schools and other parents, that would be really great. It takes a village to raise a child,” she said.

In its ongoing effort to increase parental involvement, the school board launched its parent engagement tour in October. It provides a casual setting for parents who might be intimidated by a formal meeting to address members of the school board. The meetings also allow the board to gauge the community’s opinion of a district-wide parent advisory council.

While board members are looking for more direct lines of communication with parents, parents are looking for the same thing at their children’s schools. Many parents find the structure and dues required in PTA and PTO organizations discourage them from being more involved.

Avon Avenue Elementary School doesn’t have a listed parent organization. Instead, former parent liaison Marcus Allen said the school has a parent ambassador program, which allows parents to work directly with schools to plan events, volunteer, or form committees to address student issues.

“The challenge is that in the past, historically, parents have gotten caught up in the elected [body] of the PTAs or PTOs, and it never really allows parents to come here and get the work done,” he said. “The parent ambassador initiative allows parents the opportunity to still be leaders.”

Some district parents say they are unaware of what’s going on at their child’s school and have complained of feeling unwelcome there, which discourages them from getting involved. Parents said cooperation with the school administration is integral to their involvement.

“As a parent, we know what we want in schools,” said Haneefah Webster, PTO president at George Washington Carver Elementary School. “You’re supposed to be helping us, but instead, it becomes a battle. You get tired.”

Johnnie Lattner co-founded Parents Unified for Local School Education, or PULSE, to train parents as advocates to effect change in schools and teach them about how much power they have, especially when they come together — something he thinks parents are often unaware of. (Lattner is a member of Chalkbeat’s reader advisory board.)

“Parents and students should drive the school. I think their voice is so important, particularly in Newark and diverse, urban areas,” he said. “The challenge is that we as a community have not taken the time to educate parents about just how powerful they are.”

He cited the recent debate over the board’s proposed change to the public comment policy at meetings. Some parents feel capping the number of speakers at regular board meetings at 30 people is another way the board is decreasing parental input.

“That is a violation of their rights,” he said. “Parents feel like they don’t have a voice in Newark Public Schools.”

As the district works to lay out its plan for more parental involvement, four more stops on the district’s parent engagement tour are scheduled in the coming months. In addition, a school board committee has asked assistant superintendents to provide a list of parents to be recognized at each monthly board meeting.

“Without parents, a school can’t thrive, and that’s a fact,” Johnson said. “So trying to get Newark to understand that is important. We should be engaged and involved, because they’re our children.”

At a conference on autism, NJ parents plan for their children’s transition to adulthood

2020-02-26T01:33:47+00:00

Jenise Reedus, a mother of a Newark high school junior with autism, says her daughter’s forthcoming transition to adulthood is full of uncertainties. Planning for the future can be daunting.

Reedus was among nearly 500 people who attended Autism New Jersey’s transition conference Monday, about life after high school for people with autism. Newark Public Schools was among the sponsors of the event, held at the DoubleTree Newark Airport hotel.

“I’m hoping to process what might be the right fit for her,” Reedus said, noting her daughter hasn’t yet decided if she wants to go to college or apply for jobs. “Then, how will we go about accessing it? I’m getting a lot of information here.”

The gathering focused on so-called “transition planning,” which begins for people with autism at age 14 and continues until they reach 21 and are no longer eligible for school support services that many have come to rely on.

The federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act mandates transition plans for all students who have IEPs, or individualized education plans. They’re created by the student, together with those involved with the student’s care and education, such as parents and school employees. Research has shown that student involvement in their own transition planning encourages self-advocacy skills and makes the process more student-centered. The plans typically identify the student’s post-graduation plans, their academic and non-academic abilities, needed accommodations, and achievable goals on the way to adulthood.

Newark Public Schools currently serves 854 students with autism, according to a Chalkbeat public records request, and several of its schools have programs geared toward students with autism. Newark Superintendent Roger León’s district plan calls for improvements to the special education program, though it doesn’t specifically mention transition plans. Several district officials were at the conference, including the directors of the Office of Special Education, Carolyn Granato and Marilyn Mitchell.

A challenge of transition planning is its time- and resource-intensive nature. When parents don’t understand the ins and outs of the complex process, their children may not get the supports they need.

The goal of the conference is to help families craft “a roadmap to get [their children] into adulthood successfully,” said Autism New Jersey’s Executive Director Suzanne Buchanan.

“Raising a son or daughter with autism is one of the most joyous and challenging experiences of a parent’s life, and chances are, we have information or connections or resources that can make your life better in some way,” she said.

In nearby New York City, students with pronounced disabilities learn real-life skills ahead of their transition out of school. By identifying early on what they enjoy doing in the classroom, they are better prepared for future jobs.

After remarks from Buchanan, León, and Newark’s North Ward Center CEO Michele Adubato, and a keynote address from Nkechi Okoli, the senior director of transition for the New Jersey Division of Developmental Disabilities, conference attendees could attend various workshops on topics ranging from how technology can benefit adults with autism to the financial and legal needs of families of children with special needs.

When it comes to transition planning, information is power, said Reedus — and the onus to gather and synthesize that information often falls to parents.

“For our children, it’s more difficult. It’s our job to help them find those opportunities, and it’s not an easy task,” Reedus said. “All parents want their kids to be independent and confident. Parents of children with autism want the same.”

Newark school board considers limiting public comment at meetings

2020-02-05T23:43:21+00:00

Even after coming under fire for their alleged disinterest in hearing public input, the Newark school board is weighing whether to limit the number of speakers at monthly board meetings.

Newark community members have long attended school board meetings to communicate their concerns to the board. The board, still in its first year after reclaiming local control from the state, is considering capping the number of speakers at board meetings at 30 people. Some board members cited the length and the tone of public comment as reasons for wanting to cut it off.

That would be a bold move after public criticism of the board’s alleged lack of transparency.

As required by New Jersey law, the board allots time to hear public comment at all its public meetings. However, the law permits boards to set parameters, and the Newark board already has put some limits in place.

It set a maximum of 90 minutes for public participation at regular board meetings. Speakers must sign up online at least five days before a meeting. At the board’s other meetings, it limits public participation to 30 minutes total and a maximum of 10 speakers on a first-come basis, according to the district’s website. Each speaker has 3 minutes at the microphone.

At Monday’s special board meeting, board members discussed capping the number of speakers at regular board meetings at 30 people even if not all speakers use their allotted 3 minutes. Four of the nine board members — Shayvonne Anderson, Reginald Bledsoe, Tave Padilla, and Asia Norton — were absent.

Although some board members, including board President Josephine Garcia who convened the special meeting and proposed the idea, seemed to favor limiting the number of speakers at regular board meetings, others were less sure.

“I think we should be careful about jumping into those types of decisions. I don’t see the benefit, and it might cause unnecessary community backlash,” board member A’Dorian Murray-Thomas said. “We should be wary of adding more regulations.”

She asked what the benefit of a policy like this might be.

Board Vice President Dawn Haynes responded, “Not being here all night getting cursed out.”

“People are too disrespectful,” board member Flohisha Hill added. “It takes too long.”

Murray-Thomas argued that public participation doesn’t often exceed 30 speakers and it’s the board’s duty to listen to the community.

“I get where everyone’s coming from, but our job is to hear the community,” she said. “If 40 people sign up to be heard, and there’s a 90-minute allotment, it’s possible for us to have both.”

This discussion came after increasing dismay at the board’s alleged unwillingness to listen to the community. In August, the board sent letters threatening to ban two frequent speakers who sometimes exceed their time limit.

The letters told Yolanda Johnson and Denise Cole, local advocates who ran for school board last year, that further instances of “disregard for the rules of decorum” at board meetings could result in a ban from “any and all future meetings of the Board of Education.”

The board has not carried out its threat. The possible ban suggested to some that the board wanted to curb criticism even as its members and Superintendent Roger León say they want parents to have a greater say in Newark schools.

Many Newarkers vociferously opposed the state’s 22-year control of the district and had argued that it was anti-democratic and robbed residents of having meaningful input into school policy.

Some community members felt that the letters sent the message that the board is uninterested in hearing from some concerned parents, and called the threats “divisive to our community.”

According to the New Jersey School Boards Association, boards of education may limit the number of speakers in a public comment period to manage the flow of the meeting and make sure there is time to address other school board business. However, association Communications Manager Janet Bamford said she is not aware of other boards of education that have a similar policy.

The Chicago school board limits the number of speakers at meetings, and requires them to sign up in advance. Parents have complained that spots disappear quickly, and the process discourages parents from being heard.

The Newark board is likely to discuss at its reorganization meeting in April how to handle public input.

“I don’t think that this is the right choice at the moment. It appears like they’re retaliating,” Johnson said, referring to the board’s possible policy change. “This community has been fed up with the transparency from the board, and the community of parents are the ones who put Roger in office. It’s going to be a fight if the board comes out with this, and the community is going to challenge it.”

In Newark, some families reject superintendent’s call to close four charter schools while other residents applaud it

2020-01-29T20:44:15+00:00

Newark residents and elected officials are taking sides in a roiling debate over the future of four charter schools, with charter critics calling for the schools to be closed while some families are pleading for them to remain open.

The schools — M.E.T.S., People’s Prep, Roseville Community, and University Heights — are expected to learn their fates next week. That is when the state will announce whether it will let the schools continue to operate or force some or all of them to close their doors after this school year.

For now, the state’s upcoming decision has ignited a war of words in Newark. Roger León, the superintendent who oversees Newark’s traditional schools but not charter schools, sent letters to the state education commissioner last month arguing that all four schools should be shuttered. He also urged the state to stop new charter schools from opening unless they serve “a specific educational need.”

Charter school advocates denounced León’s recommendations in their own letters to the commissioner. On Monday, Mayor Ras Baraka jumped to León’s defense after anonymous flyers appeared across the city attacking León and warning residents “Your school could be next!”

Newark Superintendent Roger León listened as charter school advocates and critics voiced their opinions at the board meeting.

The dispute spilled over into Tuesday’s Newark Board of Education meeting, though neither León nor the Newark school board control the fate of the schools, which fall under the purview of the state. That did not stop members of the public from making arguments for and against the schools during the meeting.

Parent Jessica Reyes said that enrolling her son at People’s Prep was “one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.” Reyes said school staffers work closely with her 17-year-old son, who has autism, and the attention he received made him more independent and allowed his confidence to “skyrocket.” She said she was dismayed to read León’s letter about People’s Prep, which says the school “fails to address the educational needs” of students with disabilities and that “there is nothing distinctive or innovative” about the school.

“I disagree wholeheartedly,” Reyes told León and the school board Tuesday.

But several local activists and community leaders made the opposite argument, saying they strongly support León’s call for the state to close the schools. They echoed the superintendent’s argument that the spread of charter schools, which now serve more than a third of Newark public-school students, has sapped funding from traditional schools.

“Charter schools drain our district,” Roberto Cabanas, an organizer with New Jersey Communities United, an advocacy group focused on health care, housing, and education.

He noted that former state-appointed superintendent Cami Anderson closed numerous low-performing traditional schools when the state controlled Newark’s school system. Now that the city’s elected school board has regained control of the district, its chosen superintendent is demanding that charter schools be held to the same standard, Cabanas said.

“They feared the day they would be held accountable by a community,” he said at the meeting. “That day has arrived.”

All charter schools must periodically apply for state approval to continue operating, as the four Newark schools recently did. During the renewal process, the state education department visits the schools, conducts interviews, and reviews each school’s application, academic data, and financial records. The state has shut down several low-performing Newark charter schools in the past.

M.E.T.S. and University Heights face the greatest risk of closure; the state put both schools on probation last year due to poor academic performance and safety concerns.

University Heights Charter School supporters showed up with signs to the meeting.

University Heights, which opened in 2006, performs worse than the Newark Public Schools average on state tests and ranks among the bottom 5% of high-poverty schools in New Jersey. Still, families are publicly standing by the school, arguing that test scores do not capture the essence of the school — a close-knit community where staff members care for children and “parents stick together,” said Tyola Hughes.

“My experience with University Heights is that it’s a community, a family,” said Hughes, whose son in eighth grade.

Hughes was one of dozens of parents and students who traveled by school bus and cars to Tuesday’s board meeting. They carried University Heights signs into the meeting, but no one from the group spoke during the public comment portion.

The school’s executive director, Tamara Cooper, said in a statement that she was disappointed León did not reach out to administrators or speak with parents before calling for the school to be closed. She added that the school’s midyear test scores recently showed improvements. In an interview, parent Glen McEwen added that the school has filled his son with “light and happiness.”

“If that’s taken away, I don’t know how he would cope,” McEwen said.

The other two schools appear to be in a stronger position. A larger percentage of Roseville Community students met state expectations on the 2018 tests than the Newark district average, though district students improved their scores at a higher rate than Roseville’s.

People’s Prep has a higher graduation rate than the district while serving a larger share of students with disabilities, the school’s lawyer wrote in a letter to the state. The lawyer alleged that León, who has made clear his desire to expand the district, wants the school to be shut down so he can reclaim the building space that People’s Prep rents from the district. (In his own letter, León said that People’s Prep’s presence in the shared building has prevented a district high school from expanding.)

León did not address the schools at Tuesday’s meeting or his recommendation that the state close them. While a few parents spoke in the schools’ favor, several other community members applauded León’s stance against the schools.

“He’s made bold decisions to advocate for the closure of these schools,” said Deborah Smith Gregory, president of the Newark NAACP, adding that the expansion of charter schools in Newark has put a “tremendous strain” on the city’s traditional schools.

The state is expected to inform schools of its decision on Monday.

Newark mayor defends Superintendent León after anonymous flyers attack his charter school stance

2020-01-28T15:42:07+00:00

Mayor Ras Baraka is defending the Newark schools chief after anonymous flyers and posters appeared across the city attacking the superintendent’s call to close four charter schools.

In an online message posted Monday evening, Baraka called the posters criticizing Superintendent Roger León “tasteless and sophomoric” and “based on ignorance.” He also defended León’s call for the state to shutter the four charter schools, echoing León’s argument that the charters divert funding from traditional schools and fail to adequately serve students with special needs.

Baraka’s message and the mysterious posters warning “Your school could be next!” are the latest flareup in an escalating dispute over the four charter schools: M.E.T.S., People’s Prep, Roseville Community, and University Heights. The schools are up for renewal, a routine process in which charter schools must apply for state approval to continue operating.

León submitted letters to the state education commissioner last month urging him to reject the schools’ applications, adding that the state should also restrict the formation of new charter schools. The letters drew angry responses from charter school advocates, who called León’s statements “irresponsible” and “inaccurate,” and from a lawyer for People’s Prep, who accused León of trying to “uproot the educational lives of hundreds” of students in order to seize the school’s building space.

One of the posters that has appeared across the city attacking Superintendent León’s recommendation that the state close four Newark charter schools.

Now the posters and flyers have sprung up across the city, blasting the superintendent from telephone poles and other public spaces. They refer to León as “the king” and feature a photograph of him sitting on a mock throne at his birthday celebration last year. The poster lists the names of the four charter schools as well as a traditional public school, Branch Brook Elementary, that the district plans to shut down after this school year.

“Don’t let the king close more Newark schools!” the poster reads. “Your school could be next!”

It is unclear who produced the signs. The flyers are signed “concerned parents of the NEWARK Public Schools District,” but feature no other identifying information.

In his message that was published on the City of Newark website, Baraka implied that pro-charter school groups were behind the signs. He accused the charter schools defenders of hypocrisy, saying they did not protest when a prior superintendent shuttered traditional schools.

“It is disturbing to me that when previous state-appointed superintendents closed Newark Public Schools, there was no such hue-and-cry,” wrote Baraka, a former principal in a traditional Newark school. “Cami Anderson closed 20 Newark Schools with hardly a whisper of protest from some of these groups.”

Baraka has previously called for a moratorium on the spread of charter schools, which serve more than a third of Newark public school students, saying that their unchecked expansion would “suck the life out of traditional schools.” Because charter school funding flows through district budgets in New Jersey, about a quarter of the Newark Public Schools budget is reserved for charters.

In his post Monday, Baraka noted that León does not have any authority to close charter schools, which is solely a state decision. Still, he said León has “the right and obligation” to assess the performance of all Newark schools and make recommendations to the state.

In fact, state regulations give local elected school boards, not superintendents, the option to weigh in on charter schools’ renewal applications. Charter advocates have pointed out that the Newark school board has not voted to approve León’s recommendation that the state close the four schools.

León’s recommendation appears to have rattled some residents of Newark, where a majority of voters say they support the existence of charter schools. Tave Padilla said he and other members of the Newark school board have received numerous calls from community members asking whether the district plans to shut down charter schools.

“People were in an uproar,” Padilla said last week, adding that León has assured the board that he is only targeting those four charter schools and not any others.

The board meets Tuesday evening; its public agenda does not list a vote on León’s recommendation. The state education department has said it plans to decide on the fate of the four schools by early February.

Newark schools chief plans to expel charter school amid push to expand district

2020-01-24T01:39:01+00:00

In a bid to reclaim district buildings so he can expand the school system, Newark’s superintendent wants to boot a charter school from its rented space and potentially to take back properties that his predecessor sold.

The district plans to eject People’s Prep Charter School from the public school building where it rents space, which would allow a district magnet school in that building to grow, León said last month in a letter to the state. The district is also reviewing its leases with other charter schools that rent district space, a spokesperson confirmed — a move that could have other charters packing in the future.

Meanwhile, León is scrutinizing the sales of 12 school buildings that his predecessor offloaded in 2016 as a way to raise revenue. At a board meeting this week, León suggested the district may be able to take back some of the properties if their new owners are not using them as intended. “I want people to know they were our buildings and I’m looking at what is being done with them,” he said, without explaining how the district could regain control of the properties.

The search for space comes as the 36,000-student district has added hundreds of additional students to its rosters and several new schools are slated to open. León’s focus on expansion contrasts sharply with his recent predecessors, state-appointed superintendents who sought to downsize the district by closing traditional schools, selling off empty buildings, and renting space to charter schools.

“Our strategy in this administration is to actually grow the district,” León said in 2018.

People’s Prep is a small charter high school that has rented space in the former Camden Middle School building since 2011. Along with three other Newark charter schools, it is undergoing a periodic renewal process in which the state must decide whether to allow the schools to continue operating.

In December, León urged the state to close all four schools, arguing that they drain funding from traditional schools and do not adequately serve students with special needs.

As part of his case against People’s Prep, León said the school had violated its lease with the district by taking up more than its allotted space in the shared building. He also said that People’s Prep was blocking the magnet school, Bard Early College High School, from expanding. For both reasons, the district plans to not renew People’s Prep’s lease after it expires on June 30, meaning it will “likely need to vacate the premises,” León wrote to the state education commissioner on Dec. 13.

Just two weeks later, the district sent People’s Prep a notice alleging that it defaulted on its lease — the first step in the legal process of booting the school.

This month, a lawyer for People’s Prep sent the commissioner a strongly worded response to León’s letter. The lawyer, Thomas O. Johnston, noted that the school has a higher graduation rate and enrolls a larger percentage of students with disabilities than the Newark Public Schools average.

Johnston said that People’s Prep had not exceeded its rented space. And he alleged that the district called for the school’s closure in order to seize its building space.

“Newark District is attempting to uproot the educational lives of hundreds of PPCS students,” Johnston wrote, “because it covets space that PPCS is currently using to educate Newark’s children.”

Johnston said the district wants to use part of People’s Prep’s space as a “detention center” for students who are picked up by truancy officers that León hired last year. A district spokesperson denied that claim, but otherwise declined to comment on Johnston’s letter.

Allowing charter schools to occupy all or part of district-owned buildings has long been a contentious issue in Newark and other cities. Critics say the buildings belong to district-run schools not charter schools, which are privately operated public schools. But supporters say the policy gives families more school options while allowing the district to raise money by renting out empty or under-used buildings.

In 2012, the Newark school board voted down a plan to allow charter schools to operate inside several district buildings. But because the state controlled the district at the time, the state-appointed superintendent, Cami Anderson, was able to overrule the vote and allow the charters to lease the space.

Today, at least four charter school operators rent district space: People’s Prep, KIPP, North Star Academy, and Great Oaks Legacy. While the district is reviewing all the leases, León has only signaled plans to end People’s Prep’s lease.

KIPP and North Star each have two leases with the district. Both networks have at least one lease with a provision allowing it to be extended for up to 30 years. Spokespeople for both networks said the networks have strong relationships with the district and feel confident about their leases.

In addition to renting out space, the district has also sold some of its buildings. In 2016, Newark’s state-appointed superintendent, Christopher Cerf, asked the Newark Housing Authority to sell a dozen mostly vacant district properties as a way to plug a budget hole.

By 2018, the agency had sold most of the properties, including one former school that was sold to a group connected to Marion P. Thomas Charter School. Last year, a federal grand jury began looking into that sale, issuing subpoenas to the charter school group and the housing authority, according to a report by NorthJersey.com.

Now, León says the district should try to take back any of those properties that it can, though he has not explained how he would do that.

Antoinette Baskerville-Richardson, a former school board member who had opposed the sale of the buildings, applauded León’s efforts to seek additional space for traditional schools. She said his efforts reflect a new approach to managing the district now that the state no longer controls Newark’s schools.

“The superintendent’s strategy involves reclaiming space, but it also involves reclaiming his authority to rebuild a locally controlled district,” said Baskerville-Richardson, now the mayor’s chief education officer. “I think it’s a new day.”

Below is the letter from People’s Prep Charter School’s attorney to the state education commissioner.

Newark Teachers Union, district urge staff to take asthma training this week

2020-01-14T01:34:14+00:00

The Newark Teachers Union and school district are encouraging all staff members to take an online asthma training course during this week’s professional development day.

The push to participate in the free American Lung Association training comes in the wake of a Chalkbeat Newark article that told the story of two recent childhood asthma deaths, described the toll the chronic illness has taken on local schools and families, and highlighted the deficiencies in asthma training for teachers and staff. A day after the article’s publication, Newark Teachers Union President John Abeigon promised to make sure all school employees received asthma training.

“It broke our hearts when we read that article, and it brought to our attention that this is happening,” Abeigon said. “God forbid any adult is caught in a situation and doesn’t know what to do.”

The American Lung Association trains participants to recognize and manage asthma triggers, better understand asthma action plans, and recognize and respond to a breathing emergency.

One in every four children in Newark has asthma — three times higher than the national average — and Newark has experienced about one asthma-related death in minors each year from 2010 to 2017, according to the New Jersey Department of Health. As Chalkbeat reported, grieving parents and educators have asked for more training for teachers about how to assist asthmatic students and called on schools to increase awareness.

Superintendent Roger León recently called asthma one of four health issues that impede student achievement; the illness is one of the leading causes of absenteeism in Newark.

Though New Jersey law requires annual “asthma education opportunities” for educators, it’s unclear how often they are occurring in Newark. While all of Newark’s public schools were designated “asthma-friendly” a decade ago — meaning all staff were trained to deal with asthma and each school had a nebulizer — now only 11 of 64 schools have the title.

“We’re hoping this returns the district back to an accredited asthma-safe district. At one time, the district was certified,” Abeigon said. “I can’t remember when we dropped the ball, but we’re going to work to regain that certification.”

Now, school employees can use their Newark Public Schools email address to register for the American Lung Association’s online learning module, which takes about 45 minutes to complete.

An email sent out by Abeigon says that the district has informed school administrators that the staff development day on Wednesday is a good time for teachers to complete the training. After employees take the course, they’re encouraged to add their certificate of completion to their portfolio by the end of the month.

The online training offered is basic, which Abeigon said is what every employee should receive at a bare minimum.

“An asthma attack doesn’t keep a schedule,” Abeigon said. “In the event the school nurse is unavailable or in transit, we didn’t want school staff wondering what to do next.”

Abeigon said Superintendent Roger Leon is “absolutely on board” with the effort to boost asthma training, and the two plan to discuss further steps in the district certification process. He said the teachers union is assessing how many educators have received training and talks with the district about how to better serve students with asthma are ongoing.

Charter advocates object to León’s call to close four schools, blasting it as ‘unfair’ and ’alarming’

2020-01-07T23:35:49+00:00

Charter school advocates are firing back at Superintendent Roger León after he called for the closure of four Newark charter schools last month and warn that his actions could reignite district-charter clashes.

Two advocacy groups sent strongly worded missives to the state Monday in response to a series of letters León wrote in December urging the state to shutter four charter schools: M.E.T.S., People’s Prep, Roseville Community, and University Heights.

“The ideology and factual misstatements that permeate those letters threaten years worth of work to create harmony between district and charter schools in Newark,” wrote Kyle Rosenkrans, executive director of the New Jersey Children’s Foundation, a nonprofit that promotes cooperation between Newark’s traditional and charter schools.

The New Jersey Charter Schools Association, which represents the majority of the state’s 88 charter schools, also submitted comments to the state Monday.

“I write this letter in response to the irresponsible and unfair attacks on public charter schools in Newark,” wrote the group’s president and CEO, Harry Lee, who called León’s arguments “factually inaccurate” and “alarming.”

[Read the letters here and here.]

The public dispute comes just weeks after León and charter leaders agreed to continue using a common application system — a partnership that Rosenkrans helped negotiate.

But León’s letters to state Education Commissioner Lamont Repollet revealed that he remains deeply skeptical of the schools. León argued that publicly funded, privately managed charter schools drain money from the district and fail to serve their fair share of students with special needs.

Well over a third of Newark’s public school students are enrolled in charters. The district sends about 30% of its revenue to charter schools, which receive the public funding attached to every student they enroll.

León urged Repollet to shut down the four schools, which are undergoing a mandatory state review, and to deny “any and all” applications for new charter schools or the renewal of existing charter schools unless they serve “a specific educational need.”

Rosenkrans, a former fundraiser for the KIPP New Jersey charter network who launched the foundation last year, has sought to mediate between charters and the district’s new leadership. (In 2018, the state ended its takeover of Newark schools and restored authority to the local school board, which chose León as superintendent.) Rosenkrans now appears to be taking a more combative approach in light of León’s letters.

In his message to Repollet, Rosenkrans asserts his “vehement disagreement” with León and pokes holes in León’s case against charter schools. Among Rosenkrans’ counter-arguments: Traditional and charter schools have made academic gains as the charter sector expanded; the district has the ability to assign more students with special needs to charter schools if it chooses; and the district still has budget surpluses even with its payments to charter schools.

“The district has wildly overstated its fiscal circumstances, including the impact of charter schools on its budget,” he wrote, citing a $13 million surplus that the state found last year in Newark’s budget.

Lee made similar points in his letter. He argued that charter schools have taken steps to enroll more students with disabilities and are entitled to the public funding they receive when students choose charters over traditional schools.

Lee also asked the state to disregard León’s letters because they were submitted after a 30-day deadline and were not endorsed by the school board. However, a state spokesperson previously said the commissioner would review “all relevant records” when deciding whether to allow the four schools to continue operating. A decision is expected by Feb. 1.

A district spokesperson declined to comment on the responses to León’s letters.

Seeking to rein in charter sector, Newark superintendent urges state to close four schools

2019-12-31T00:24:18+00:00

The head of the Newark school system is calling for the closure of four local charter schools and a ban on most new charter schools, a clear signal that the district hopes to rein in the city’s fast-growing charter sector.

The schools — M.E.T.S., People’s Prep, Roseville Community, and University Heights — are up for renewal, meaning they must apply for state approval to continue operating after this academic year. In a series of letters this month, Newark Public Schools Superintendent Roger León asked the state to reject their applications, arguing that the publicly funded, privately managed charter schools sap funding from traditional public schools and are failing to serve their fair share of students with special needs.

The state education commissioner is expected to make a decision by Feb. 1.

León also urged the state to deny “any and all” applications for new charter schools or the renewal of existing charter schools unless they serve “a specific educational need.” While other local officials have sought to halt the expansion of Newark’s charter sector, whose student population quadrupled over the past decade, León is taking a more extreme position by demanding that existing charter schools be phased out.

“The writing is on the wall for corporate charter schools,” said Newark Teachers Union President John Abeigon, an outspoken critic of charter schools, which tend to be non-unionized. “The days of unchecked charter school applications are over.”

León, who spent his entire career working in Newark Public Schools before becoming superintendent last year, has walked a fine line when it comes to charter schools, which enjoy significant public and political support in the city.

He has publicly praised some high-performing charters and sought to preserve the city’s common application system for traditional and charter schools. Yet he has also made clear his desire to draw more families back into district schools, and expressed alarm at the swelling share of tax dollars funneled to Newark’s charter schools, which educate more than a third of the city’s public-school students.

León’s letters to the state — including one implying that he plans to eject a charter school from a district building — remove any doubt that he intends to use all the means at his disposal to staunch the flow of students and funding to the city’s charter sector.

Some charter school leaders, who have already accused León’s administration of trying to limit families’ access to charter schools, view his new stance as an open attack.

“The call to close all four schools is reckless and does not take into consideration what’s best for students and families,” said Harry Lee, president and CEO of the New Jersey Charter Schools Association. “This was surprising and an aggressive move by the district.”

During the periodic charter renewal process, which all New Jersey charter schools undergo, the state education department visits the schools, conducts interviews, and reviews each school’s application, academic data, and financial records. The department must also consider the recommendation of the local traditional school board, according to state regulations. León’s letters are not signed by Newark’s board, but a state spokesperson said the department will consider all relevant records during the review process.

León raised a number of general objections in his letters to Lamont Repollet, the education commissioner.

First, he cited the financial impact of charter schools on the district. Because school aid follows students in New Jersey, districts must hand over most of the funding attached to each student who enrolls in a charter school. (Districts keep a small portion of that funding to cover expenses such as building maintenance that remain constant even when students opt out of the district.) This year, about 30% of the district’s revenue was redirected to charter schools, León said.

“As that budget is barely sufficient to meet the district’s needs,” he wrote, “the impact of such a large payment stream cannot be [overstated].”

Second, he suggested that the schools do not offer students a better education than they could receive in the district. He cited data showing that the district, on average, outperformed all the schools except People’s Prep on state tests in terms of the percentage of students who met grade-level expectations, students’ year-over-year improvement, or both.

Finally, he questioned whether the schools adequately serve a significant number of students with special needs. He pointed to data in the schools’ renewal applications showing that they serve a smaller share of students with disabilities or those still learning English than the district, and argued that the schools’ own descriptions of their programs suggest students are not being properly served.

“Data in the renewal application shows that the school currently fails to address the educational needs of Newark’s most vulnerable students,” he wrote in each letter.

León added a few specific objections. He noted that the state put M.E.T.S. and University Heights on probation this year due to poor performance and safety concerns. He also accused People’s Prep of enrolling more students than it is authorized to serve, admitting students regardless of their order on a district-made waiting list, and exceeding its allotted space in the part of a district building it rents. The letter says People’s Prep will “likely need to vacate” the building, which it shares with Bard Early College High School, after its lease expires in June.

The heads of People’s Prep, M.E.T.S., and University Heights did not immediately respond to emails. A district spokesperson also did not respond to a request for comment.

Lee pushed back on several of León’s claims, arguing for instance that the district controls the common enrollment system and could send more students with special needs to charter schools if it chose to.

In an interview, the leaders of Roseville Community Charter School defended the school, which enrolls students in kindergarten through fourth grade in Newark’s North Ward.

They said Roseville serves a sizable share of students with special needs — this year, 15.5% have disabilities and 18.4% are still learning English — which is comparable to Newark Public Schools, where each group accounts for 17% of students. The school has also expanded its services for those students, including by hiring additional staffers, despite the district poaching one of its English-language teachers in September, they added.

“It appears the leadership of Newark Public Schools is seriously misinformed and misguided,” said Rashon Hasan, the chair of Roseville’s board of trustees, adding that León has not visited the school. Shutting down the school would be “devastating for families,” he added.

Dionne Ledford, Roseville’s principal and executive director, said a group of parents sent their own letter imploring the state to keep the school open.

“It’s a true community school,” she said. “A true family.”

León’s letters to the state are below.

Newark Students Union proposes a grassroots alternative to the district’s new student advisory cabinet

2019-12-10T23:54:35+00:00

Newark students want more input in the school district’s decision-making and have come up with two different proposals for the board of education.

The school board’s student representative said he has created a 15-member cabinet, with one representative from each of the district’s high schools, that will discuss district policies.

The Newark Students Union — an entirely student-run organization — has a different idea, one that would institutionalize student representation and give their input more weight, according to group members. David Daughety, an Arts High School senior and Newark Students Union member, made the proposal at the district’s recent board meeting.

“NSU is formally petitioning the board for an advisory committee,” Daughety told the school board on Nov. 26. “It’s a seat at the table we deserve.”

The student advisory committee would discuss policies that directly impact students, and make recommendations to the school board. Daughety hopes it will give students a “firsthand and hands-on experience of reviewing policies and voicing their opinions.”

If the board establishes the committee, he said, it will continue every year, regardless of who the student representative is.

In contrast, the newly formed student cabinet includes students recommended by their principals and reports to student board representative Bruno Coelho, a senior at Science Park High School, who will convey the cabinet’s suggestions to the school board.

Coelho could not be reached for comment.

Newark school board member A’Dorian Murray-Thomas expressed support for Coelho’s proposal and suggested that the board institutionalize the student cabinet beyond Coelho’s tenure.

For the advisory committee, the student union hasn’t decided how many students would serve on it nor how they will be chosen, but Science Park senior and NSU member Azé Williams said the process will be as inclusive as possible, in line with the student union’s belief that all students are equal.

“Students deserve an input. Without the students, there is no district,” Daughety said.

The committee fits in with the Newark Students Union’s mission of effecting change in the district. Since it was founded in 2012, Newark Students Union has advocated for students and attracted national attention for its methods.

Its members have occupied the district’s headquarters and helped stage a citywide school walkout that drew thousands of students into the streets, protesting the policies of a state-appointed superintendent who resigned shortly thereafter. The union joined calls for the state to return control of Newark’s schools to the local school board, which happened last February.

Since then, the Newark Students Union has been trying to work with the district’s elected board and superintendent, Roger León, by advocating for policies instead of staging protests.

León has said publicly that he regularly consults with students. But Williams said an advisory committee will provide students a more direct, formal avenue to be heard by district administration.

“Students have always been the driving force for change in history,” Williams said. “A lot of our demands fall on deaf ears and we will have to go to extremes like chaining ourselves to fire hydrants and poles in order for someone to finally listen to us. With this, we can finally make the change that we want to see.”

So far, Williams and Daughety say a district committee is scheduled to discuss their proposal in January. After a committee vote, the proposal could reach the board. The students hope to create the committee in the spring.

“I hope that this committee will give students the opportunity to be seen as equal and be heard,” Williams said, “since we are the people that bear the brunt of whatever political decisions adults make.”

State: Newark is on track to regain full control of its schools in 2020

2019-12-07T00:00:23+00:00

Newark is poised to regain full control of its schools early next year, formally ending a decades-long state takeover, state officials said this week.

The state restored authority to Newark’s elected school board in 2018 under the condition that it meet the requirements of a two-year transition plan. A newly released progress report says the district has so far “fully implemented” those requirements, according to a presentation Wednesday before the state Board of Education. If the district continues on that course, it will exit state monitoring and complete its return to local control in February.

“They are moving exactly as a model school district should be moving,” N.J. Education Commissioner Lamont Repollet said after the board meeting. He also cited the positive feedback from Newark’s “highly skilled professional,” a state monitor overseeing the transition.

“We are very comfortable and confident that if they continue to work with the highly skilled professional,” Repollet added, “they will get to that point where we will gladly hand over the keys for Newark Public Schools.”

The progress report is the second Newark has received and covers six months that ended on July 31, though the results were not released until this week. It tracks whether Newark is carrying out the activities in the transition plan, such as choosing and evaluating a new superintendent, ensuring that school board members attend training sessions, and submitting a balanced budget.

The district received perfect scores on all the measures, according to the report, which was produced by the Bloustein Local Government Research Center at Rutgers University. The center will issue a final report in January, which the state will consider when deciding whether to finalize Newark’s return to local control.

“We’re extremely excited and are waiting to see those reports about the incredible work that we’ve actually done,” Newark Superintendent Roger León said at a school board meeting last month.

Much of the information in the progress report was supplied by Anzella King-Nelms, a former Newark principal and deputy superintendent chosen by the state to serve as the highly skilled professional. In that role, she has alternated between advisor and monitor — helping Newark adhere to the transition plan while also informing the state of its progress.

King-Nelms also submitted a progress report, which points to several signs that Newark’s transition to local control is proceeding smoothly. For instance, no ethics complaints have been filed against the school board, mandatory teacher evaluations were conducted, and León released a strategic plan for the district, she wrote.

The state seized control of Newark’s schools in 1995, citing dismal test scores and corruption within the school board. The board was placed in an advisory role and lost the power to appoint the district’s superintendent.

After a years-long effort by Newark activists and political leaders to regain local control of the schools, the state restored the board’s authority in February 2018 — but kept it under state monitoring until 2020.

In May 2018, the newly empowered board named León as superintendent, making him Newark’s first locally chosen superintendent in nearly 23 years. At this week’s state board meeting, board member Arcelio Aponte offered praise for León.

“I think he’s an amazing leader,” Aponte said. “I certainly wish him well and continued progress for the district.”

Two other districts — Jersey City and Paterson — are also in the final stages of exiting from state control.

Reporting contributed by John Mooney of NJ Spotlight.

Shabazz unveiled as Newark’s fifth career academy; will offer engineering classes

2019-12-05T02:56:53+00:00

With great fanfare, Newark has unveiled its latest career academy, one with an engineering focus at Malcolm X Shabazz High School.

Even though it’s more than midway through the semester, Shabazz students could start engineering classes as soon as next week, district officials said. They did not say how many students would enroll in the academy.

Students may earn college credit from the New Jersey Institute of Technology for their academy courses. As with other career academies, students will be paired with mentors in industry, district officials said.

The engineering career academy will provide coursework rigorous enough for students to be creating work that they could patent, according to the district. The academy will offer various engineering certifications.

This marks the fifth career academy launch — and the fourth in recent weeks — in Superintendent Roger León’s 17-month tenure, all part of his goal to revamp traditional high schools and better prepare students for college and careers.

Superintendent Roger León announces the new engineering academy at Malcolm X Shabazz High School in Newark’s South Ward.

The district is pairing each academy with one of the district’s selective magnet schools and with a college and an industry partner.

Shabazz students will be supported by the New Jersey Institute of Technology and Stryker Corporation, a medical technology company. The school will will partner with the magnet school Technology High School.

“For these incredible, beautiful, brilliant students, we want three entities to say it’s legit. We want the magnet to say that it’s worthy of our brand. We want NJIT to say [this work] meets our standards, and we want Stryker to say this will prepare them for the future,” Leon said at the public announcement Wednesday. “I am extremely excited about the incredible work that’s underway.”

The academies are also aimed at making the city’s comprehensive high schools more attractive to students, closing the gap in attendance between the district’s more selective magnet high schools, where the district’s higher-achieving students enroll, and non-selective comprehensive schools, where the city’s neediest students enroll. The academies may allow students at comprehensive high schools to take courses at the partnered magnet schools.

Shabazz sophomore Kennedy Amoako, who participates in robotics, video production, and virtual reality programs at the school, is looking forward to the new classes.

“I want to be an architect based in the engineering field, so I was happy to hear about this,” he said. “It’s going to help me because I’ll have the opportunity to interact with 3-D printing and all this new stuff.”

The New Jersey Institute of Technology will provide staff development, equipment, and financial support. Stryker is providing mentorships and helping Shabazz shape curriculum.

“We hope we’re helping this high school generate graduates that are committed to this journey,” said Robert Cohen, a vice president and chief technology officer at Stryker. “It’s not technology by itself that does anything, it’s the people who use the technology. If we can help this generation find this technology and use it to improve health care, that’s a good thing for Stryker to do.”

A 3-D printer is used in a lab at Malcolm X Shabazz High School.

Pegi Haliti, who has a master’s in biomedical engineering from the University of Bridgeport in Connecticut, will be teaching engineering design at the academy.

“What they learn in the class, it will be enough for students to pass any exam related to engineering design,” she said.

She said academy courses will culminate in introducing students to biomedical engineering.

Two weeks ago, Weequahic High School unveiled its allied health services academy in a partnership with Rutgers School of Health Professions, Rutgers School of Nursing, and RWJBarnabas Health.

Last spring, East Side High School opened its teacher training academy, which is partnered with Montclair State University and the American Federation of Teachers.

Barringer High School and West Side High School launched their career academies last month. Through a partnership with Rutgers Law School and the McCarter & English law firm, Barringer students will learn about law and safety, while West Side is partnering with Rutgers Business School and Google Creative Labs to teach students about business and finance.

Malcolm X Shabazz High School Principal Naseed Gifted, who has a background in engineering and a degree from the New Jersey Institute of Technology, has come full circle with the academy. He credits his education in Newark with launching him into technology.

“It was exposure that inspired me to create and become a problem solver,” he said. “Today is that moment where we get to help develop the next generation of technology leaders, and the young people in front of you will lead the way.”

Newark’s new enrollment system launches this weekend, but questions remain about how it will work

2019-12-03T22:20:17+00:00

When Newark’s revamped school-enrollment system launches on Saturday, families will find some new school options. But some people also have lingering questions about how the system will work.

Parents and students may learn about new school choices and get help with the enrollment system at the annual citywide school fair from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday at Barringer High School.

At a school board meeting last week, Newarkers lined up to ask questions about enrollment. Superintendent Roger León was clear about one thing: The online enrollment system, Newark Enrolls, is meant to make it easier for families to apply to schools, not for charter schools to fill their seats.

“Newark Enrolls is not a charter school opportunity,” he said, but is an “opportunity for the children of this city to go to the school they want to.”

The updated Newark Enrolls system by the vendor Schoolmint will continue to allow families to enroll online during the enrollment period until Feb. 14. They also may seek help by visiting any Newark traditional school during operating hours from 8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Enrollment in Newark schools has been the source of increasing strife in recent years. Last summer, district officials pledged to revamp the enrollment system.

At the board meeting, charter school boosters worried that the new system would hinder enrollment at their schools. The school district has placed more restrictions on charter school enrollment, and the district will not allow families to request school transfers by visiting charters, which are privately run but publicly funded schools.

According to the Newark Enrolls website, the district will send school assignments on April 12, but has not said whether the online system will be available for requesting changes in schools after then.

In October the board approved guidelines that no longer guarantee that families may switch schools online after they receive their school matches. Instead, the district will consider giving families that option if it can modify the online enrollment system to prevent switching schools in a way the district believes could cause problems.

For instance, León said families previously could transfer online to schools that don’t offer the bilingual or special education services that their children require.

For instance, if a parent sends a non-English speaking student to Hawthorne school, León said, “you’re going to be the only one speaking Spanish. Now I have to deal with a lawsuit, because that parent claims I didn’t provide a program.”

At the meeting, speakers affiliated with Newark charter schools expressed worries about limiting families’ abilities to switch to schools that they want.

“This will have a severe effect on the community we serve. I respectfully ask that you reconsider,” said Lamar Washington, event coordinator at Newark’s Great Oaks Legacy Charter Schools. “I’m here not as an advocate for charter, traditional, or private schools, but an advocate of parent choice. This is impeding upon that choice.”

What’s not clear is whether the new academic programs will attract more applicants for comprehensive high schools that generally get fewer applications than the district’s magnet schools (excluding East Side High School). The district recently unveiled career academies intended to boost enrollment at neighborhood high schools.

The district also announced last week two new school options, the Newark School of Global Studies and the Sir Isaac Newton Elementary School, which will replace the closed Newton Street School.

At the board meeting, León noted that all rising ninth graders will take a new high school admissions test in late February, which will help determine admission to magnet schools and honors programs at the comprehensive schools.

The Newark Enrolls website was updated this week with information about the enrollment process for the upcoming year.

This article tackles a topic raised during our 2019 Listening Tour. Read more about the Listening Tour here, and see more articles inspired by community input here.

Weequahic classrooms transformed into health clinics and labs as part of Newark’s career readiness push

2019-11-20T22:53:09+00:00

Inside their school building, students will learn to take blood pressure, analyze blood splatter, and give physical exams. Their classrooms have been set up like clinics, with mock crime scenes and patients. Science labs have been outfitted with microscopes and incubators.

Welcome to Weequahic High School, where a new allied health services academy will give high schoolers skills they can use in fields, such as physical therapy, exercise science, and health administration.

“We will dive deep into this work, into this pathway, and now the students will become great at it,” Weequahic Principal Andre Hollis said.

Students at Weequahic will soon train through a combination of in-classroom education, off-site learning, and specialized courses to earn industry certifications that could help them land internships in Newark and beyond. This is the third career-oriented academy to open this month in Newark schools.

Its launch is another milestone in Superintendent Roger León’s efforts to revamp the district’s traditional high schools and better prepare students for college and careers — something that he’s talked about since his tenure began in 2018.

Earlier this month, Barringer High School announced a law and safety academy, and West Side High School said a business and finance program would open. A Newark career academy focused on teaching is scheduled to open at East Side High School. Each academy is paired with a magnet high school, as well as a college and professional organization in the industry of their specialization, providing students with mentors and additional educational opportunities.

Weequahic students will get support from Rutgers School of Nursing, Rutgers School of Health Professions, and RWJBarnabas Health. The academy is partnering with Science Park, a science magnet and one of the district’s top-performing schools. Berkeley College School of Health Studies is among several other local organizations providing additional support.

Weequahic already offers some health-related courses, but with the announcement of the new academy, students will have the opportunity to gain medical technical certifications and credentials, helping to prepare them for jobs.

“It’s been proven time and time again that real-world experience and goal direction leads to student success,” said Barbara Gladson, associate dean for academic affairs at Rutgers School of Health Professions. “By the time your students graduate from high school, they will be well equipped to meet many of the healthcare challenges that we struggle with today… and will be leaders at a time when their services will be in great demand.”

Weequahic High School principal Andre Hollis announces the school’s new allied health program.

According to the district, Newark Public Schools has spent nearly $375,000 improving facilities and infrastructure in the schools hosting the new programs.

In the coming months, the health sciences academy’s partners will provide feedback and make recommendations for advancing the program, which will have some offerings this school year.

“It’s always about improving what we’re offering. I think we have a good start, but these programs must, in fact, be ready for freshmen who will be reporting to this school in September of 2020,” León said, noting the date the academy is expected to be fully up and running. “I know that these young people are extremely excited.”

Freshman student Hasson Bass isn’t sure yet of what he wants to do when he graduates, but he knows he wants to work in healthcare and is grateful for the creation of the academy.

“In some schools, people don’t have this,” he said. “We’re learning something new, and this is going to take us somewhere.”

Reporters were invited to the program announcement, but district officials took no questions.

Correction: November 22, 2019: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said Barbara Gladson was the associate dean of academic affairs with RWJBarnabas Health. The story has been updated to reflect her correct title as associate dean of academic affairs at Rutgers School of Health Professions.

As Newark school district looks 10 years into the future, it’s asking community members for advice

2019-11-19T17:49:28+00:00

Just months after unveiling a one-year plan to begin overhauling the Newark school system, officials are already working on a 10-year plan for the district — and they want the public to weigh in.

In June, the district published a nearly 30-page strategic plan to create a “stronger, wiser, and more efficient” school system. It drew on the ideas of hundreds of stakeholders collected at more than 30 meetings this year.

But that one-year roadmap was intended as a precursor to a more expansive vision: a decade-long district plan slated for release next June. So, with the current plan just getting off the ground, the district is reconvening focus groups to gather input for the next plan, which will stretch from 2020 to 2030.

“Everyone and anyone who is interested in educating children in Newark will definitely want to be part of the authoring of that strategic plan,” Superintendent Roger León said at last month’s school board meeting, adding that the district needs to have “a good pulse on what people believe are the necessary strategies” to improve the school system.

The latest round of brainstorming sessions began last month and will continue through December. Each session is geared toward a different set of stakeholders, including students, parents, partner organizations, and experts in early childhood and special education. The district invited select participants to join each group, but León added that “everyone else is also invited to attend.”

A Newark-based consultancy called Creed Strategies, which oversaw the development of the one-year plan, is hosting the focus groups with help from district officials and external partners.

The student sessions earlier this year and this fall have been co-hosted by Kaleena Berryman, the executive director of the Abbott Leadership Institute, a nonprofit at Rutgers University-Newark that trains students and parents on advocating for school improvements.

Berryman said the one-year plan featured strategies that students had called for, including more career-training opportunities and additional mental-health services in schools.

“The district is definitely listening — you can see the changes happening,” she said. “That’s what’s kept us at the table.”

At a recent session, students were asked to envision themselves in 10 years, then consider what the school system must do to help turn their visions into reality, Berryman said. Students used terms like “transformative,” “well traveled,” and “mentally healthy” to describe their future selves. To that end, they recommended that the district provide internships, study abroad opportunities, robust mental health and wellness services, and “culturally responsive” classroom materials that celebrate students’ diverse backgrounds.

Berryman said she was encouraged to see officials continue to seek feedback from a broad array of stakeholders as they chart a new course for the district.

“When you’re planning to transform a school district, the conversations don’t end, so why would the community engagement?” she said. “Hopefully it will go on for years and years to come.”

As the district works on its 10-year plan, tentatively called “The Next Decade,” the one-year plan known as “Clarity 2020” is in effect this school year. That document includes nearly 170 action items that touch on everything from teacher training to student transportation and building renovations.

Observers will be watching closely for evidence that officials are achieving Clarity 2020’s objectives amid the longer-term planning. León appears mindful of those expectations, writing in the introduction to Clarity 2020 that the district’s “greatest weakness” is failing to enact the “brilliant ideas” that people in the district propose.

León has also faced questions about his decision to create a decade-long strategic plan. Most districts map out goals for three to five years into the future, though a few appear to have made 10-year plans.

“We know that in education during the course of a decade things constantly change,” Newark school board member Reginald Bledsoe told León at last month’s meeting. He asked how León’s plan would be responsive to “the changes in the trends in education during that 10-year period.”

“To forecast 10 years is really a difficult task,” León acknowledged. He said one way the district will address that challenge is by incorporating shorter-term goals and “milestones” into the plan, allowing officials to periodically evaluate their progress and make any necessary course corrections.

Just as important, León said, will be regular check-ins with schools stakeholders such as parents, students, and teachers.

“We know that we are relying on the community to have a say on every aspect of the strategic plan,” León said. “Not only on its creation now, but also as it continues.”

The district calendar lists upcoming focus groups for the 10-year plan. The next session, intended for students, is scheduled for Wednesday.

This article tackles a topic raised during our 2019 Listening Tour. Read more about the Listening Tour here, and see more articles inspired by community input here.

High lead levels found in water at seven Newark schools, spurring calls for greater transparency

2019-10-09T15:35:53+00:00

Elevated levels of lead were found in the water at seven out of 29 Newark schools where tests were conducted since August 2018, according to newly revealed district data.

The district shut off the water sources with high lead levels soon after the samples were analyzed, according to the data, which Chalkbeat obtained through a public records request.

However, the district did not post the test results on its website, as required by state rules.

The rules also mandate that the district inform families and school staffers whenever elevated lead levels are found. However, the district did not send the required written notifications, according to WNYC/Gothamist, which first reported the test results.

The data comes as Newark grapples with an ongoing water crisis that drew national attention this summer when high lead levels were discovered in some homes, forcing the city to temporarily distribute bottled water. City officials have faced criticism in the past for downplaying the lead problem.

Now, some residents are alarmed that district officials are not being fully transparent about the findings of lead in some schools’ water.

“Parents want to know what’s going on with the water so we can know what to do,” said Ronnie Kellam, whose son is a first-grader at McKinley Elementary School, which was not among the 29 recently tested schools.

“They haven’t shared the data with us — all they do is tell us they’re testing the water,” Kellam added, saying it seems district officials are concerned with “protecting themselves and not getting information out to the public.”

Most of the schools tested from August 2018 to June 2019 had no lead in their water samples or concentrations below 15 parts per billion, which is the federal threshold for taking action. But seven schools had at least one water source with lead concentrations above the federal action level, according to the data.

The schools found to have high lead levels were: 13th Avenue, 14th Avenue, Ivy Hill, Mount Vernon, Newark Leadership Academy, Park, and West Side High School.

The contaminated sources included water fountains and sinks used in nurses’ offices and for food preparation. In each case, the district turned off the affected water source or — at West Side — posted a sign saying “hand washing only” above a sink, according to the data.

A district spokeswoman did not respond to emailed questions Tuesday. She also did not respond in August when Chalkbeat asked whether elevated lead levels had been found any schools since 2017.

During a live radio program last month, Superintendent Roger León said “we have information that is clearly indicating that the water sources that our students are being provided is safe for them to drink.” He did not mention that tests conducted after he became superintendent in July 2018 found high lead levels in 10 water sources across the seven schools.

Referring to lead testing, León added that he is “making sure that when we do this, the results are on the web so that everyone can see.” However, the district has not posted the results of any lead tests conducted after 2017.

In an interview with WNYC/Gothamist, the district’s school business administrator said that officials believed they did not have to notify families and staffers about the elevated lead levels because the district was conducting tests more often than is required by state law.

The administrator, Valerie Wilson, added that officials were also concerned about how the public might react if the results were posted online.

“The next piece is now when you have these exceedances, how do you report them responsibly so you don’t create panic for people,” Wilson said.

The district faced its own water crisis in 2016, when nearly half of Newark schools were found to have elevated levels of lead. In response, the district shut off the water at the schools, replaced lead pipes, and installed new water filters.

Soon after, state lawmakers updated regulations to require districts to test for lead every six years and post the results online. In accordance with the rules, Newark school officials notified families and posted the lead results on the district website.

Since then, the district has continued to conduct periodic tests for lead in schools’ water. Most of the recent water samples showed little or no lead, lending credence to officials who say that schools’ water filters are working. Of the nearly 450 water sources tested since August 2018, just 10 had lead levels above the federal standard for taking action.

Yet even as the findings have been mostly reassuring, the district has not posted any lead test results for more than a year. The most recent samplings to be posted online are from tests conducted in 2017 — despite state regulations that say districts must publish the results within 24 hours of viewing them.

Kim Gaddy, who was on the Newark school board from 2016 until this April, said the district did a good job informing the public during the lead crisis three years ago. But, she said, the district has been less forthcoming about water quality since León took charge.

“I don’t know why that process changed when a new superintendent came in,” she said. “I just see that something changed.”

Gaddy said she was not aware of the district notifying families and schools when high lead levels were found in water sources over the past year, as it previously had. She also said her request that the board share the results at its monthly public meetings “fell on deaf ears.”

“It’s always the lack of transparency and communication that cause problems,” Gaddy said. “When you begin to not share information, then parents begin to ask: ‘What are they hiding?’”

On Monday, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy announced new guidelines that will require districts to test for lead more frequently and submit the results to a public statewide database.

In Newark, Mayor Ras Baraka has repeatedly defended the city’s handling of the water crisis, which has included distributing free water filters and creating a plan to replace thousands of lead pipes.

León has touted the district’s system for filtering and monitoring the water in schools. During last month’s live broadcast of “Newark Today” on WBGO, he added that the district had no reason to hide the results of lead tests.

“We don’t have time to be lying about anything,” he said.

As León vows improvements, here are 5 issues facing special education in Newark’s schools

2019-09-19T21:50:32+00:00

Newark schools chief Roger León has promised to make many long-needed changes, but perhaps the biggest promise he’s made is to fix the city’s special education program.

Even the most thriving school districts can struggle to serve students with disabilities. Complex districts with many needy students often have it harder — and run up against challenges that can stand in the way of getting those students the services they legally are entitled to.

Many of those challenges, including having the right staff in place and being able to get children to the schools that can best serve them, have long plagued Newark, where more than 16% of students in the school district require special education services. The district is still being monitored under the 2012 settlement of a class action lawsuit about its handling of special education.

But León says changes are on their way, and he’s amassing a team to tackle those problems. The team includes Carolyn Granato, the special education office’s executive director, who was carried over from the previous administration, and Marilyn Mitchell, who was recently promoted to deputy director of the district’s special education team.

“[Mitchell] knows that she has a big challenge before her: We will be developing our special ed program like never before,” León said at a school board meeting in August. “Our neediest children need to be taken care of.”

León’s Clarity 2020 plan includes a promise to analyze how often black and Latino students end up in special education classes and to train educators and administrators about how to best work with students with disabilities. León did not offer additional specifics about his plans at the board meeting, and the district did not respond to questions.

Here are five issues León will have to contend with if he’s going to achieve that lofty goal, and what parents and advocates say needs to happen with each.

Want to discuss special education in Newark? Come to our listening tour event Sept. 21. Details and RSVP here.

How students with special needs get to school

The district is reeling from a troubled transition to handling transportation for students with disabilities on its own. Last year, it began managing contracts with transportation providers on its own — and thousands of students ended up stranded on their doorsteps when their school buses failed to pick them up after a November renegotiation.

“Parents had to take off work,” Jenkins said. “It was a big issue.”

The district has taken steps to smooth transportation this year. Kanileah Anderson’s daughter didn’t get assigned a bus route until the seventh day of school last year, but so far this year her rides to and from school have gone smoothly. “It’s way better than last year,” she said.

Board members learned in August that three transportation providers whose work did not satisfy the district had not had their contracts renewed. The board is also considering a resolution that would reimburse families of students with special needs who are attending private schools for their transportation costs, rather than providing it directly, which could reduce the number of students requiring bus routes. But the real test will come as the year wears on and the district continues to refine bus routes and contracts.

Which students are getting services, and in what settings

The trend in many districts has been to move students out of classrooms with only special education students, or self-contained classrooms, and into classrooms with some students without disabilities, or inclusion classrooms. That’s in keeping with research about what’s best for children and in compliance with a federal mandate that students participate in the “least restrictive environment” that’s appropriate for them.

In the superintendent’s report from March 2016, challenges in special education for the district included inadequate inclusive opportunities — more than half of special education students are in self-contained classrooms. And León and advocates alike have expressed concerns more recently about whether students are warehoused in special education classes when they could be in less restrictive environments.

At the August board meeting, León lamented what he said was an overrepresentation of black boys in special education — a trend that is common across the country – and vowed to make changes.

Debra Jennings, an executive co-director at Newark’s Statewide Parent Advocacy Network, said this remains a top issue for the district to contend with.

“Once you’re in, you’re in forever,” she said about special education in Newark. “These programs are created, and then there’s more of an emphasis of putting children into these programs than figuring out a transition out of these programs and making them more inclusive. If you build it, they will come — it’s built, and they need students in order to keep the program going.”

Which schools are serving students with disabilities

The Newark district that León controls serves only about 65% of the city’s students. The rest go to private schools or privately managed, publicly funded charter schools that are also legally required to meet the needs of their students with disabilities but do not face the same oversight from León’s team as district schools.

The city’s charter schools have historically served relatively few students with disabilities, who made up 10% of their total enrollment in the 2015-16 school year, compared to 16% that year for district-run schools. Despite the enactment of a universal enrollment system since then, Newark’s district schools continue to serve the majority of students with disabilities in the area.

For Newark charter schools to increase their share of students with disabilities, they will need to offer a full range of services and make sure parents know they offer them, so they apply. They will also need to convince families that their schools are good places for students with disabilities. Historically, local charter schools have suspended students with disabilities at a high rate — a dynamic that drew a formal complaint last year against North Star Academy that charged that the school had suspended 29 percent of its students with disabilities.

Elizabeth Athos, a staff attorney at the Education Law Center of New Jersey, says she gets regular calls from local charter school parents who say their children are not receiving the help they need. And Saafir Jenkins, president of the Newark Special Education Parents Advocacy Council, said he, too, hears complaints from parents about charter schools.

“According to the law, you have to bring those services to the students,” Jenkins said. “There are cases where students are accepted and the school attempts to provide services, but then they aggressively try to take those services away each year.”

A group working with local charter schools says it has coached them to serve students with disabilities better. But in an October 2018 blog post, the director of the New Jersey Special Education Collaborative at the time said there was much more to do.

“As members become more effective compliance managers, the focus of the Collaborative is shifting to service quality,” wrote Mark Rynone, who has since left the organization. “How can charters build capacity and systems to serve students of all ability levels and not just those who require the least support and services?”

Whether services are being provided — and on what timetable

Newark has a long history of struggling to provide students with the services they need — and even to assess their needs in the first place. A class action lawsuit filed in 2009 and settled in 2012 accused the district and state education department of not evaluating students for special education or providing services in a timely manner. As part of the settlement’s terms, the district agreed to evaluate and begin serving students more quickly to award “compensatory education” services to students who see a delay in getting needed support.

But many of those challenges have persisted. A superintendent’s report from March 2016 said the district was implementing IEPs inconsistently, sometimes taking longer than the 90-day limit outlined in the law. And parents continue to complain that their children do not receive required services quickly or consistently.

Van Ness Roper said he moved his son Jahad, who has a learning disability, to a charter school after his district school said it could not provide the services he needed. After Roper filed a formal complaint, a judge ruled that the district needed to provide extra tutoring to his son.

“Special education kids are sitting up in these classrooms and doing nothing,” Roper said. “These services need to be in place.”

Staffing issues play a role. Anderson said her daughter’s special education classroom was staffed last year by an inexperienced long-term substitute teacher, not someone with deep expertise in working with students with disabilities.

“Those are the things that need to be looked at with a microscope,” she said.

Roper said he is driven in part because he received special education services while enrolled at Newark Public Schools himself.

“The district is telling parents the services I’m talking about [having received] are not needed,” he said. “But if I didn’t have those services, I wouldn’t be able to articulate to you right now what things need to change.”

Students’ trauma and lead exposure

Any efforts to improve special education could face roadblocks as Newark students who have been exposed to lead in their homes and schools begin to reckon with the possible fallout. Lead poisoning can pose health problems and affect student performance in school — but research says those effects can be mitigated with early intervention.

“I’m interested in what they’re doing to screen for students who have been poisoned in their community. Many of those kids will end up being eligible for special education,” said Athos. “There needs to be an affirmative effort trying to identify kids at an early stage.”

León has assured families that school water fixtures are safe, but the city is grappling with an ongoing lead crisis, and it’s unclear when the last time schools have been checked for lead in their water.

Another big issue, according to Shayvonne Anderson, a board member who is also the parent of a child who receives special education services, is that students who have experienced trauma are too often being treated as though they have emotional or behavioral disabilities.

“Trauma is just so prevalent here in Newark,” she said. “When kids are labelled emotionally disturbed or combative, a lot of it is what they’ve experienced. They’ve had some traumatic experience that triggered something to happen in them for those behaviors to come about.”

“We’re doing children a disservice if they don’t have the right diagnosis and we’re trying to treat them,” she added. “The reason why we’re seeing that children are not doing better is because they’re not targeting the right thing.”

As schools open with changes this week, Newark students react to new teachers, principals, and school policies

2019-09-05T16:45:00+00:00

Two rows of cars lined the front entrance of Science Park High School at 2:40 p.m. on Tuesday as parents waited to pick up their children after the first day of school.

“I’m waiting to hear how her day went,” Adrianna Carvalho said, as she sat in her air-conditioned car. “I’ve been happy with her experience so far. As long as she’s happy, I’m happy.”

A few minutes later, Carvalho’s daughter Nathalia Peregrino exited the school with a smile on her face after her first day as a sophomore.

Science Park is one of 66 Newark schools that opened this week after undergoing substantial changes over the summer. After a tumultuous year, it got a new principal, as did almost a quarter of Newark schools. Other schools opened in new spaces — sometimes unexpectedly. Others have changed policies to align with Superintendent Roger León vision for how to improve the struggling school district.

That vision includes changing the leadership at several schools, using authority that the city school board gave him this summer to make personnel changes unilaterally. It also includes holding school leaders accountable for making improvements.

“Principals need to be on top of it,” León said at the first board meeting of the school year. “I know how to remove principals who can’t get it done.”

Though Peregrino said she was a little shocked at all of the staff changes that took place over the summer, she hopes that the new administration will revamp the school culture.

At a school board meeting in March, some Science Park students named culturally insensitive incidents — including a white physical education teacher who wore a Barack Obama mask and “Make America Great Again” hat on Halloween, and a vice principal who ordered black students to remove their head scarves. León said then that things were being done to address the students’ concerns.

“I hope people are more cautious about what they say and do this year,” Peregrino said. “It was kind of negative in the hallways after that incident.”

Another Science Park parent, Sheril Henderson, brought up the same concerns.

“I hope that’s being taken care of. We don’t need that here,” she said. “This is for everyone, and kids should be come to come here to learn.”

Students at Arts High School said their main adjustment on the first day was to a new schedule that compresses time between classes to just two minutes. Plus, if students aren’t in their homeroom class in the morning, their parents will get an immediate phone call, according to senior class president David Daughety, who said the policies were explained through a meeting between school administration and the student body during orientation the last week of August.

“I believe it will push to get people to school on time,” Daughety said. “But what about people who are late due to circumstances out of their control but still make it to school and put in effort and produce good work?”

Carl McDonald has been sending his daughter, Brianna Lugo, to Marion P. Thomas Charter School for the past four years.

Right down the street from Arts High, students at Marion P. Thomas Charter School — part of a network that is undergoing major changes of its own — had their day of school in a new building, and fourth-grader Brianna Lugo was a fan.

“I like this one more,” she said. “It has smaller spaces, for kids to play in and not get hurt.”

Parents also filtered in and out of schools all day, completing last-minute school registration. The district’s online enrollment system, Newark Enrolls, has been down for two months — taking the process offline, forcing families to go to the district’s downtown “Family Support Center,” and putting a strain on parents and schools. The district announced two weeks ago, in an effort to make the process easier, that parents could enroll their children at their closest schools instead.

In the East Ward, Jon Abeigon, president of the Newark Teachers Union, said Hawkins Street School was packed on Tuesday with parents coming to register their children in school, with bilingual faculty working to help Spanish-speaking families.

“Because of the school’s location in the Ironbound, there are a lot of cultures here,” he said.

As students spent their first morning back in school with new teachers in new buildings, parent activists held a rally outside the district’s Broad Street headquarters. Local activist and former Newark Board of Education candidate Johnnie Lattner announced the event to protest the school board’s recent threat to ban disorderly parents from meetings and demand answers about water filters in schools in the wake of Newark’s lead crisis.

“There is an attack on the parents, students, teachers, and community in Newark and [it’s] time to fight back and make everyone aware of the disrespect, dishonesty, and conditions that are currently happening in Newark,” he said in a press release.

At the last board meeting, León assured the audience that water is safe to drink at Newark schools. In response to an examination of lead contamination in 2016, the district installed water filters turn off the water supply when the filters stop working, according to León.

“Parents should feel very confident, as it relates to drinking water at our schools,” he said.

León spent the day visiting schools around Newark, as shown on the district’s website. But unlike in the past, the district did not invite reporters to join the superintendent, and he gave no public remarks.

Happy first day of school, Newark! Here’s our plan for covering the city’s schools this year, and how you can help

2019-09-03T10:00:01+00:00

Welcome to a new school year! As journalists covering education, we appreciate having a chance to renew our coverage every fall — by building on what we learned last year and setting goals for the coming one.

We’re sharing our coverage plans here in part to hold ourselves accountable for carrying them out, and in part because we want you, our readers, to help us refine them.

The biggest difference from last year is that we’ve grown. We now have two reporters: Patrick Wall, who launched our Newark bureau last year, and Devna Bose, who joined the team as a Report For America fellow this summer. (Plus there’s me! I’m a Chalkbeat editor who helps oversee our Newark team.) That means we can look twice as many places for stories, and listen to (at least!) twice as many Newarkers about issues in their schools.

To get started, we’ll be holding an event about special education on Sept. 21 at 1 p.m. at our office in Newark’s East Ward. The event, co-hosted by the Newark Special Education Parent Advisory Council, is part of Chalkbeat’s seven-city “listening tour” happening this summer and fall as our local reporting teams try new ways to learn from our readers.

We’re also going to keep doing what we know best: producing news stories about the issues facing Newark schools that might not see the light of day without our reporting. Here are some of the big topics you can look forward to reading about on Chalkbeat this school year.

How the transition to local control is translating on the ground: When Newark regained control of its schools, the newly empowered school board chose a local career educator, Roger León, to become superintendent. In his first year, León has taken steps to restore elements of the traditional school district that preceded state takeover; drafted a short-term plan to overhaul the city’s schools; and won a contract extension that preserves his employment until at least 2023.

So far, we’ve covered León’s vows to reshape the district bureaucracy, revamp the enrollment system, and improve student achievement. This year, we’ll be monitoring whether and how those promises translate into reality, and tracking attendance efforts, the district’s curriculum overhaul, and what happens to special education (hence our listening tour event topic). We’ll also be keeping an eye on how León’s brash leadership style influences how much traction he is able to make, and how much support he is able to command from the public in Newark.

This topic is vast, so our whole team will be working on it. We welcome your thoughts!

How Newark students live: As Newarkers know well, the education world is filled with people who are invested in shaping the narrative about how well local schools are doing. (That’s why a recent study that showed long-term gains in the district’s performance ignited significant debate.) But that conversation has given short shrift to the often challenging daily experiences of Newark students, which do much to shape what schools and students can achieve.

Whether students in Newark are healthy, safe, and engaged can make or break their educational experiences, an idea that is baked into León’s Clarity 2020 plan, which calls for the district to help support students from infancy through college. As the school district seeks to play an increasing role in students’ lives outside of school, our coverage will follow. We’ve already started, with our coverage of the city’s approach to LGBTQ-inclusive education and the school district’s role in the city’s current lead crisis. We plan to stay on top of those issues, as well as efforts to enhance early childhood education in Newark, the effects of violence on students and schools, and the ways that the city’s “community schools” integrate academic and social support.

Want to talk about this topic? Reach out to Devna.

Changes to the city’s high schools — and what happens after students graduate: The Newark district has a mix of comprehensive schools that enroll any students who live in their zone and magnet schools that enroll students on a selective basis. The divide between those two kinds of schools is stark, in terms of who enrolls and how prepared they are for high school. León, a former high school principal, simultaneously is seeking to improve the neighborhood schools and to strengthen the screens at the magnet schools. We’ll be looking at what’s happening at both kinds of schools — and how changes to one might influence the course of the other.

That means keeping an eye on how leadership transitions are playing out at Newark’s most prestigious and lowest-performing high schools, what happens with the city’s effort to expand access to job training, and whether a curriculum overhaul changes what students are taught. It also means continuing to pay close attention to Newark’s enrollment system, and to showcasing high school educators through Chalkbeat’s How I Teach feature. (Know a teacher who might be a good fit? Let us know!)

Of course, graduating from high school is meaningless if students are unable to succeed in the colleges or jobs they head to next. Leon has vowed to get more students to and through college, which is part of a larger effort involving City Hall and local universities to help more Newark residents get college degrees. We’ll take a close look at what it’s like to be a graduate in Newark trying to make it after high school, and the many personal, academic, and financial roadblocks that can stand in the way of success. Stay tuned for an in-depth project from Patrick this fall, produced in conjunction with another Chalkbeat location that’s also examining life after graduation.

Want to share tips about Newark’s high schools? Email Patrick.

With little fanfare, Newark board finalizes contract deals for Newark teachers, Roger León

2019-08-30T17:52:40+00:00

The Newark school board signed off on two contracts with long-term implications this week.

At its meeting Tuesday, the board formally approved a five-year contract with the Newark Teachers Union and a two-year contract extension for Superintendent Roger León.

Neither contract was on the agenda the board had printed before the meeting. The board had discussed extending León’s contract, which now runs until 2023, at a brief and sparsely attended public hearing before its meeting last week. It had not publicly discussed the teachers union contract, which union members ratified this week. The full cost of the contract, which provides raises and other financial benefits to teachers, has also not been disclosed.

The contracts represent a substantial exercise of the board’s recent empowerment from an advisory board when the district was under state control to one with almost complete authority.

“History was made tonight,” board president Josephine Garcia told her fellow board members after the vote. “This board voted and passed the first [teachers union] contract negotiated, ratified, and passed for the first time as 20 years as a functioning board under local control. You guys should be really proud of yourselves.”

All board members who voted signed off on the contracts. (One member, Asia Norton, said she could not vote because she had a conflict, but added that she is happy that León is leading the school system.)

But one member raised questions about the process.

Instead of voting on a package of items that included the superintendent’s contract extension, Reggie Bledsoe, who was not present for the public hearing about León’s contract, suggested holding two votes.

“Personally, out of respect for our superintendent,” he said, “I think we should separate that item to vote on separately so that we know there’s unanimous support to amend the contract for an additional two years.”

Garcia pushed back against that suggestion, saying that León’s contract had undergone substantial board discussion.

“It’s a discussion we had [last] Tuesday evening, we all unanimously showed our support at our business meeting, but we’re voting on it tonight at the actual board meeting,” she said.

But then another board member, A’dorian Murray-Thomas, formally made a motion to separate the contract vote. It passed, unanimously.

After asking state for emergency aid, León says Newark does not face fiscal emergency

2019-08-26T22:55:52+00:00

Roger León says he’s not worried about the Newark school district’s budget.

Just weeks after the district asked the state of New Jersey for nearly $37 million in emergency aid — and outlined a set of dire consequences if the money didn’t flow — Newark’s schools chief told the city school board that everything is under control.

“The request for emergency aid was never because we were in an emergency,” León said at Saturday’s board meeting retreat, where he and board members spoke widely about what is happening in the city’s schools.

Instead, he said, the district was just responding to the state’s invitation to apply for additional funding when it filed a formal request Aug. 9 — and guarding against possible bad press if Newark didn’t make an ask.

“The commissioner wrote a request saying if you are a school district in New Jersey and you believe you need more money … they said apply,” León said. “Let’s make believe that we decided because we’re Newark, we’re not going to write anything [to the state]. I bet the article would have said ‘Newark does not take advantage of emergency aid.’”

Listen to León’s comments here:

The state did invite districts to apply for additional aid, as it does every year. But districts are supposed to make a request only if the additional funds are essential to their operations. This year, nearly 200 New Jersey districts saw their state funding decline, but Newark did not.

Still, Newark does face very real budget pressures. León’s ambitious “Clarity 2020” plan to improve the district’s schools will be costly — and the district already says hundreds of millions of dollars of repairs are needed to its aging school buildings. The letter to the state said the district had to eliminate some teaching positions and put off repairs in order to balance the budget. It also said the district would not be able to make required payments to local charter schools without more state funding.

The state is likely to allocate emergency aid later this fall; last year, it parceled out funds to 13 of the more than 50 districts that applied.

Even if Newark does make the cut this year, it’s unlikely that the district will get most of the funding it applied for. The state has set aside $20 million for emergency aid this year — far more than last year’s $6.8 million, but well below the level requested not just by Newark, but by several other districts as well. Paterson, for example, requested nearly $25 million.

The board passed a resolution last week endorsing the district’s request for emergency aid.

Roger León has been Newark’s superintendent for 1 year. The board is already considering a contract extension.

2019-08-23T22:45:57+00:00

Just one year into Superintendent Roger León’s three-year term, the Newark school board is considering extending his contract for an additional two years.

The board hired León last year to steer the schools back to local control. Now, it could soon ink a deal to keep him in charge of the school system until 2023 — rather than 2021, as his contract currently stipulates.

The revelation came at a sparsely attended public hearing, held half an hour before the board’s regularly scheduled meeting on Tuesday. The hearing was not listed in advance on the district calendar on the board’s website, although a district official said the board had complied in other ways with laws requiring that the public be alerted.

Yolanda Johnson, a parent activist, said she arrived early for the regular meeting — where León’s contract was not discussed — and was surprised to see another meeting taking place. She said she supports León’s leadership but thinks the board would be premature to extend his contract.

“I personally love him, and I see his vision,” Johnson said. However, “the community wasn’t there, and the parents weren’t there. It should have been advertised so we could be in the know.”

A person with knowledge of the situation said the board could vote on the contract extension as soon as next week, when it is scheduled to meet at the district central office on Broad Street on Tuesday. (The board is also holding a retreat, which is open to the public, Saturday morning at its central office.)

The source said the contract extension reflects León’s original request when he agreed to shepherd the Newark district through a period of significant change, after decades of tumultuous state control.

A contract extension would amount to a major vote of confidence in León’s leadership, as the superintendent is just getting started on his plan for elevating achievement in the district. He released a one-year plan this summer and promised that a 10-year plan would follow.

Newark Teachers Union president John Abeigon said he supports the board’s move to guarantee León more time in charge of the district’s schools.

“It takes a while. It took the state eight years to completely destroy and bankrupt the district,” Abeigon said. “I would imagine giving the new superintendent, who is actually an educator in contrast to the two predecessors, time to rebuild the system they destroyed.”

So far, León has started to restructure the district bureaucracy, but many of his school changes haven’t gone into effect yet. And little information about how the district fared under his first year has been made publicly available. State test scores and official graduation rates have not been released, and the district has also not yet released information about attendance and enrollment, two of León’s top early priorities.

Plus, parents in the district haven’t gotten a sufficient chance to influence León’s planning, Johnson said.

“Last year, León had the opportunity to undo some things with a big overhaul of principals,” she said. “But parents want to weigh in more.”

León has indicated at multiple board meetings that promising data is on the way, and the board conducted an official evaluation of him earlier this summer. While it did not make the results available, board members have praised León’s leadership at public meetings.

That continued at this week’s meeting about his contract, Johnson said.

While contract extensions more typically happen closer to the end of their term, school boards sometimes do renegotiate superintendents’ employment contracts earlier. This summer, for example, Randolph Township’s school board extended the local superintendent’s employment until 2023, just one year into her contract. (She had been leading the district since 2016.)

León’s extension also comes amid major changes to New Jersey law governing superintendent contracts. This year, the state removed a cap on superintendent salaries.

Also this year, a state appellate court ruled that boards must give the public 30 days’ notice and hold a public hearing before extending superintendents’ contracts. (One board had tried to evade those requirements by arguing that extensions are similar to contracts with new hires, which are not subject to the same rules.)

Newark parent Shanaya Thomas said she thinks it’s too soon to consider extending León’s contract. If anything, she said doesn’t think it should be extended at all — but as a frequent board meeting attendee, she said she’s mostly disappointed she didn’t know about this week’s hearing.

“I feel like they were trying to keep secrets,” she said. “They don’t want our opinion. Give us a chance to say if we want you back in there. That’s our right as parents.”

León’s staffing shakeup continues: 15 new principals to take the helm of Newark schools

2019-08-06T04:19:00+00:00

Newark’s newest school leaders include a dozen people who have worked their way up through the district’s ranks, the former principal of a local charter school, and an educator who is returning to the helm of one of the city’s most struggling high schools after nearly a decade.

With school starting in less than a month, Newark Public Schools has announced its principal lineup for the year. The changes mean that almost a quarter of Newark Public Schools will have new leaders in the upcoming year.

Earlier in the summer, Superintendent Roger León promoted principals and district veterans to fill district leadership positions. Other principals retired, resigned, or lost their jobs, according to documents from the city school board’s June meeting.

Fifteen new principals will be filling those vacancies, León announced Monday.

“I am excited to start the year with such a talented group of leaders,” León said in a press release. “We know they have the passion, the drive, and track record for advancing student achievement.”

Most are internal hires who began their careers as teachers in Newark, reflecting León’s preference for hiring administrators who are already familiar with the city’s schools. They include Camille Findley-Browne at the West Ward’s Mount Vernon Street School and Kenneth Montalbano at Luis Muñoz Marin School in the North Ward, where the principal positions opened up after León promoted school leaders to district leadership positions.

But three of the new hires come from outside of the district, including one from a local charter school. In an especially notable appointment, León chose Jose Aviles to run Barringer High School, one of New Jersey’s lowest-performing high schools. Aviles held that position from 2008 until 2010, when he was demoted by then-superintendent Clifford Janey, who said that despite Aviles’s popularity with students, he was not up to the challenge of running a large high school. Since then, Barringer has had a rotating cast of administrators who have tried to improve the school, while Aviles worked for Newark’s KIPP charter network before running schools in other districts and earning a doctorate in education administration.

Here’s the full list of principal appointments that León’s office released Monday:

American History High School — Allison DeVaughn, formerly the “chief innovation officer,” a top administrative position, at Malcolm X Shabazz High School
Barringer High School — Jose Aviles, most recently a principal in Franklin Township
Benjamin Franklin School — Amy Panitch, who is moving up from her position as vice principal
Dr. William H. Horton School — Hamlet Marte, who is moving up from his position as vice principal
Early Childhood Centers — Jeanne Ramirez, formerly the chief innovation officer at Elliot Street School
East Ward Elementary School — Rosa Monteiro-Inacio, formerly a vice principal at the Ann Street School
Harriet Tubman School — Angela Davis, formerly vice principal at the Camden Street School
Lincoln School — Hillary Dow, who has most recently been working as a special assistant supporting a dozen Newark schools. Dow is also a leader in EdCamp Newark, a group of local educators working to provide professional training for their colleagues.
Louise A. Spencer School — Karla Venezia, who is moving up from her position as vice principal
Luis Muñoz Marin School — Kenneth Montalbano, formerly vice principal at the school. He replaces Maria Ortiz, now Newark Public Schools’ executive director of student life.
McKinley School — Carlos Reyes, formerly a vice principal at Park Elementary School
Mount Vernon Street School — Camille Findley-Browne, who was until last month the vice principal of First Avenue Elementary School. She replaces David Scutari, now León’s executive assistant.
Newark Vocational High School — Kyle Brown, formerly a vice principal at West Side High School
Quitman Street School — Justin Avery, formerly an assistant principal at Teaneck’s Thomas Jefferson Middle School
University High School — Genique Flournoy-Hamilton, the former principal of Marion P. Thomas PAC Academy, part of a Newark charter network.

Not on León’s list: the prestigious Science Park High School, which will be led this year by Angela Mincy, whose departure from Barringer High School created the opening that Aviles will fill. Some schools have not yet announced their new leaders, including Elliot Street School, whose former principal Nicole Johnson has been promoted to deputy superintendent of Newark schools.

Correction: This story has been corrected to reflect that Genique Flournoy-Hamilton was the former principal of Marion P. Thomas PAC Academy. An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that she was the former principal of Marion P. Thomas High School of Culinary and Performing Arts.

We read Roger León’s Clarity 2020 plan for Newark’s schools so you don’t have to. Here’s what to expect in the next year.

2019-07-15T20:34:49+00:00

Roger León’s Clarity 2020 plan for Newark schools, unveiled last month, has 168 action items. We’ve broken them down so students, parents, and educators can know what to expect in the upcoming year.

Some of the items are concrete and measurable, such as creating a system that flags struggling students. Others, such as pairing every Newark student with a mentor, name goals that seem challenging to achieve in just a year. Some outline plans to collect information that would allow changes to be made in the future. Much of Clarity 2020 is open-ended, listing areas where the district still needs to come up with detailed plans.

León has already gotten started on some of the agenda items but others have yet to undergo public discussion or action. What happens with the plan matters for León’s future, and that of the city’s schools, as observers are watching closely to see whether his ideas translate into action and improvements for students.

We’ll be tracking what happens to the promises — and will update them when León delivers a more detailed, decade-long plan that he has said is coming as soon as next year.

Here are the Clarity 2020 plan items, broken down into changes that students, guardians, and educators in Newark could see in the next year.

Newark seventh graders listening to Superintendent Roger León in September.

Students should see changes to their school buildings, how they get to school, and what happens if they fall behind.

Renovate school buildings: The district plans to make sure students attend class in “state of the art buildings and classrooms with the light, heat, space, air, and technology needed to learn and compete globally.”

This could be hard because … many Newark schools are in disrepair, with leaking roofs, faulty heating and cooling systems, and outdated technology. Despite a court order requiring the state to replace Newark’s dilapidated schools, the state has only funded a fraction of the repairs Newark requested — and it has no plans to build any new schools in the district.

Revamp special education: The district says it will place students with disabilities in the “least restrictive environment,” analyze how often black and Latino students end up in special-education classes, and train educators and administrators about how to best work with students with disabilities.

This is important because … federal law says students with disabilities should be placed in the “least restrictive environment,” which generally means classes with non-disabled peers whenever possible. (New York City’s recent push in that direction resulted in more students with disabilities attending integrated classes and also raised concerns about how well they are being served.) Nationally, black and Latino students students tend to be referred to special education more often than their white and Asian peers.

Support the “whole child”: The district will develop programs to support students’ physical and mental health, embed “health and social services coordinators” in every school, and train staff to help students cope with trauma.

To accomplish this … the district wants to fill schools with social services for students and their families. This “community schools” approach has been tried before in Newark, with mixed results. It is expensive, complicated to pull off, and won’t by itself improve student achievement. But advocates say that students cannot learn until they feel safe and their physical and emotional needs are met.

Catch struggling students: The district plans to create a system that flags when students are struggling and prompts schools to come up with strategies to improve their attendance, academic achievement, and likelihood of graduating on time.

To accomplish this … Newark could draw from successful models in Chicago and the Bronx where schools actively work to identify struggling students and intervene before they fall too far behind.

Extend learning beyond the classroom: The district plans to work with local businesses and colleges to create more internship and apprenticeship opportunities and to pair every student with a mentor.

To accomplish this … the district can build on existing career-focused efforts, including a summer jobs program run by the city. Outside groups, like Schools That Can-Newark, specialize in helping schools provide real-world learning experiences for students. But finding mentors for all 36,000 students, or even a subset of them, could prove much harder.

Get students to school safely: The plans calls for “comprehensive transportation plan” developed in partnership with the city and New Jersey Transit, as well as the expansion of a program that places adult monitors along the routes that students walk to school.

This is important because … families have long called on the district to offer transportation to more students, especially after the district stopped automatically assigning students to their nearest schools and instead allowed them to apply to schools anywhere in the city. Providing transportation to more students and monitoring students who walk to school could help reduce absenteeism and give families access to more school options. (The “Safe Passage” program that places monitors on students’ routes to schools is already expanding.)

Newark families will get more support under the Clarity 2020 plan.

Parents and guardians should get more help getting involved with their children’s schools and learning.

Help parents prepare their children for school: The district says it will make sure parents have access to prenatal care, health insurance, and immunizations; develop a “Healthy and Ready to Learn” plan for children entering preschool; and support teen parents.

This is important because … children from low-income families enter school far behind their higher-income peers. León wants to tackle that phenomenon, which researchers call the “school readiness gap,” by starting to support students “while the baby is in the womb.” While research has shown that increase access to preschool and support for new parents can help close that gap, it will be an expensive and demanding proposition for the district to extend its services to thousands of younger children and their parents.

Get families involved: The district plans to establish parent organizations in every school that encourage families to get involved in school and district policy. León also plans to launch a “Superintendent’s Council of Parents.”

This is important because… students’ grades and graduation rates can increase when their families are more involved in their education. However, schools sometimes struggle to draw parents in and many parents don’t feel welcomed or valued at their children’s schools. And it’s unclear the degree to which León wants parents to play a concrete role in decision-making — a question that has generated tensions in other districts’ parent engagement efforts.

Improve communication with families: The district says it will create an app to keep families informed about district news and resources; put out information in multiple languages; and use electronic billboards to send “essential messages.”

This is important because … parents often say they’re unaware of what’s going on at their children’s schools or across the district. While better communication with families is a start, some observers say the superintendent and school board need to be more transparent about the policies they’re pursuing and changes they’re making.

Educate parents: The district will offer parent workshops, create a “Parent University,” and prepare a home-based learning program for parents.

This could be … similar to New York City’s “Parent University,” which taught parents how to navigate their child’s education, or Detroit’s “Parent Academy,” which allowed parents to enroll in free parenting and career courses. Either way, parents who participate are likely to be more involved in the school system — a major goal of Clarity 2020. However, it’s still unclear what Newark’s parent-education program will actually do.

Tamara Leveridge, a sixth-grade teacher at Ivy Hill School in Newark, is the district’s 2019 Teacher of the Year.

Teachers and administrators should experience more concerted efforts to help them improve.

Facilitate collaboration: The plan calls for “professional learning communities” among school staffers, including by enable principals to visit each other’s schools and give feedback.

This sounds similar to … former New York City Schools Chancellor Carmen Farina’s approach to strengthening her school district. Her “Learning Partners” program emphasized collaboration among district principals and teachers. Lauren Wells, a consultant who helped write Clarity 2020, has said that one of the district plan’s tenets is “helping schools work together rather than in isolation.”

Diversify the teaching force: Newark plans to work with universities and outside groups to recruit and retain more black and Latino male educators.

This is important because … research shows that when students have teachers who look like them, their performance improves. While roughly 90 percent of Newark students are black or Hispanic, only about 57 percent of their teachers are. Other districts are also looking to hire more nonwhite teachers; in 2018, New York City launched a $16 million program called NYC Men Teach aimed at recruiting and training male teachers of color.

Provide more training: The district is planning to train educators on an array of topics, from how to respect students’ cultures (known as “culturally responsive education”); how to develop students’ social-emotional skills and help them cope with trauma; and on the “science of learning.” School leaders would also get more coaching and mentoring under the plan.

This is important because … students and parents have complained about cultural insensitivity at some Newark schools. Training faculty to embrace students’ cultures and recognize their own biases is one way to combat that problem. In general, much on-the-job teacher training has been found to be ineffective in changing teacher practices and improving student learning. Yet experts say that well-designed training that gets teachers to work together and provides coaching — two components of Clarity 2020 — can improve teacher effectiveness. The plan also plugs Newark into a robust national discussion about the need for teaching practices to reflect the latest understanding of how children learn.

Create pathways to promotion: The district plans create a program to develop “leadership capacity” in teachers and principals and to help “per-diem staff” (such as classroom aides) move into permanent roles.

This is interesting because … León has made clear that he wants district leaders with extensive experience working in schools, so creating a leadership program for educators could be a way to prepare them for central-office roles. Giving teachers and principals opportunities for career advancement could also help keep them in the district.

León appoints Newark school district veterans to oversee academics, facilities, and student support

2019-07-12T14:05:01+00:00

A year after forcing out officials hired by his predecessor, Newark superintendent Roger León is staffing up again — promoting principals and other district veterans to fill leadership positions he says are crucial to moving the city’s schools forward.

The new top-level administrators are: Mary Ann Reilly, who will head up teaching and learning; Steve Morlino, the incoming executive director of facilities management; and Maria Ortiz, the new executive director of student life. They join Nicole T. Johnson, a principal who was recently promoted to deputy superintendent, and David Scutari, another principal who will now serve as León’s executive assistant.

All currently work in the district or previously have, a reflection of León’s preference for hiring administrators who are intimately familiar with Newark schools. His immediate predecessors, Christopher Cerf and Cami Anderson, were criticized for filling many top positions with consultants and others from outside the district.

León has also abolished some job titles that his predecessors gave their top lieutenants — including chief strategy officer, chief talent officer, and chief academic officer — and restored departments that were eliminated or renamed, such as human resource services, teaching and learning, and student life. In many ways, León is returning the district bureaucracy to how it looked before Anderson and Cerf arrived.

“Part of what we want to do is take advantage of the fact that I not only know this city, but I also know this organization,” León said at a budget presentation in March where he outlined some of his planned changes.

The school board approved León’s personnel decisions at its June meeting, though León and the board did not discuss the new appointments publicly. Typically, the district posts the agendas of board meetings online so the public can see what items were voted on, including staffing changes. Yet the district has still not posted the June agenda more than two weeks after the meeting.

The latest promotions mean that several more schools will be getting new leaders. Johnson was principal of Elliott Street School in Newark’s North Ward, Scutari was principal of Mount Vernon School in the West Ward, and Ortiz was principal of Luis Muñoz Marin School in the North Ward. And at least six other principals are retiring, resigning, or losing their jobs, according to board documents. No replacements have yet been named publicly.

As the assistant superintendent of teaching and learning, Reilly will have a full plate. The role involves overseeing teacher recruitment, curriculum and textbooks, teaching strategies, school improvement plans, support for principals, and more, according to a district job posting.

“I don’t want to call it the brains of the operation, but it is the critical component of what occurs in classrooms in front of children,” León said about the teaching and learning department at a May board meeting.

The position was vacant last school year. That left the previous deputy superintendent, Gerald Fitzhugh II, who stepped down last month, to take on many of those duties.

Reilly was Newark’s literacy director from 1997 to 2001, which involved overseeing English and social studies across the district, according to her LinkedIn account. Since then, Reilly, who has a doctorate in English education from Columbia University, has worked as an administrator in other districts, a college professor, and an education consultant.

After the board approved her appointment at its June 25 meeting, Reilly said on Twitter that she was “joining a dynamic team dedicated to securing better outcomes for all learners.”

Ortiz’s role as executive director of student life makes her the district’s “leader and expert” in student support services, according to a job posting. The student support services department, which did not have a leader for most of the past year, will oversee school counselors, social workers, and attendance counselors, León said in May.

Ortiz will also write the student support curriculum, lead the committee that chooses textbooks, design staff trainings and parent workshops, and collaborate with the heads of the special education and bilingual departments, according to the posting.

After arriving in Newark from the Dominican Republic as a child, Ortiz graduated from the former Science High School and went on to become the city’s first Dominican principal, according to her biography on the district website. A resident of Newark, she is earning a doctorate from Seton Hall University to add to her two master’s degrees. “Her commitment to education is led by her passion for culturally relevant pedagogy, special education, social justice, and bilingual education,” her biography says.

León brought on Morlino as a consultant earlier this year to advise the district on managing its facilities and help write a five-year building plan to replace one that expired last month. He previously worked in the district for 15 years overseeing facilities and other departments. Most recently, he oversaw the facilities for Paterson Public Schools before he was fired in May; Paterson officials did not disclose the reason for his termination.

Now, he will have his hands full trying to rehabilitate Newark’s aging school buildings. Many are plagued by crumbling roofs and outdated electrical systems; and despite a court order saying New Jersey must repair or replace Newark’s schools, the state has mostly allowed them to deteriorate.

“The majority of our schools are requiring repairs that go from basics to major health and safety issues that are of great concern,” León told state lawmakers in March.

Newark school buildings raised safety concerns. Why haven’t they been fixed?

2019-07-09T22:02:50+00:00

Newark’s school buildings desperately need fixing. Yet, despite a longstanding court order that the state replace Newark’s crumbling schools, no help is on the horizon.

In 2016, New Jersey’s education and school construction agencies offered to pay for urgently needed repairs in certain school districts. The projects had to address school conditions that could cause “imminent peril to the health and safety of students and staff.”

This was exciting news to Newark officials, who knew the district’s schools were in serious disrepair. They catalogued the most egregious problems: falling roofs, obsolete fire alarms, faulty heating and cooling systems, broken windows, and deteriorating doors. Ultimately, they asked the state to fund more than 150 projects at an estimated cost of $311 million.

Nearly a year later, the state responded. The education department approved just 11 projects in Newark — a fraction of what district officials said was needed to make their buildings safe and sound.

This week, the Schools Development Authority, the state agency tasked with overseeing the repairs, said that seven of the projects are expected to be completed this year at a cost of $3.2 million. The others, including two additional projects approved after 2017, will not be completed until at least 2020 — four years after the district requested the urgent repairs.

That leaves dozens of Newark schools still needing major fixes — and new superintendent Roger León facing pressure from advocates and families alike to improve their conditions. He has taken early steps to tackle the problem, commissioning a detailed inspection of the district’s more than 60 school buildings and setting aside funds for renovations in his budget.

But it remains unclear how the cash-strapped district will pay for the full range of repairs that are needed without more money from the state.

“Ultimately, we don’t have the dollars to actually fix everything that is wrong in our respective schools,” León said at last month’s school board meeting after Deborah Smith-Gregory, president of the Newark NAACP, called for immediate repairs. “The state of where we are now is not good.”

Newark’s schools are old and, in many cases, crumbling. Officials say the average age of its buildings is more than 90 years. The oldest, Lafayette Street School, was built in the 1840s — more than a decade before Abraham Lincoln became president, as León has noted. Last year, four of its ceilings collapsed, displacing students for several weeks.

Newark is one of 31 high-poverty districts where the state has been court-ordered to fully fund the construction and renovation of school buildings. The Schools Development Authority has issued more than $11 billion in bonds to pay for that work, which includes some 850 completed projects.

Much of the money has gone towards repairs in Newark. But many of the aging buildings will continue needing fixes until they are replaced. In 2005, district officials said nearly 40 new buildings were needed. Yet the state has paid for just six over the past dozen years, León told state lawmakers in March.

Today, the Schools Development Authority is almost out of money and cannot afford to add any more new schools to its construction list. And because it has long been beset by charges of corruption and waste, some lawmakers are reluctant to let the troubled agency take out more debt.

Now, education advocates say they may take legal action to force the state to comply with landmark rulings by the New Jersey Supreme Court in 1998 and 2000 that said the state is responsible for the full cost of upgrading the buildings in the poorest school districts, including Newark.

“The court made it clear that a ‘thorough and efficient education’ requires safe and adequate school facilities,” said Theresa Luhm, an attorney at the Newark-based Education Law Center, which filed the original lawsuit prompting the court orders. “It’s not optional — it’s the state’s obligation.”

In the meantime, Newark has been left to grapple with a host of acute building challenges with limited state support.

Nearly a third of the schools have “extensive water infiltration” due to leaky roofs or damaged outside walls, said Jason Ballard, the district’s assistant school business administrator, at a January board meeting. In nine schools, the leakage has led to “possible indoor air-quality issues” due to mold, said Ballard, who added that the district regularly monitors the air in those schools.

Earlier this year, León hired two former Newark educators, Mary Bennett and Raymond Lindgren, to personally inspect every school building.

They found peeling paint, uncovered radiators, and bathrooms with missing sinks and toilets, according to a presentation they gave. Some classrooms lacked air conditioning because the schools’ old electrical systems could not handle the window units that were purchased. Other schools must have student meals delivered to them because they lack full working kitchens. And more than 60 percent of school roofs “need major attention,” Bennett estimated.

In an interview, Bennett said past superintendents did not do enough to maintain the buildings. But now it is León’s job to find solutions, which could include using the district’s current resources more efficiently to make repairs.

“Nevermind who created the concerns,” she said. “The bottom line is: You’re sitting in the chair now — what are you going to do?”

The district recently hired a consultant to help write a new five-year building plan to replace one that expired last month. And the district’s budget for next school year includes nearly $14 million for building improvements.

However, the district’s school business administrator, Valerie Wilson, has said she wants to minimize the amount of money pulled from classrooms to pay for renovations. But with the state unlikely to pay for new buildings, the district will have to find alternative funding sources. Earlier this year, Wilson she was looking into city-issued bonds — effectively loans the city takes out to cover expenses. The money would fund school building projects that the Schools Development Authority will not.

Yet some residents are tired of waiting. The Newark NAACP recently sent León a list of repairs it wants completed immediately so that all classrooms, cafeterias, and bathrooms are fully functional by the fall.

At last month’s school board meeting, a parent of three children who attend Thirteenth Avenue School said the gym is unuseable gym and the library outdated. Students there deserve more than promises of better buildings in the future, said the parent, Regina Underwood.

“You giving them a dream that you’re going to come in and fix up the school,” she said. “Do it.”

During his first year in charge, Roger León started reshaping Newark’s schools — and promised bigger changes to come

2019-07-02T18:51:54+00:00

Roger León had a very big year.

Last July, the Newark native became the city’s first Hispanic superintendent and, owing to the end of a prolonged state takeover, the first in over two decades to answer to the Newark school board rather than officials in Trenton. In the year since, León has met with thousands of local stakeholders, ordered audits of every facet of the 36,000-student system, and boldly promised to make the district “second to none.”

“Right now, the honeymoon is good,” said Brian Taylor, a Newark Public Schools parent and advocate. “He’s homegrown, he cares, he believes, and he’s got the trust of the people in the community.”

But honeymoons last only so long. As he passed his one-year mark Monday, León was grappling with fiscal uncertainties that he inherited from previous administrations, an expired teachers contract, and aging school buildings in need of major repairs — just to name a few of the urgent challenges.

Also on Monday, León’s master plan for the district took effect. León has said it will spark a renaissance at the city’s struggling traditional high schools and marshal the resources needed to meet students’ emotional and physical needs, as well as their academic ones. Now that Newarkers have heard León’s lofty promises and his assessments of where his predecessors went wrong, they’ll be looking for him to deliver changes.

“We’ve got to give him time,” Taylor said. But, “this time next year, it’ll be different kinds of questions being asked.”

Meet the new boss

Last August, just over a month after starting as superintendent, León wanted everyone to know that change was going to come to Newark schools — and fast.

He summoned all 6,300 or so district employees to a downtown arena, where he catalogued his credentials from a towering stage. He had been a student in Newark, a teacher, an elementary and high school principal, and an assistant superintendent, he told the crowd. Now, it was time for a “reorganization” of the system he knew so well.

In recent years, he had watched state-appointed superintendents — white outsiders in a majority black and brown city — close schools and lay off employees, even as the city’s charter schools mushroomed. The changes led to real gains in student learning, but the intervention also incited fury among Newarkers who resented the suggestion, as León’s chief of staff put it, “that we needed an army from all over the place to come in and fix us.”

Those days were now over. To roaring applause, León told his audience that he had forced out more than 30 central-office workers connected to his predecessors. His strategy, he said, would be to grow the district, not downsize it. He would give educators all the support they needed to improve student achievement, without relying on specialists with little classroom experience — “chief of strategy, chief of talent, chief of data.” The only chief “in this house,” he said, would be his chief of staff, a former teacher in the schools where León was principal.

With León at the helm, the state’s largest district was back under local control, governed by a man who knows the city and its schools intimately — and has strong ideas about where to take them.

“I’m not the chief,” León said, his face beaming down from the arena’s Jumbotron. “I’m the boss.”

León addressing district employees in August 2018.

Undoubtedly, some of León’s boasting was a form of vindication. The Newark school board had picked him as superintendent years earlier, yet the state installed Christopher Cerf — a former New York City schools official and New Jersey education commissioner — instead. But León’s swagger was also strategic, a way of embodying renewed pride in the city’s schools.

Former Superintendent Cami Anderson, who previously worked alongside Cerf in New York, had portrayed the Newark school system as fundamentally broken and in desperate need of an overhaul — which she attempted with the backing of then-Mayor Cory Booker and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. By contrast, León talks about a district “poised for greatness,” with all the talented students and educators necessary to reach new heights.

“It’s a breath of fresh air,” said Isabel Sousa, an Arts High School teacher, at the August convention.

León began his tenure with an ambitious listening tour, an effort to build consensus for his agenda rather than impose it from above. He sat down with students and college presidents, community activists and union leaders, and held breakfast meet-and-greets with parents. He showcased his fierce pride and protectiveness of Newark, often calling students “babies” and promising to restore the names of schools that had been changed under state control.

“It’s disrespect,” he said at a budget hearing about such tampering with the city’s history, “and we’re not allowing that, in whatever shade.”

But if anyone thought León planned simply to celebrate the system’s strengths, and overlook any deficits, he quickly disabused them of that notion. At the August convention, he called out schools with the lowest test scores by name. In later meetings, he called the student achievement data “ugly” and “atrocious,” and the curriculum used by many schools “horrible.”

Despite the recent academic progress in Newark, León suggested that many of his predecessors’ policies had failed. He mocked Anderson’s “Attend Today, Achieve Tomorrow” attendance campaign. “You can see they don’t attend today, so they don’t achieve tomorrow,” he said in August. Later, he declared that her and Cerf’s efforts to give principals more authority had backfired: “This whole autonomy concept went buckwild,” he said.

His solution has been to impose new mandates meant to create consistency across schools, and to tell everyone — from students and parents to teachers and central-office staff — that he expects to see results. “It’s all about accountability,” he said at an August school board meeting.

In some ways, his no-excuses style is not so different from his recent predecessors. But whereas their message could sound shaming or condescending coming from outsiders, it’s accepted as tough love when delivered by a lifelong Newarker — the son of Cuban immigrants, León still lives in the same neighborhood where he grew up and went to school.

“Roger is known to the district,” said Nitia Preston, who was the parent liaison at Peshine Avenue School before deciding to leave at the end of this school year. She said she appreciated León’s demanding approach, which she said spurred her colleagues to up their game.

“People were basically saying, ‘Get your stuff together,’” Preston said. “Because Roger is not playing.”

Echoes of the past

With a quarter-century of experience working in the district, León started as superintendent with firm convictions about which policies worked — and which didn’t.

Just as the school year was starting, León began to eliminate those he deemed failures. He ended a program that gave struggling schools longer days, forcing the schools to quickly adjust their hours and bus schedules. He discontinued an online math curriculum, leaving some high schools to use years-old textbooks while the district sought replacements. And after personally reviewing hundreds of student transcripts, he mandated changes to the way high school courses are scheduled. For instance, he ordered schools to split up block schedules that offered extra-long periods of English and math, requiring schools to revamp students’ course loads mid-year.

Even when educators agreed that certain policies were flawed, some felt the changes were rushed and imposed with little warning — a disruptive approach that had galled Newarkers when adopted by Anderson.

León “doesn’t seem to think through the human cost of these decisions,” said a high school teacher who left the district in October, speaking on the condition of anonymity to avoid retaliation. “All of those changes led to me leaving — I had a full-on breakdown.”

León at a school board meeting in November 2018.

At the same time, León moved to restore past practices that his predecessors had abandoned. He began to reboot vocational programs that high schools had in the early 2000s and rehire attendance workers who were laid off six years ago. He revived a reading program the district used when he was principal, and brought back a requirement that students take an entrance exam if they want to attend one of the city’s elite magnet schools.

Many district veterans cheered the moves, believing that past superintendents had discarded the policies before giving them a chance to succeed. But the approach has also left León open to the charge that he is simply resurrecting pet programs without evidence of their success.

“Some people will assume we’ll just do something from the past that didn’t work,” he said during a state hearing in June. In fact, he said, “What we’re doing is taking something that worked. We’re saying, ‘We learned over the years what were some issues,’ and we’re kind of upgrading it.”

But, to the surprise of some observers, León has embraced a more recent policy: school choice. Both Anderson and Cerf had endorsed the growth of Newark’s charter schools, whose enrollment more than tripled over the past decade. Charter critics, who accused the previous superintendents of trying to shrink or even privatize the traditional school district, expected León to take a tougher stance on charters.

Instead, he has praised the work of some charter school networks and sent district employees to be trained by them. More significantly, he convinced the school board to retain an online enrollment system that allows families to apply to charter and traditional schools in one place — despite calls by community activists and some board members to dismantle the system, which they say funnels students into the charter sector.

“There were people warning me that he would be terrible for charter schools — and that has not been the case,” said Kyle Rosenkrans, a former charter school official who heads a new group promoting district-charter cooperation. “He’s been a willing collaborator and an open-minded, pragmatic, enthusiastic partner. In that sense, he defied the expectations that many had of him.”

Long road ahead

For most of the school year, few people were privy to León’s full agenda. ”He articulates his plan from his head,” a former board member said in November.

Last month, he unveiled a district roadmap for all to see. The plan for next school year touches on nearly every aspect of the school system — from teacher training to student support services to school budgets and buildings. The plan “will help us change the course of history,” León wrote in a newsletter to families.

Yet the document provides scant details about the dozens of new initiatives it lists — a point made even by people who support the superintendent’s vision.

“The overall premise is a good one,” said John Abeigon, president of the Newark Teachers Union. “We’re still waiting to see more details on how it’s going to be effectuated.”

León at an event for his “Clarity 2020” plan in January 2019.

The plan also does not include student achievement goals for next year, making it hard to judge if his program is a success even by its own lights. Officials said such goals will be included in a 10-year plan to be released in June 2020.

Some Newark residents do not want to wait that long to know if León’s reforms are working or to see improvements.

Kanileah Anderson commended León for inviting parents like her to offer suggestions for his district plan. Yet her daughter still had a permanent substitute for most of the school year, and the high school Anderson applied to for the fall said it does not offer the special-education services her child needs.

“I was able to talk to them,” Anderson said of officials in León’s administration. “But I still don’t think anything changed.”

León also has other pressing matters to attend to. He must reach a deal with the teachers union to replace the contract that expired last month. And he must find funds to upgrade the district’s aging infrastructure. Last week, the Newark NAACP sent León a letter requesting that school buildings in disrepair receive any urgent upgrades — including to air conditioners, lights, and bathrooms — before classes resume in September.

At a meeting in Trenton last month where León presented his plan, members of the state board of education praised León’s vision and his efforts to improve student attendance, which appear to be bearing fruit. But they also pressed him for details about his plan, called Clarity 2020. “There’s no good way to say this,” one board member said, “I’m confused on Clarity.”

Another member, Ronald Butcher, said he was “very, very encouraged” by León’s presentation, which included a graph of Newark students’ test scores. But he left León with a challenge.

“Come back to us next year,” Butcher said, “and demonstrate that what you did made a difference in that graph.”

New Jersey’s first all-male public school celebrates its first graduating class

2019-07-01T20:52:00+00:00

The cheers were loud as Samuel Colon’s name was called Wednesday evening to receive his high school diploma.

His family was applauding, and so were his teachers, but the most powerful whoops came from his classmates at Eagle Academy of Young Men in Newark. The 42 graduating seniors were “founding members” of the school, which opened in 2012 as the first all-male public school in New Jersey, and they had traded their signature blazers and ties for caps and gowns after seven years together.

Colon, who will be attending New Jersey City University in the fall, said he wants to come back to Eagle Academy one day to be a teacher or track coach.

“I really want to come back and make an impact on the youth,” he said. “I learned a lot from Eagle, and it played a big role in my life.”

Colon and his classmates entered Eagle Academy in sixth grade with city officials exuberant about the new school, the fourth replica of an all-boys school in Harlem.

“The idea of having a single-sex school focused on our young men — I knew it had the ingredients of greatness,” then-Mayor Cory Booker said during a 2012 speech at the school.

Seven years later, much has changed in Newark. Booker is in the U.S. Senate, and the city’s schools have been restored to local control. Yet the problems that Eagle Academy aims to address are hardly resolved: Many black male students do not complete high school, and many also are involved in the criminal justice system.

“We know that when crime happens within our community, there’s a large population of black and Latino males as a part of that,” Principal Semone Morant said. “We need to counteract that with schools that provide positive vibes such as Eagle Academy to let those young men know that there’s another way.”

To foster those feelings, Eagle Academy teaches its students “real-life” skills, like how to tie a tie, and instills in them the school’s “C.L.E.A.R.” motto — confidence, leadership, effort, academic excellence and resilience. It also assigns them to “houses” named after black male leaders — Malcolm X Shabazz, Nelson Mandela, Roberto Clemente, and Muhammad Ali — with the goal of fostering an intimate community for each student.

This type of community-building, Morant said, makes many of the students feel like their “brother’s keeper.” The phrase, which came up repeatedly at graduation, is also the name of an Obama administration initiative to improve education and opportunities for young men of color.

Yet the strong community hasn’t translated into academic success. Fewer than a third of this year’s graduates met New Jersey’s standards on the 2018 state reading exams, and the school has landed on the state’s list of low-performing schools, meaning that it could face intervention in the future if achievement doesn’t improve.

The school started with 80 sixth graders, but over time half of them exited the graduating class. Some fell behind while others, in some cases, dropped out entirely. According to school officials, after the school was moved from the Central Ward to the South Ward in 2014, many parents were concerned about longer commutes and transferred their sons to other schools.

Morant said new Newark Superintendent Roger León’s ideas about how to boost performance are welcome at his school.

“We’ve really been trying to be aligned with the district’s vision for providing interventions and academic support for all scholars,” Morant said. “We just try to tailor it particularly for the way boys learn, which is distinctly different than young ladies.”

All of this year’s graduates have been accepted to at least one college, school leaders said. Some plan to enter job-training programs or the military.

“You are already eagles,” Newark school board member A’Dorian Murray-Thomas said during Wednesday’s ceremony. “All you have to do is soar.”

Ajani Carter joined Samuel Colon in graduating this week. His mother, Rochelle Green-Carter, said she decided to send Ajani to Eagle Academy because “it was just something different.”

“It was the perfect opportunity for him to have that brotherhood,” she said. “That’s what Eagle Academy is all about — making those bonds that last forever.”

Several Newark schools will lose vice principals, get new leaders amid staffing shakeup

2019-06-27T21:05:33+00:00

Many Newark schools are losing top leaders this summer as Superintendent Roger León follows through on a promise to slim down the corps of school administrators.

And more change could be coming: The city’s school board on Tuesday voted to give León unilateral power to make personnel decisions over the summer.

The changes include at least six schools where principals are retiring, resigning, or losing their jobs, according to documents prepared for this week’s school board meeting. Board members signed off on the changes in the final minutes of their nearly five-hour meeting, without any public discussion about them.

The schools with departing principals are American History High School, Lincoln, Peshine Avenue, Spencer Miller, Quitman Street, and Uplift Academy. Each will be getting new school leaders, but the district has not yet named the departing principals’ replacements.

Another 35 vice principals are exiting their roles; most will not be replaced.

Eleven were not rehired based on their job performance, while 23 are losing their positions due to district restructuring and one is resigning, according to the documents. Some of the vice principals whose roles were eliminated will likely become “department chairs,” a lower-paid school administrator role that León is reinstating.

At a board meeting last month, León said he planned to cut 66 administrative positions, saving the district more than $7 million. He said schools had previously been allowed to create many unnecessary roles.

“We started to make up titles. We have vice principals of ‘culture and climate,’” he said at the May 18 meeting. “I think it’s important, but if all I’m doing is walking around checking out the culture and the climate — I actually need you to watch what’s occurring in the classroom.”

The school board voted to approve the changes at its Tuesday meeting, but there was no public discussion of them or the departure of Deputy Superintendent Gerald Fitzhugh II, who sat alongside León and the board members. Nicole T. Johnson, principal of Elliott Street School, will replace Fitzhugh.

A limited number of paper packets were available at the meeting that listed the names of departing employees, including Fitzhugh. But the packets did not provide details about any of the other personnel matters the board approved, including new hires and promotions, a resolution to eliminate certain positions, and a resolution giving León the power to unilaterally make personnel changes during the period between the board’s June and August meetings.

“You’re not making things transparent to the public as far as governance,” said Denise Cole, an education activist, during the public-comment session.

As of Thursday afternoon, the meeting agenda and documents had not been posted on the board’s public website.

Nicole T. Johnson, North Ward principal, to become deputy superintendent of Newark schools

2019-06-27T20:12:10+00:00

A Newark educator is rocketing from school leader to one of the top jobs in the district.

Nicole T. Johnson, principal of Elliott Street School in Newark’s North Ward, has been promoted to deputy superintendent. In her new role, Johnson will manage the district’s assistant superintendents and help lead efforts around curriculum, special education, and teacher evaluation, among other core district functions.

“They will be charged with the mission-critical task of inspiring, providing thought-partnership, coaching, and holding assistant superintendents and school support teams accountable,” said a description of the deputy superintendent job that the district posted this month.

The Newark school board approved dozens of personnel changes at its public meeting Tuesday, but did not release the names of people who were hired or promoted. Two people with knowledge of the staffing changes confirmed that Johnson was promoted to deputy superintendent. (Johnson and a district spokeswoman did not respond to requests for comment.)

Johnson is replacing Gerald Fitzhugh II, who is stepping down after one year to become superintendent of Orange Public Schools, a small district adjacent to Newark. Johnson will be tasked with helping oversee the rollout of Superintendent Roger León’s new district plan, which he unveiled this month.

The turnover at the top of the district comes amid a leadership shakeup at the school level. At least six schools are getting new principals and nearly three dozen assistant principals are leaving their posts at a time when León is looking to remove excess school administrators.

At the district level, León has said he is seeking leaders with extensive school-level experience. Johnson clearly fits that bill.

She has worked in Newark schools for more than two decades as a teacher, literacy supervisor, vice principal, and principal, according to her LinkedIn account. She began her career in Newark at Bruce Street School for the Deaf, which León has said he wants to transform into “the best school for deaf children in the country.”

Johnson has been a principal for the past six years. At Elliott Street School, she has watched the school’s enrollment nearly double since it moved into a new building in 2016. In the 2017-18 school year, the most recent for which state data is available, Elliott Street served a larger share of low-income students and English language learners than the district overall. Its share of students who met or exceeded state expectations on the annual math and English tests was on par with the district average.

In a February 2018 Facebook post, North Ward Councilman Anibal Ramos Jr. praised Johnson’s leadership.

“Ms. Johnson is an outstanding educational leader and has been a great partner in connecting the community with the schools,” he wrote. “As an alumnus of Elliott Street School, I could not be prouder to have Ms. Johnson as our principal.”

With contract about to expire, Newark Teachers Union says new deal with district is ‘very close’

2019-06-21T20:12:07+00:00

The school year is over in Newark, but a big question lingers for teachers trying to budget for summer vacations or just pay the bills: How much will they earn this fall?

Union and district officials are still hammering out a contract for next school year that will determine how much Newark’s roughly 2,700 teachers are paid and how they can qualify for annual salary increases, which currently are tied to classroom performance. It appears possible that a new agreement may not be reached before the existing one expires at the end of this month, which would freeze the current pay system in place until a replacement is approved.

“Our negotiations team has worked diligently and nonstop to try and get it done by the end of the school year, but that is looking less and less likely every day,” Newark Teachers Union President John Abeigon said in a note to members last week ahead of the final day of classes on June 20. “As long as progress is being made, we will continue to meet with the district over the summer in the hopes of coming to the settlement our members deserve.”

Union officials sounded more optimistic this week about the negotiations, which began in February. They posted a new message for members Wednesday saying, “We believe we are very close to reaching a contract settlement.” The union said to expect details of the final agreement and a vote this summer.

The new contract will be a milestone for Newark — the first since the state ended its decades-long takeover of the district last year, and Roger León, a veteran Newark educator, became superintendent. It will test whether, absent the animosity that soured relations between the union and the past two state-appointed superintendents, the two sides can reach an agreement that satisfies educators while meeting the demands of district management.

The negotiations built off a contract from 2012 that was hailed as “groundbreaking” for linking teachers’ pay to their performance ratings, which are based partly on student test scores. It established $5,000 bonuses for teachers rated “highly effective,” and restricted once-automatic annual pay hikes to teachers rated effective or higher.

That contract — which included hefty raises to win teachers’ support for the merit-pay system — cost the district an estimated $100 million, about half of which came from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and other donors eager to inject private-sector accountability and compensation practices into education. While a majority of teachers approved the deal, many suspected that the bonuses would not be awarded fairly and would disappear after the philanthropic money dried up.

Sure enough, the private funds were soon tapped, forcing the district to scale back the bonuses it offered in the 2017 contract that ends June 30. Now, León must decide whether the merit pay is worth funding through the district budget (at a likely cost to other programs), and whether salary increases should remain contingent on performance.

He and the union have also had to bargain over a number of other contract provisions that tend to attract less attention than performance-based pay but can matter a lot to teachers’ bottom lines, such as salary bumps for advanced degrees and time spent in the district.

But the biggest issue for many teachers is their base pay. New Jersey teachers have some of the highest salaries in the country, even when factoring in the state’s high cost of living. Yet salaries vary widely by district. Newark’s median teacher salary in the 2017-18 school year — $64,848 — was slightly less than the statewide average and well below some neighboring districts, including East Orange and Jersey City, according to state data. Starting teachers in Newark make just $53,000 and must stay for nearly two decades to reach the top of the pay scale.

“My school is hemorrhaging good, young teachers right now because Newark is not paying them enough,” said Branden Rippey, a longtime social studies teacher at Science Park High School and a member of a union caucus calling for higher pay.

Rippey said he knows of at least four Science Park teachers who are headed to other districts that offer more generous compensation — including one educator who said his salary will grow by $19,000 by his simply crossing district lines.

Under the terms of the closed-door negotiations, district and union officials declined to comment. Yet some details about what’s on the bargaining table have already surfaced.

The district budgeted $10 million for next school year to cover the cost of new teachers and a 2.5 percent increase in teacher salaries, according to a district presentation. The average salary increase for New Jersey teachers this school year was 2.9 percent, according to a survey of contracts by the New Jersey School Boards Association.

District officials also agreed, even before negotiations began, to revise a salary system that assigns all teachers to the same pay scale regardless of their education level. In the past, teachers with masters’ degrees or doctorates earned higher salaries. But the 2012 contract ended that practice, creating a single pay scale for new hires that offered a one-time $20,000 bonus for teachers who completed district-approved graduate programs.

However, an arbitrator ruled in 2017 that the district had violated the terms of the contract in how it chose the single approved program. Last fall, León agreed to end the bonus program and go back to the traditional system of higher salaries for advanced degrees, union leaders said at the time. The two sides agreed to work out in negotiations the amount of the salary increases, which will be given retroactively to teachers who earned degrees since 2012, according to the agreement.

“Instead of continuing to try and make an unwieldy, tainted system work, we got the district to agree in writing to work with us on putting the original time-tested system back in place during our next contract negotiations,” Abeigon said in an email to union members in November.

It remains to be seen what concessions the district will demand, if any, in return for those salary increases and any across-the-board raises in teachers’ base pay. While officials may want to contain the cost of salaries and benefits, which account for 94 percent of the money Newark schools receive, they also are acutely aware that talented teachers can find jobs elsewhere if they feel shortchanged by the new contract.

Other contract features that could be up for negotiation include employee health benefits, how much time teachers get for training and lesson planning, and the wages of per-diem teacher aides, who are also covered by the contract and currently earn $15 an hour. Yet another issue is “longevity” rewards, which hike the pay of veteran teachers at certain increments beginning in their 15th year. The 2017 contract ended those raises for newly hired teachers; restoring them could cost the district millions of dollars in the future.

Yvette Jordan, a Central High School teacher and member of the union’s executive board, who is not involved in negotiations, said she hopes a new contract is in place by the time classes resume in September. She said she expects León, a former teacher and principal, to agree to terms that are fair to teachers while still holding them accountable for results.

“He is our biggest cheerleader,” she said. “Yet he also recognizes that we have the most impact on the students in our classrooms, and because of that, our responsibility is great.”

Superintendent León unveils long-awaited plan to build ‘stronger, wiser’ school system

2019-06-14T20:29:40+00:00

After nearly one year on the job, Newark’s superintendent unveiled a long-awaited district plan Thursday that hints at new initiatives while leaving most of the details to be filled in later.

The plan, which Superintendent Roger León crafted with the help of a consulting firm, sets forth a broad theory of change for New Jersey’s largest school district. It is designed to guide the district back to full local governance and set the stage for a more-detailed 10-year plan.

The theory posits that the school system must simultaneously address students’ academic and personal needs, which can only happen through increased cooperation among schools and closer partnership with the community and outside organizations. And it says the district must begin supporting future students while they are still in the womb and continue until they finish college or start careers.

The one-year plan offers a rough sketch of how the district will put that theory into action. Mainly, it lays out a long to-do list focused on analyzing current practices and data and developing new programs and policies.

“This strategic plan is designed to set the foundation for everyone and set the ball rolling,” León wrote in an introduction to the plan, titled NPS Clarity 2020. “We will rebuild a stronger, wiser, and more efficient organization.”

The plan does not include goals for student achievement or timelines for the rollout of new initiatives — both of which are featured in the district’s current three-year plan, which expires this month.

León has previously faced calls from board members to share clear goals for the district. And a document governing the district’s release from state control says the superintendent’s plan should be used to hold the district accountable “for achieving measurable goals that will drive student success.” (A district spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.)

León’s plan references several specific efforts without going into detail. They include hiring more black and Latino male teachers, training current employees to respect students’ cultures and screening new hires for biases, embedding staffers in every school to coordinate support services for students, sending principals to other schools to get ideas and give feedback, and connecting every student with a mentor and internship opportunities.

But many of the strategies mapped out in the plan are broader and call for redesigning every aspect of the school system — from teacher training and evaluation to student transportation, special education, and the district’s management structure. Léon has promised to release a longer-term roadmap for the district a year from now.

“From work defined in NPS Clarity 2020, we will build and launch a ten-year strategic plan that will reform education in Newark beyond the next decade and for generations to come,” he wrote.

León’s blueprint arrives at a pivotal moment for Newark. Last year, the state began the process of ending its decades-long takeover of the district and the newly empowered city school board chose León — a veteran Newark educator — as superintendent. If the district meets the state’s requirements during the current probationary period, the elected board will gain final control over the schools next February.

León, who started in his new role last July, appears to be guiding the district in that direction. A state report, which was completed in March but made public Thursday, found that the district is so far meeting all of the requirements to transition back to full local control. And during a state school board meeting last week, several board members said they were impressed by León’s leadership and the preview he gave of his plan.

“We have a leader who is as good as any superintendent who has ever come before us,” said state board president Arcelio Aponte, adding that he has known León since they were children. “Superintendent León is well-positioned to lead this district forward.”

León’s tenure follows a recent period of upheaval in Newark that began in 2011 under state-appointed superintendent Cami Anderson, who was brought in from New York to overhaul the district. With support from U.S. Sen. Cory Booker and national philanthropists including Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Anderson closed some schools, revamped the enrollment system, and laid off many district employees. Some of the policies were driven by the explosive growth of the city’s charter schools, which now educate a third of Newark students.

León’s plan takes stock of some of those changes. It says the state’s operation of the district showed that “the absence of knowledgeable and skilled voices” from the local schools and community made it difficult to “solve complex problems.” And it asserts that “unchecked competition” between traditional and charter schools “destabilizes the infrastructure and resources of the District while promoting division and discord in our communities.”

Yet the plan also calls for collaboration between the district and charter and private schools. And León said Thursday his plan is not an indictment of previous change efforts.

“It is not a critique of reform practices — the most aggressive that we’ve had over the last seven years,” León said at a launch event for his plan.

León hosted a celebration Thursday, complete with cake, to mark the release of his plan.

The policies of the past decade sparked bitter protests, while the charter expansion strained the district’s budget. Yet student achievement also greatly improved during that period, as highlighted by a new report published Thursday. The district’s test scores and graduation rate have climbed steadily in recent years, and its enrollment has stabilized after years of contraction while the charter sector expanded.

But challenges remain. More than 11,500 students are enrolled in chronically low-performing district schools, according to the report produced by MarGrady Research and funded by the New Jersey Children’s Foundation. District officials have warned of budget shortfalls if the charter sector reaches the full size approved by the state. And the district is still grappling with legal settlements and federal investigations that began under previous administrations, León has said.

“We applaud Superintendent Leon and his team for unveiling a strategic plan to continue the improvement of the Newark public school system,” said Kyle Rosenkrans, executive director of the New Jersey Children’s Foundation, in a statement. He added that “much work remains until we can guarantee every child in the city access to a great public school.”

León’s plan draws on substantial input from local stakeholders — including 2,000 personal conversations he said he had last year and a series of focus groups and forums this spring with educators, students, parents, and community partners.

The planning process was led by a Newark-based consultancy called Creed Strategies that is headed by Lauren Wells. Wells, a former teacher with a doctorate in urban schooling, previously advised Mayor Ras Baraka and helped spearhead an effort to improve several Central Ward schools and infuse them with extra services for students and their families.

After León presented his plan Thursday at Science Park High School, he hosted a celebratory dinner at the school complete with a cake that said “NPS Clarity 2020” in red icing. One of the attendees, Rev. Louise Scott-Rountree, said it is now up to the community to help bring the plan to life.

“We all have to play our part,” said Scott-Rountree, who directs clergy relations for the mayor’s office. “The superintendent can’t do it alone.”

Newark’s 2019 Teacher of the Year is a homegrown educator who wants students to know, ‘You are loved’

2019-06-03T18:08:24+00:00

To understand Tamara Leveridge’s teaching style, read the bright yellow sign on her classroom door.

“When you enter this classroom, you are important,” reads the sign, which also tells students that they are leaders, thinkers, and creators. “You are loved.”

Now the sixth-grade English teacher at Ivy Hill School has been named Newark’s 2019 Teacher of the Year. A Newark native, she is the first Teacher of the Year to be honored by Superintendent Roger León, himself a proud Newarker who was briefly Leveridge’s high school principal.

Leveridge attended University High School, where León was principal during some of her time there, and graduated from Montclair State University. She has been teaching for 11 years — two at Ivy Hill in Newark’s West Ward and six years at Dr. E. Alma Flagg School before that.

Leveridge said she wanted to be a teacher since she was in the third grade, and always tries to bring good energy to her classroom. This past February, she spearheaded a “Living Wax Museum” project where nearly all of the sixth-graders at Ivy Hill dressed up as notable historical figures from their respective cultures. Parents and community members were then invited to the “museum” to learn about people like Rosa Parks and Louis Armstrong from the students who were dressed up as them.

Ivy Hill Elementary School principal Dorrice Rayam said that when Leveridge interviewed for the teaching job, she stood out because of her humble demeanor and the way she prioritizes students.

“She always talks about the kids first,” said Rayam, who nominated Leveridge for the Teacher of the Year honor. “She doesn’t like attention, but she deserves it.”

A teacher from every school in the district is honored each year after being nominated by administrators and faculty in their school, but only one is selected by the district as Newark’s overall Teacher of the Year.

“Ms. Leveridge is an extraordinary professional,” Superintendent León said in a statement, “who, through her compassion and love for students and teaching, is changing lives every day.”

León presented Leveridge with balloons and flowers in front of her students and asked them what they liked most about their teacher.

One of her students, Grace Adzakey, who dressed up as Whitney Houston at the “wax figure” museum, said, “She always tries to help us so we can get better.”

Adzakey, 12, also said that she likes Leveridge’s sense of humor.

“When we are playing around, she makes a joke out of it,” she said.

Leveridge said that playful banter is one of the reasons she enjoys teaching sixth grade.

“They get my sarcasm,” she said.

She emphasized the importance of putting students first and developing relationships with them.

“I think what sets me apart is my passion and relationship with the kids,” she said.

Leveridge, along with the other top teachers in the district, will be honored at a breakfast later this week.

After educators weigh in, Newark schools set to get new textbooks that prioritize diversity

2019-05-24T17:55:32+00:00

When Newark students return to school this fall, they’re likely to see brand-new books.

The district plans to spend $10 million to adopt new English, math, social studies, and science textbooks, according to the budget for next school year that the school board approved in March. The spending is meant to bring consistency to local classrooms and ensure that students are seeing instructional materials that reflect the district’s diversity.

More than 90 city educators spent multiple days recently reviewing textbooks and choosing the ones that students and teachers across Newark should use, A’Dorian Murray-Thomas told her fellow school board members at their meeting Tuesday.

“We really wanted to make sure there was a diverse contingent of educators present who would inform the decision on what textbooks were adopted,” Murray-Thomas said.

The teachers were led by a team of seasoned school administrators, including Darleen Gearhart, principal of Sussex Avenue School; David Scutari, principal of the Mount Vernon School; and Deputy Superintendent Gerald Fitzhugh II.

The main goal, Murray-Thomas said, was to ensure consistency across the district — a valuable arrangement in a city where students frequently change schools, and a significant departure from recent years, when principals were free to design their schools’ academic programs.

Earlier this year, Newark asked publishers to submit bids for the curriculum contracts. The review teams scrutinized the submitted options for their rigor, cultural relevance, and ease of use, then ranked the options. They also checked to make sure some materials would be available in multiple languages.

In math, the teachers chose HMH Into Mathematics, from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, for elementary and middle schools and Envision, from Pearson, for high school subjects. Both curriculums receive high scores for their content and ease of use from EdReports, a nonprofit organization that reviews curriculums.

In English, they chose HMH Into Reading for elementary schools and Into Literature for middle schools. Both curriculums, again from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, are so new that EdReports has not finished reviewing them.

School board members cheered the selection process, saying that the textbooks would ensure that students across the district are exposed to the same high-quality and culturally relevant instruction. Students will benefit, Asia Norton said, from “a continuum from [kindergarten] to first [grade] and first to second all the way to high school, versus having curriculum that is K to 5, then 6 to 8.”

One especially exciting aspect of the selected curriculums, Murray-Thomas said, is that they all prioritize diversity — rather than just the social studies or English textbooks, where it is more common to feature a range of voices and experiences.

“We saw that same diversity — color, races, stories — adopted even into the mathematics textbooks,” she said. “So we see that cultural relevance and really having the products that are reflective of our students isn’t restricted to one subject. This is something that should be across all subjects.”

The review and selection process came during the district’s first year under Superintendent Roger León, a former Newark Public Schools teacher and principal, who has been blunt in his assessment of the textbooks that schools currently use.

“Right now, my argument to you is that our English curriculum from kindergarten to 12th grade is horrible,” he said at a board meeting Saturday, adding that the teaching materials are partly to blame for the district’s “atrocious” academic performance.

He noted that his predecessors, state-appointed superintendents Cami Anderson and Christopher Cerf, gave principals wide latitude to shape their schools’ academic programs. That, he said, led to uneven quality across schools.

“The math in the elementary schools — we have every school doing whatever they want because this whole autonomy concept went buck wild,” he said.

León has also noted that the district does not have a social studies curriculum, and that civics and Newark’s history are not taught — all things he plans to change. He also promised to offer African and Latinx studies, which he said were part of the curriculum at University High School when he was principal.

León also said the district has failed to adhere to New Jersey’s Amistad law, passed in 2002, which requires schools to teach African-American history.

“Amistad is written in the legislation,” he said at a March meeting, “but if you try to find it in any of our curriculum, it is absent.”

The board is set to vote on the curriculum recommendations next week. León said on Tuesday that he hoped board members would sign off on what teachers want — something he said had not always happened before when the district sought advice from educators.

“Your vote on this item next week,” he told the board, “will send the message that when you ask teachers for input, you do something with it.”

Big staffing changes coming to Newark schools, as top-to-bottom overhaul begins

2019-05-21T16:02:11+00:00

Major staffing changes are in store for the Newark school system.

As part of a long-planned district overhaul, Superintendent Roger León is cutting the positions held by dozens of vice principals and other administrators, while also bringing back a school management role that his predecessor eliminated. He is also hiring directors to lead more than a dozen central-office departments, including math, social studies, and bilingual education.

At the same time, hundreds of school employees will see their official job titles change, which could spell pay cuts for some workers, their union warned. Those changes are the result of a 2017 ruling by the state’s Civil Service Commission, which found that previous superintendents had placed 485 employees in non-unionized positions without the agency’s approval.

Now that their titles are shifting, some of the employees will have to reapply for their jobs.

“We can migrate them in there, but they still have to apply officially,” León said at a school board meeting Saturday where he detailed the staffing changes. “Since this is a new title, people don’t have a right to it.”

León added that “good staff” would be retained — but warned that some employees might not make the cut.

“I want the people who aren’t good to go — we don’t need people that are going to delay us,” he said. “This school district, we need people who are going to run forward.”

Key to León’s top-to-bottom reorganization of the district is reversing changes made by his two immediate predecessors, Cami Anderson and Christopher Cerf, state-appointed superintendents who sought to streamline the district’s bureaucracy and give school-level leaders more decision-making power. The prior superintendents pursued those ends by undermining local labor unions and recruiting some school and district leaders with limited classroom experience — methods that rankled León, a career educator whom the local school board named superintendent last year.

“If I have a certificate, people working below me must also have certificates,” León said Saturday, referring to teaching certifications. He added: “This whole autonomy concept went buck wild — and it went buck wild in the central office too.”

León’s overhaul will shake up the corps of administrators who help run the district’s more than 60 schools.

He is reducing the number of vice principals and eliminating the position of chief innovation officer in schools, an Anderson creation that critics considered a tactic to install relatively inexperienced educators as school administrators. At the same time, he is restoring the department chairperson position in schools, which Anderson cut, whose job is to oversee teachers of specific subjects like English and math.

Overall, the cuts will remove 66 administrative positions, saving the district more than $7 million, León said. As the district begins layoffs, more than 100 current administrators will be spared because they have earned tenure.

“This is a scary problem because some of those 101 people may not be worthy of being saved, but they’re protected by the law,” León told the board.

In that regard, he said, he agrees with one of the justifications that Anderson and Cerf gave for their controversial staffing policies — that bureaucracy and union rules can sometimes protect incompetence.

“This is Cami’s argument, and I agreed with her,” León said. “It’s not fair that someone who isn’t good stays in a position because they have more years of experience than somebody who is better.”

One chief innovation officer who has worked in Newark schools for nine years told Chalkbeat that the district recently sent her a termination letter that provided no explanation for her removal. In her role, she helped evaluate and coach teachers, plan staff trainings, and organize workshops for parents, among other duties, said the employee, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because she is considering appealing her dismissal.

“To be discarded this way, it’s humiliating,” she said. “I have lost all respect for this district.”

Some vice principals who are losing their positions will apply for one of the 55 new department chair spots, which could shrink their paychecks by thousands of dollars, one principal said. The principal, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said León’s downsizing makes sense: Vice principals proliferated under Anderson, yet many held specialized roles that were not much different than department chairs.

“Now some people are going to lose money, but they probably shouldn’t have been vice principals,” the school leader said. “There’s no other way to fix that than demoting them.”

The nearly 500 staffers affected by the title change include school operations managers and community engagement specialists — roles Anderson established that were originally not affiliated with any union. Union leaders, who criticized the move as a ploy to weaken organized labor and circumvent seniority rules, filed grievances with the Civil Service Commission.

The employees eventually joined the Newark Teachers Union, but the district did not make changes required by the commission until now, said Newark Teachers Union President John Abeigon. As the district reclassifies and eliminates certain job titles, it will match employees with the new positions based on their years of experience in the system, said Abeigon, whose union negotiated the salaries of the new roles with the district.

“We’re going to monitor each and every decision they make,” he said, referring to district officials. “If we come across a decision that has been reached in violation of civil service or seniority rules, we’ll definitely bring it to the board’s attention.”

In the coming weeks, León also plans to hire several top officials, including a head of teaching and learning and a new safety director.

He also is looking for directors to oversee 15 academic departments. Some of the departments are currently run by special assistants who lack the proper qualifications, León told the board. His new hires, which the board must approve, will be required to hold teaching certifications, he added.

“The director is supposed to be able to teach the content that they’re directing over,” León said. “These people must be my very, very best.”

How can Newark’s superintendent improve the city’s schools? Stakeholders weigh in.

2019-05-03T16:47:49+00:00

Now that the state has ended its decades-long takeover of Newark’s schools, residents have a few thoughts about what should change.

New employees should be screened for biases and trained in cultural sensitivity. Parents should have access to GED programs and language classes. And students should have a say in policy decisions.

Those were just a few of the ideas that parents, students, and community partners presented this week to Roger León, Newark’s first locally chosen superintendent since the elected school board regained control of the district last year.

The recommendations emerged from a series of community meetings and focus groups that the district hosted over the past few months. León said they will inform the master plan he is set to unveil next month — the product of a nearly yearlong process of analyzing the current state of the school system and plotting its future.

While it remains to be seen how many of the suggestions make it into León’s final plan, the outreach was meant to signal a break from the past, when state-appointed officials devised sweeping changes to the schools without always consulting local stakeholders.

“Newark is a city that doesn’t want people to tell them what to do,” León said Wednesday during a four-hour presentation of stakeholders’ recommendations. “We don’t like that.”

As part of his planning process, León also ordered extensive audits of the district’s school buildings, textbooks, and teaching practices. The findings revealed some bright spots — but also urgent needs.

Newark’s school buildings, many of which have been in use for a century or longer, have leaking roofs, peeling paint, and student bathrooms with missing sinks and toilets, the auditors said Wednesday. The district has just one mechanical lift for cleaning the gutters at more than 60 schools, the auditors added.

Another audit focused on students still learning English, who account for about 11 percent of the district’s enrollment. The audit found that those students “grew linguistically” from 2017 to 2018, but that the growth was “insufficient to achieve the district’s goals.” It also revealed “significant and long-term gaps” in support for those students and the programs that serve them.

A third audit, conducted by external consultants, looked at the academics and culture in 30 district schools. (The remaining schools will be visited this fall.) Based partly on surveys of parents, students, and staff, the review concluded that most of the schools do a good job managing student behavior, forming partnerships with the community, and establishing “positive, professional, and collegial” cultures.

But the auditors also determined that many principals do not give teachers enough feedback on their craft, teachers mostly ask students “low-level” questions, and students are often unclear about what they are supposed to take away from lessons. Many schools also struggle to recruit and retain staff, the reviewers found.

A Newark-based consultancy called Creed Strategies led the planning process that resulted in the recommendations. The consultants convened nine advisory groups that focused on such issues as community engagement, student supports, and special education. (Creed has not released the names of the group members, but they included representatives of local philanthropies, businesses, and universities.) The consultants also hosted public feedback sessions in each of the city’s five wards, where community members and school employees reviewed student data and proposed ways to achieve better outcomes.

Among the other recommendations presented on Wednesday: let teachers help revamp the way they are evaluated, create a parent resource center, better integrate students with disabilities into general-education classes, design an app to help the district communicate with families, and improve relationships between students and school safety agents.

“Walking into that building, I need to know that I’m going to be safe,” said Yamin Reddick, a student at Central High School. “And if I don’t know you as I security guard, then what are you there for?”

The district’s previous superintendent, Christopher Cerf, who was appointed by the state, also convened a series of public forums to gather feedback for his three-year plan, which expires this year. His predecessor, Cami Anderson, sparked outrage when she announced a district overhaul developed without public input, which called for the closure of multiple schools.

León said he will incorporate the stakeholders’ ideas into his one-year plan, called Clarity 2020, which he is set to release June 13, and into a subsequent 10-year district roadmap. Before receiving the recommendations, he has already launched a number of initiatives, which some critics have said came with few details or stated goals.

But Linda Carter, a Newark education activist and professor at Essex County College, commended León for seeking input for his forthcoming plans from people with a wide range of backgrounds and opinions. Carter, who was a member of one of the advisory groups, said the process should be a model for districts across the country.

“That was an example of valuing the community,” she said. When it comes to making decisions about their schools, Newarkers “haven’t felt in a very long time that they were valued.”

‘Match letters’ are delayed in Newark as families anxiously await school placements for the fall

2019-04-15T20:35:01+00:00

The wait isn’t over yet for Newark families eager to learn where their children will be headed to school this fall.

Newark Public Schools posted a notice on its website Monday saying that letters scheduled to go out on April 15 telling families what schools their children will attend in the fall have not yet been completed.

“We are working diligently to finalize Newark Enrolls match letters,” the notice said. “Please continue to monitor our website for further updates.”

Families with children entering kindergarten or high school in September, or those hoping to switch schools, had until Feb. 15 to apply to up to eight schools for the coming academic year. All of the city’s roughly 70 district-run schools and most of its nearly 20 charter schools participate in the online application system.

Students were supposed to learn Monday which schools the district matched them with using a computer program that factors in family preferences alongside other considerations such as the number of available seats and whether applicants have any special needs.

The district posted an alert about the match letters on its website Monday.

A district spokeswoman said Monday afternoon that she believed “some” matches had been completed, but that the district had encountered technical difficulties. It was not clear whether the problem related to the matching process or the notification letters, which were supposed to be sent to families via email on Monday and available for pickup on Tuesday.

“There is a glitch that we are working on,” said spokeswoman Tracy Munford in an email. “We are asking people to check the home page of the district web site for updates.”

Munford also sent out a notice Monday afternoon saying that a school board meeting planned for that evening had been cancelled.

Monday’s delay is just the latest hiccup in the enrollment process for next school year.

In January, the district delayed by a month a new admissions test that students were required to take in order to get into one of the district’s popular magnet schools, which already consider applicants’ academic and attendance records when deciding whom to admit.

Last fall, the district’s new superintendent, Roger León, and charter school leaders clashed over proposed changes to the district-charter enrollment system, called Newark Enrolls. In response, the charter sector accelerated planning for an alternative system, although that never materialized.

Both sides eventually agreed to continue with a joint enrollment system for at least another year. But some people in the charter sector privately questioned whether León’s administration was prepared to manage the enrollment process — a concern that intensified after the top district officials who had overseen enrollment stepped down last year.

On Monday afternoon, an employee who answered a call to the district’s family support center said she wasn’t sure when the technical difficulties with the enrollment system would be resolved.

“We’ve having a delay,” the employee said. “Just keep looking out on the web page.”

A family engagement specialist at a school told Chalkbeat that she had not received any information from the district about the delay. She said she expected concerned parents to begin calling to ask when they would learn where their children are going to school next year.

“I expect I’m going to get a flood of these phone calls,” said the specialist, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to speak to the press. “There’s always a lot of anxiety around this process.”

Newark moves to end costly pool of displaced teachers, but some staffers linger in it

2019-04-05T17:45:55+00:00

The Newark school system spends millions of dollars annually on teachers who lack permanent placements because their positions were cut or due to performance or disciplinary issues.

For years, the district paid those teachers to help out in classrooms until they were hired by schools or left the system. Recently, officials began to shrink that costly pool of displaced teachers by assigning them to fill openings at schools regardless of whether principals wanted them — a process critics call “forced placement.”

Last year, Superintendent Roger León said all of the unhired teachers, known as “employees without placement sites,” had been assigned to schools, saving the district $6 million by shifting the teachers from the central-office budget to school budgets.

Despite those efforts, the pool of displaced employees has not yet been eliminated, according to a district memo sent to principals this week.

Principals were given two days to decide whether to accept any staffers from that pool to work at their schools next year. Those who are not chosen will have until May 3 to look for positions. After that, the district will place them in schools that still have openings, according to the memo.

It’s unclear how many employees still lack placements, whether they include teachers or other school workers, and how much they are costing the district. A district spokeswoman did not respond to calls or emails.

The pool was established to spare principals from hiring displaced teachers they didn’t want. But critics, including the Newark Teachers Union, say it morphed into an expensive tool for principals to remove tenured teachers without bringing charges against them. While this week’s memo suggests the pool has not been fully dismantled, union president John Abeigon applauded León for taking steps to end it.

“Roger’s actually an educator — you don’t need to explain to him that you’re wasting money and precious resources” by keeping teachers in the pool, Abeigon said. “He began eliminating it, pushing them back into classrooms, day one.”

The pool originated around 2013 former Superintendent Cami Anderson began closing and consolidating under-enrolled schools, which resulted in scores of displaced educators. Rather than allow veteran teachers to find new positions by using seniority rules to take the spots of more junior educators, the district paid them to work as classroom aides and substitutes.

By 2014, the pool had ballooned to nearly 250 unassigned teachers at an estimated cost of $25 million to the district. Anderson asked the state education commissioner for a waiver from the state’s seniority rules that would allow layoffs based on teachers’ performance, not just their years of service. Otherwise, Anderson argued, the district would be forced to remove high-performing junior teachers while retaining seasoned teachers in the pool, who she said tended to be less effective than teachers with permanent placements.

Anderson did not receive the waiver, and the pool continued to swell to over 450 teachers in 2015. Her successor, Christopher Cerf, said he had no choice but to assign those teachers to open positions.

“It was borderline unconscionable and I was forced to do that to protect us from going off the fiscal cliff,” he told NJ.com. “It has the effect of literally force-placing teachers in schools.”

By 2017, the number of unassigned teachers was down to about 100, officials said at the time. Some teachers in the pool faced investigations into their conduct or efforts by principals to remove their tenure, officials have said, and were not placed in schools.

Last year, León suggested that any remaining teachers in the unassigned pool had been cleared out.

In a district-wide email to staffers in September, he said the title of “employee without placement site” had been “removed.” He attributed that to “the success of our teacher evaluation efforts under TEACHNJ in the past few years,” a reference to the state’s revamped teacher-tenure law implying that some ineffective teachers had been forced out of the district. In December, he told TAPinto Newark that any remaining teachers without permanent placements had been assigned to schools.

León also said in September that he got rid of training workshops at the central office for teachers who were removed from classrooms due to investigations or challenges to their tenure, saving the district about $1 million. It is unclear where those employees go now.

But this week’s notice to principals made clear that some employees still are in the unassigned pool.

A principal said Thursday that he had not yet had time to go through the list of employees and that the quick turnaround meant he was unlikely to request any before the Friday deadline. He guessed that the memo may have been intended primarily for principals who were assigned teachers this year and wanted to keep them next year.

Teachers in the pool sometimes face a stigma based on the assumption that they have struggled to find a permanent placement because of poor performance or clashes with supervisors. But that bad rap is not always deserved, said a different school administrator.

“I’ve had some great teachers come from the list,” he said. “And I’ve had some not-great teachers come from the list.”

Newark’s traditional schools need more money, officials say, amid rising charter school costs

2019-03-29T17:31:57+00:00

Newark’s new schools chief has big plans for the district’s $1 billion budget — but he needs your support.

Superintendent Roger León unveiled his new administration’s first budget proposal this week, which included plans to restore programs for gifted students and adult learners, reopen shuttered schools, and replace the teaching materials used in classrooms. To help fund those initiatives, he asked voters to approve a 2 percent property tax increase next month — the first time Newark residents will vote on the district’s budget in over two decades.

“We are asking to have the citizens of Newark to vote yes on the budget,” León said at a Wednesday evening presentation. “These are dollars and programs and services that our students have longed for, that they need.”

León’s presentation was long on promises but short on details, which he said would be fleshed out in a strategic plan later this year. But even as he sketched out his vision for the district, he also described financial threats that could imperil his plans.

About a quarter of Newark Public Schools’ revenue next school year will go to charter schools, whose funding flows through district budgets in New Jersey. The district budgeted for a $10 million increase in charter costs. But if Newark’s charter enrollment grows to its full projected size in 2019-20 — a possibility that officials acknowledge is unlikely — the district will come up $24 million short. It’s a serious enough concern that León traveled to Trenton Wednesday morning to ask lawmakers for more money.

Newark schools are getting a 3.15 percent boost in state aid this year, part of Gov. Phil Murphy’s plan to gradually increase education spending. Yet, as León pointed out to the state assembly members, that raise is smaller than last year’s and still leaves the district with $174 million less than what it is owed by the state, according to a funding formula that has not been properly enacted for nearly a decade. At the same time, the district’s enrollment grew by about 1,000 students this year, León said.

Meanwhile, the district faces several legal settlements and penalties incurred by previous administrations — including a $48 million fine from the IRS — that could come due unless some other remedy is found. As León told lawmakers, he inherited legal challenges “that would scare most school districts.”

The district managed to balance next year’s budget, in part by ending some after-school programs and cutting more than two-dozen unspecified “school support” positions, officials said. But more drastic measures — including hundreds of teacher layoffs — could become necessary if the district’s worst fears materialize, such as the greater-than-expected charter growth or the massive federal fines, officials warned in their pitches for more state aid and higher taxes.

“It’s means closing schools,” León said at the Newark hearing. “It means high unemployment.”

The district budgeted for a $10 million increase in charter school costs. But officials say the amount could increase if the sector reaches its full projected enrollment.

Those worst-case scenarios do not appear probable, at least in the near future. Valerie Wilson, the district’s school business administrator, noted that charter schools do not usually reach their full projected enrollments. And León acknowledged that the doomsday scenario of school closures and widespread layoffs are “not where we are right now.”

In recent years, the district has faced gaping budget holes due to flat funding under former Gov. Chris Christie, declining enrollment, and rapid charter school expansion. Léon’s predecessors responded by closing schools, cutting staffers, and scaling back services for students and parents — moves meant to save money, as well as eliminate some positions and programs that were deemed ineffective.

Now, León wants to reinstate some of those personnel and programs.

His plan calls for a reorganization of the district’s central office that would reboot 11 departments — including English and math, gifted and talented, and career and technical education — that were ended or consolidated by previous administrations. León, who worked in the school system for 25 years before becoming superintendent last July, said he watched many of those departments disappear over the years.

The timeline of that overhaul is unclear, as is the cost and whether it will require new hires. Budget documents simply say “pending availability of funds.”

León, who has tended to announce big plans without sharing many details, declined to be interviewed. He and Wilson referred questions to a district spokeswoman, who did not respond to a list of detailed queries.

The plan León outlined Wednesday also allocates $5 million to reopen several shuttered schools, including Harold Wilson and Newton Street, currently occupied by central-office employees. Those employees would return to the district’s downtown headquarters, requiring a $3.6 million expansion of those offices.

He also proposed numerous academic investments, including $10 million for new curriculum materials and $10 million for 107 additional teachers along with other school workers. He vowed to bring back adult education, such as Spanish and GED courses, and to revamp the district’s special education and bilingual programs.

Both educators and non-instructional staff, such as school guards and cafeteria workers, will receive new training, León said. A new “superintendent’s leadership academy” will help top teachers and administrators move into bigger leadership positions, he added. A budget document lists topics the academy will cover, including Microsoft Office software, telephone and email etiquette, and time management.

León told lawmakers his plans will jumpstart student learning, which he said remains limited even after aggressive reform efforts by his predecessors. (Before a downtick last year, the district’s test scores and graduation rate rose steadily for several years.)

“The academic achievement levels in the district after multiple superintendents are in dire need of improvement,” León said, “and require significant investments in curricular materials, programs and services to begin the road to recovery.”

The Newark school board approved León’s budget on Wednesday. Now, Newark voters will decide whether to sign off on a $2.7 million tax hike to help fund León’s plan on April 16, when they will also choose three new school board members. If they vote down the tax increase, which would raise education-related property taxes to about $1,953 for the average homeowner, then the city council and possibly the state education commissioner would decide whether or not to allow the increase, officials said.

Danielle Farrie, research director at the Newark-based Education Law Center, said the district will remain “dramatically underfunded” based on the state formula — even if it gets slightly more state aid and local revenue this year.

“Even if they aren’t making cuts,” she said, the district is “still not at level of resources where they should be.”

Newark schools backtracked in 2018 on several measures, halting years of progress

2019-03-28T03:01:35+00:00

After years of progress, Newark Public Schools backtracked on a number of key performance measures last school year, including the district’s graduation rate, absenteeism rate, and college-readiness scores, according to state data released this month.

The city’s traditional schools did make modest gains on last year’s state tests, and former officials note that the district’s test scores and graduation rate had grown steadily for several years before last year’s dip. Experts also caution that one-year changes have little bearing on the district’s long-term trajectory, adding that the declines may not be statistically significant.

Still, the signs of stalled progress provide fodder for critics of the district’s previous aggressive changes, and complicate efforts by the architects of that overhaul to claim victory. The new data points could even become darts that U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, the former Newark mayor now running for president, will have to dodge as he highlights his education record on the campaign trail.

For now, the numbers give a boost to Roger León, who became superintendent in July. While León has mostly refrained from directly criticizing his predecessors, last year’s disappointing numbers bolster his argument that “dramatic changes” are needed, especially in student attendance and high school performance.

“All I have to do is look at our student attendance from last year — 86 percent — look at our student achievement data across our schools, to know that there’s a lot of work that needs to be done,” León said at a school board meeting Tuesday, where he vowed to eventually “redefine and redesign” the district. “We need to do a far better job at educating and preparing our students.”

The data, which the state published this month in its school performance reports, show that Newark’s traditional schools slipped from 2016-17 to 2017-18 on several benchmarks. The city’s charter schools, which educate about a third of students, saw their graduation rates and test scores rise last year.

Looking at district high schools, a slightly smaller share of students graduated, immediately enrolled in college, and passed Advanced Placement or ACT exams, which are used in college admissions. (SAT and PSAT scores also fell, but state officials said changes in how they were calculated could have affected last year’s rates.)

In the lower grades, the district’s scores declined in both English and math on a metric that compares student growth to that of peers across the state with similar past scores. But while their relative growth slowed, the share of Newark Public Schools students who met expectations on the state PARCC exams last year increased by about 3 percentage points in English and 1 point in math.

Across the district, a larger share of students also missed 10 percent or more of school days last year, qualifying them as “chronically absent.”

Mark Weber, a lecturer at Rutgers University and an education policy analyst, cautioned against reading too much into the district’s relatively slight backsliding last year.

“Small changes from one year to the next are almost always due to statistical noise,” he said in an email, “and not indicative of the success or failure of particular policies and programs.”

Former district officials, who declined to speak on the record, offered some context they said could help explain the declines. For example, they noted that far more students took the ACT last year, which tends to depress scores. They also said that as Newark students’ test scores rise, the state compares their annual growth to that of higher-performing — and often more affluent — peers across the state, effectively raising the bar each year. And they pointed out that more of the students who did enroll in college last fall chose four-year schools, which have higher completion rates than two-year colleges.

The former officials have also tried to shift the blame for last year’s graduation drop onto the new superintendent, by suggesting that his administration may have failed to remove former students from the rolls or help seniors make up missing credits over the summer — both of which could have dragged down the final graduation rate that was calculated last fall.

León, who could settle that debate, has declined to be interviewed; his spokeswoman did not respond to a request to comment for this story. But León referred obliquely to the former officials’ theory at Tuesday’s board meeting, saying last year’s graduation rate did not go down “because somebody in the new administration didn’t do what they were supposed to do.”

“In fact, my administration does know what it’s supposed to do,” he added, before suggesting that unspecified people under the previous administration were unqualified for their positions. “Ultimately, one of the issues we had is a serious problem in this school district where people were providing guidance without having the necessary certification to actually provide guidance.”

The question of who owns last year’s academic results — both the good and the bad — is complicated by a series of district leadership changes.

Newark’s state-appointed superintendent, Christopher Cerf, stepped down in February last year when the state ended its decades-long takeover of the district. An interim superintendent filled in for the remainder of the school year, after which León became the district’s first locally chosen superintendent in nearly 23 years.

Meanwhile, a yearslong debate has raged over the impact of the district overhaul led by Cerf and his state-selected predecessor, Cami Anderson, and promoted by former Mayor Booker and wealthy donors he enlisted. The overhaul, which began in 2010 and included school closures and new charter schools, outraged many educators and families and ushered in a temporary decline in test scores.

Scores eventually rebounded, largely driven by the expansion of the city’s high-performing charter school networks. But the city’s traditional schools have also made clear gains: scores have improved each year since the PARCC tests began in 2015, the graduation rate has increased by more than 14 percentage points since 2011, and students’ annual test-score growth remains well above 2012 levels even with last year’s decline.

Critics including Weber have questioned whether the recent improvements can be linked to the reforms, noting that similar districts saw test score and graduation rate gains during the same period. Whatever has driven Newark’s performance, its long-term trajectory has been “unquestionably upward,” said Jesse Margolis, an education analyst previously contracted by Cerf to study the overhaul.

“Despite modest declines on several measures last year, over the longer term, NPS has shown meaningful increases in test score performance, test score growth, and the graduation rate,” Margolis said in an email, adding that the city’s charter schools continued to show “substantial gains” last year.

NJIT wants to enroll more Newark students. It’s joining forces with the school district to make it happen.

2019-02-28T02:19:47+00:00

The New Jersey Institute of Technology has called Newark home for nearly 140 years. Yet less than 2 percent of its current students hail from the city — something the public research university is promising to change.

To do that, it plans to tackle the financial and academic barriers that officials say prevent many Newark students from attending.

Through a partnership with Newark Public Schools and the mayor’s office, NJIT will help teach math to students at four district high schools — Central, Malcolm X Shabazz, Science Park, and Technology — and provide training to their teachers, officials announced Wednesday.

The university will also spend more than $1 million on financial aid for Newark students, and offer full scholarships to three Newark Public Schools students each year, officials said.

The goal: to enroll at least 600 undergraduate students from Newark. This academic year, just 200 of the university’s roughly 11,400 total students are Newark residents.

“We can achieve that,” said NJIT President Joel Bloom at City Hall alongside Mayor Ras Baraka and Newark schools chief Roger León. “It’s a comprehensive program.”

The partnership continues a campaign, launched last year by Baraka and local business and higher-education leaders, to increase college attainment in Newark.

In recent years, a growing number of Newark students have enrolled in college. Yet fewer than 10 percent attend selective schools like NJIT, according to a recent study that tracked graduates of district, county, charter, and private high schools in Newark. Instead, the most common destination is Essex County College, a community college in Newark.

One reason that so few Newark high school graduates land at competitive colleges is because many students do not apply to those schools even when they have the grades and test scores to get in, according to the report by the Newark City of Learning Collaborative and Rutgers University-Newark. Researchers call that “undermatching.”

Another cause is financial. Even with tuition assistance, the full cost of attending college is out of reach for many Newark students.

Under the new initiative, NJIT and the district will select three high-achieving students per year — including at least one each from Shabazz and Technology — to attend the university’s Albert Dorman Honors College. Those students will receive full scholarships, as well as paid summer internships with the city.

For all other Newark students, the university will make sure they receive as much financial support as necessary, Bloom said. About 72 percent of students receive some form of financial aid at NJIT, where in-state tuition is $14,174.

“We’re going to make sure that you never leave NJIT for financial reasons,” he said.

The other major admission obstacle is academics — in particular, math. Bloom said Newark students often struggle with math, which is the bedrock of the science, technology, and engineering fields that NJIT specializes in. He attributed that partly to a lack of rigorous math classes in high school, saying many Newark graduates have not studied precalculus or calculus.

The new partnership between Newark and NJIT, called the “Math Success Initiative,” is meant to strengthen students’ math skills at the four high schools. Beginning this summer, a select group of rising seniors will study math for seven weeks at NJIT, while also receiving tutoring and counseling. Eight of their teachers will receive training by NJIT faculty members.

During the school year, the group of 30 to 40 students will continue to take math classes at the university during the week and on Saturdays. They will also get help submitting college and financial aid applications. Meanwhile, 24 teachers will meet monthly with NJIT faculty.

Superintendent León said Wednesday that he is also making district-wide changes to ensure that all graduates are prepared for college-level math. For instance, he is adjusting the sequence of high-school math courses to make sure students have a chance to take advanced subjects like calculus, and is providing additional math training for teachers.

“This is going to change the face of how we teach math in our high schools,” León said.

Career education is poised for a comeback in Newark high schools, but challenges await

2019-02-26T02:29:00+00:00

After a decades-long decline, Newark’s traditional high schools are plotting a comeback.

On Tuesday, the district will unveil a new program at East Side High School to prepare students for teaching careers through a partnership with Montclair State University and the American Federation of Teachers, the nation’s second-largest teachers union. Later, the district is expected to announce similar career-themed “academies” at the five other traditional high schools backed by partnerships with hospitals, universities, and even the tech-giant Google.

“Major initiatives, major work, major dollars,” Superintendent Roger León said last month.

Despite their proud histories and pockets of excellence, the district’s traditional, or “comprehensive,” high schools suffer today from low test scores and graduation rates, high levels of absenteeism, and discipline problems. Many high-achieving students shun them, opting instead to compete for spots in the district’s selective “magnet” schools or high schools run by Essex County or charter school networks — a trend that has made it all the harder for some traditional schools to bounce back.

León wants to end that cycle by generating a new buzz around the traditional schools. To do that, he’s urging a rapid reboot of career academies, which previously existed in each high school but have languished in recent years.

Newark’s return to vocational training reflects a national trend as school districts increasingly focus on preparing students for careers, not just college, and businesses clamor for employees with specialized skill sets. But experts caution that effective career programs demand significant resources, including qualified instructors and up-to-date equipment and curriculums — all of which are in short supply in Newark’s high schools after years of disinvestment by the district.

Under León’s plan, each revamped academy will have a career focus and partner organizations. For example, Weequahic High School’s allied health academy will be backed by Newark Beth Israel Medical Center, RWJBarnabas Health, and Rutgers University, while West Side High School’s business and finance academy will get support from Google and Rutgers, according to school promotional materials. Every traditional school will also be paired with a magnet school, which will offer guidance.

The goal is for students to graduate with industry credentials that will help them find well-paying jobs, whether they choose to attend college or enter the workforce.

But those credentials may not be available for some time: District officials do not expect the new academies to be fully operational until July 2020, according to school board members — despite León’s promises to “move very, very quickly” to rebuild the vocational programs.

“You have a district that has underfunded these facilities, curriculums, and student supports now trying to scramble to piece its career-and-technical-education programming back together,” said Monique Baptiste-Good, former vice president of programs at the Newark Alliance, who co-founded a group dedicated to expanding career education in Newark schools. “It’s going to be a really tough climb.”

The district first embedded a career academy in each high school in the early 2000s. Later, schools added more of the programs, often with the same themes, such as culinary arts, leading them to compete for qualified instructors, according to district veterans.

More recent superintendents, including Cami Anderson, pulled back from vocational education as districts across the country focused intently on preparing all students for college. A central-office team devoted to career education was disbanded; until last year, no district official oversaw that work.

Individual schools continued to offer vocational programs in fields ranging from carpentry to cosmetology to information technology. But many schools struggle to maintain the expensive equipment needed to run the programs or find teachers with industry experience. Few of the programs meet the stringent eligibility requirements for federal funding. And in many cases, students who complete the courses are unable to obtain the industry certifications that employers require.

“Currently, we have academies that are in name only,” León said at an October board meeting. “In all reality, that’s called an elective.”

León vowed to swiftly restore the programs. Each traditional school would have an approved career focus by last fall and the necessary teaching materials and equipment by this spring. “Our timing is very, very short,” he said in October.

Since then, the district has approved academies at every school. Some, such as Weequahic’s allied health program and Central High School’s dental and environmental studies programs, already existed. Others, such as Barringer High School’s law and public safety academy, are new. The district also appears to have lined up outside partners for most if not all of the academies.

Actually getting the programs up and running is a different matter — as the district’s July 2020 target date shows.

Experts say a key challenge will be attracting qualified teachers, who must have a special career and technical education, or CTE, certificate issued by the state. (Individuals with industry experience can get provisional teaching certificates, but must undergo two years of classroom supervision and coursework to become fully certified.) Skilled workers are often wary of the lower pay and strict certification rules that come with teaching, which has contributed to a nationwide shortage of CTE instructors.

Newark must also compete for teachers with Essex County’s four vocational-technical high schools, which tend to have more established programs and better facilities. A recently approved $500 million state bond act provides new funding for vocational programs in county schools and colleges — putting Newark’s district schools at even more of a disadvantage.

Besides teachers, the district also has a limited supply of administrators available to build out the academies. The district’s career education chief, Chamiris Mantrana, became the sole official overseeing that work when she was brought on last year. At the school level, vice principals in charge of career programs are often assigned unrelated tasks that drain their time and attention, experts said.

“If you’re really going to do this, you have to have a person who 24-7 in each school this is all they do,” said Erin Sweeney, executive director of Schools That Can Newark, a nonprofit that is helping several schools develop the academies and co-founded the Newark CTE Network. “I don’t think most people realize the amount of work it takes to pull together even the minimum of what you need for a CTE program.”

District spokeswoman Tracy Munford said the plan is for industry experts to teach at the academies. Montclair State University faculty will teach students at East Side’s new academy, she added. She also noted that the academies are still being developed, and that all new programs face challenges early on.

Deborah Smith-Gregory, a retired Newark high school teacher who is president of the Newark NAACP, applauded León’s plan to reboot the academies. But she said it will take “creative thinking” to secure the necessary resources after years of neglect by the district.

“It wasn’t undone in a year,” she said. “And it’s not going to be restored in a year.”

Years after laying them off, Newark brings back attendance workers to track down absent students

2019-02-21T00:38:57+00:00

A new school-attendance squad is on the job in Newark, ready to phone families and track down truant students.

More than 40 new attendance counselors and truancy officers made their official debut this week — part of a campaign by Superintendent Roger León to curb rampant absenteeism in the district. The linchpin of León’s approach is the rehiring of the attendance workers, who were laid off nearly six years ago amid questions about their effectiveness.

The employees — some new and some returning — will help craft school attendance plans, contact families, and bring truant students back to class with the help of Newark police officers.

They have their work cut out for them: Nearly a quarter of students have already missed about two weeks or more of school since September, according to district officials.

In his drive to boost attendance, León also launched a back-to-school campaign last fall and eliminated some early-dismissal days when students tend to skip class. At a school board meeting Tuesday, León said those efforts have resulted in fewer “chronically absent” students who miss 10 percent or more of school days for any reason. So far this school year, 23 percent of students are chronically absent, down from 30.5 percent during the same period the previous school year, he said.

“Right now, we’re in a really, really good place,” León told the board. “Having hired these attendance officers will get us where we need to go.”

A long to-do list awaits the attendance workers, who will earn between $53,000 and $95,531, according to a district job posting. They will create daily attendance reports for schools, call or visit families of absent students, and make sure students who are frequently out of school start showing up on time.

They will also be tasked with enforcing the state’s truancy laws, which authorize attendance officers to arrest “habitually truant” students and allow their parents or guardians to be fined. Newark’s attendance counselors will gather evidence for potential legal actions, deliver legal notices to students’ homes, and appear in court “when required,” according to the job posting.

The district is also establishing a new “truancy task force” to track down truant students, as required by state law. The task force will include both district employees and police officers who will patrol the streets searching for truants to transport back to school.

The teams will be “going up and down every one of our corridors and getting kids in school,” León said Tuesday, adding that they will eventually be provided buses.

Criminal-justice reform advocates across the country have criticized state laws, like New Jersey’s, which criminalize truancy. As a result of such laws, parents can face fines or even jail time and students can be put on probation or removed from their homes. Meanwhile, a 2011 study found that truant students who faced legal action were more likely to earn lower grades and drop out of school than truant students who did not face those sanctions.

While truancy laws may be on the books, districts have discretion in how they enforce them.

Peter Chen, a policy counsel for Advocates for Children of New Jersey, has studied absenteeism in Newark and said he did not know how the district’s new attendance workers would carry out the law. But he cautioned against “punitive strategies,” such as issuing court summonses or suspending frequently absent students, which can temporarily boost attendance but eventually drive students further away from school.

“Once the school is viewed as the enemy, as somebody who is out to get the student, it’s incredibly difficult to rebuild a trusting relationship,” he said. “And what we see time and again is that a trusting relationship between a school and a family or student is a critical component to building a school-wide attendance strategy that works.”

Superintendent León declined to be interviewed after Tuesday’s board meeting, saying he would answer written questions. As of Wednesday evening, he had not responded to those questions.

At the meeting, he did not rule out the possibility of the district’s truancy officers making arrests. But he said the police officers’ job was not to arrest truant students, only to protect the attendance workers.

“I need to make sure that any staff members that we hire are safe,” he said.

In 2013, then-Superintendent Cami Anderson laid off all 46 of the district’s attendance counselors. She attributed the decision to budget constraints and limited evidence that the counselors had improved attendance.

The district shifted the counselors’ responsibilities to school-based teams that included administrators, social workers, and teachers. Critics said the district was expecting schools to do more with less, and the Newark Teachers Union — which had represented the attendance counselors — fought the layoffs in court. An administrative law judge sided with the union, but then-State Education Commissioner David Hespe later overturned the decision.

León, who became superintendent in July, promised to promptly restore the attendance counselors. However, his plans were delayed by a legal requirement that the district first offer the new jobs to the laid-off counselors, some of whom had moved out of state. By the beginning of February, all the positions had been filled and, on Friday, León held a roughly 90-minute meeting with the new attendance team.

To create lasting attendance gains, experts advise schools to consider every aspect of what they do — their discipline policies, the emotional support they provide students, the quality of teaching, and the relationship between staffers and families. Simply outsourcing attendance to designated employees will not work, they warn.

Superintendent León appears to agree. In an interview last year, he said he expects all school employees to join in the work of improving attendance.

“The last thing that needs to happen is for people to walk away saying, ‘Oh, attendance is going to be solved because now we have the attendance counselors,’” León said. “No, everyone has to worry about attendance.”

Newark reading teachers get help from an unlikely source: a charter school network

2019-01-31T15:38:08+00:00

Dozens of Newark Public Schools teachers got a crash course in reading instruction Wednesday that, on the surface, looked like a typical training.

Seated around tables in the Elliott Street School cafeteria in Newark’s North Ward, the educators underlined key lines in a piece of academic writing — a critical skill for students trying to make sense of a complicated reading. They learned how to gauge the difficulty of a text, which they practiced on a passage from an Edgar Allan Poe story. And they watched a video of a teacher “aggressively monitoring” her students’ reading by asking probing questions and recording their answers.

But this workshop came with a twist: The instructors, materials, and videos were provided by Uncommon Schools, a network of charter schools — schools that are often viewed as district rivals, not partners.

“Personally, I don’t care where it comes from if it works,” said Erica Paich, a literacy specialist in the North Ward assistant superintendent’s office. “For me, it’s about the instructional strategies and best practices to support our students.”

One justification for charter schools, which are publicly funded but privately operated, is that they can function as incubators of innovative practices that can later be shared with traditional schools. But, in practice, such cross-sector pollination is rare — especially in cities like Newark, where district and charter schools compete for students and funding, and critics accuse charters of serving less than their fair share of the neediest students.

Uncommon, which operates several high-performing Newark schools under the banner of North Star Academy, is one of the few examples of a charter organization sharing its strategies with district schools — a partnership that began under Christopher Cerf, the district’s previous, charter-friendly superintendent. Some observers expected Cerf’s successor, Roger León, a Newark Public Schools veteran, to take a tougher stance on charters.

Instead, León has repeatedly signaled his openness to working with the charter sector, which now enrolls more than a third of Newark students. On Wednesday, León said he plans to borrow some effective practices from charter schools as he tries to strengthen and standardize teaching across the district.

“We want to be in conversations with partners who are doing things we’re not doing,” León said during a brief visit to the Uncommon workshop Wednesday, which was a training day for all district teachers. “They get credit for saying they helped us — and we get credit for doing a strategy that worked.”

The district began importing some of Uncommon’s methods after then-Superintendent Cerf visited one of its Newark schools in 2016. After watching how the charter teachers taught reading, Cerf told an aide, “I want to bottle this,” according to an account in the The 74. That led to several Uncommon-led trainings of district staffers, and to a district-run summer program for struggling readers that employed Uncommon’s teaching techniques.

In May, the charter network led a workshop for Newark Public Schools principals on how to coach beginning teachers. To the delight of Uncommon officials, León — who had been selected as superintendent that week — made a brief appearance.

Uncommon has also supported district schools in New York City, using a state grant. (The network covered the cost of Wednesday’s training with private funds; the district was not charged.) Uncommon, which was formed in 2005 and operates schools in six cities, also sells books and training materials that explain its approach.

“Sharing and disseminating our work has just been part of Uncommon’s DNA since we were founded,” said Crystal McQueen-Taylor, the network’s senior director of external impact.

León has partnered with other charter networks, too. In July, he sent some guidance counselors to a three-day training in Texas led by KIPP charter schools. More significantly — and to the dismay of some school board members — he has preserved a single application system for traditional and charter schools, making it easy for families to opt out of the district if they choose.

León’s friendliness toward charter schools may be tested this spring when he creates his first budget. Last school year, about a quarter of the district’s funding went to charter schools.

Many district teachers are quick to point out the disparities between the two sectors — how some charter schools occupy brand-new buildings while theirs are crumbling, or how charters on average enroll fewer students with disabilities or those still learning English than traditional schools. However, some teachers say they prefer to focus less on those divisions than on the sectors’ shared goals.

“We’re all on the same team,” said Isabel Abreu, a fourth-grade teacher at Benjamin Franklin School who attended Wednesday’s training. “We’re here for the education of children.”

Work here, enroll here: Officials want Newark teachers to send their kids to Newark schools

2019-01-23T15:44:00+00:00

UPDATED: Newark education officials think they have a solution to the problem of local teachers racing out the schoolhouse door each afternoon — free tuition for employees’ children.

According to policy, if not always practice, Newark Public Schools employees who live outside the city must fork over tuition if they want their children to attend public school in the district. While officials could not say how many employees currently pay tuition, Superintendent Roger León suggested that some staffers have transferred their children out of the district after being charged.

On Tuesday, the school board voted to eliminate those charges, adding Newark to a lengthy list of school districts across New Jersey that reduce or waive tuition fees for employees’ children. While each district sets its own tuition rate for non-residents, some affluent school systems charge more than $11,000 per student.

Newark officials argue that offering a free education to employees’ children will help with recruitment and keep teachers from rushing home each afternoon to pick up their children from school.

“The idea behind this was to motivate our staff not to leave at the end of the day,” León told the school board during its December meeting.

While the board approved the policy change at its meeting Tuesday evening, it did not publicly discuss the policy Tuesday or release the language of the revised policy.

In previous meetings, several board members expressed serious concerns about the plan, including whether it would saddle the district with new costs and force Newark residents to compete with non-residents for spots at popular schools.

The proposal has also touched on a larger debate in Newark about whether people who earn a living in the city — including educators — have a duty to live there. More than 80 percent of Newark workers live outside the city, according to one analysis. The rate is about the same for teachers, with only about a quarter of Newark teachers residing in the city, according to a former official citing an internal district analysis.

Proponents of the policy change say that, while it may be ideal for Newark teachers to live in the city, making it easier for non-resident educators to enroll their children in the city’s schools will only enhance their commitment to the district. But critics worry the proposal will encourage even more teachers to live outside Newark, depriving the city of their tax dollars and community involvement.

“I would like to see the employees actually live in Newark,” said board member Leah Owens at the Dec. 18 meeting. “That would help to really boost the city as a whole.”

The details of the enrollment policy change remain unclear. Could Newark students lose spots in sought-after schools to the children of employees who live outside the city?

“We will not bump a Newark resident to put in a non-Newark resident,” Tave Padilla, the board member who chairs the committee that oversees enrollment, said at the board’s business meeting this month. “It doesn’t work that way.”

But district officials said employees’ children would have to go through the normal enrollment process. That leaves open the possibility that magnet high schools, which screen and rank applicants, could admit some non-resident students ahead of residents.

Would state funding flow to Newark instead of the students’ home districts? A state education department spokesman told Chalkbeat that, if the board approves the policy change, the district would receive additional state funding to account for the new students.

But a district official said at the December board meeting that the funding question “requires some further research.” The official, Valerie Wilson, also warned that any funding boost would be delayed by a year because of the way the state calculates district budgets.

“The earliest that funding would appear in the budget would be September 2020,” Wilson said, even though the new students would begin this fall.

And how many students might enroll in the district if the proposal is approved? Officials have not said how many non-resident employees have expressed an interest in enrolling their children or how many — if any — currently pay tuition.

“We’ve asked them and we don’t know yet,” Padilla said in an interview. Until those and other questions are answered, he added, the proposal “is not going anywhere.”

A district spokesperson did not respond to emailed questions about the proposal, nor did Board Chair Josephine Garcia. The proposal was not listed on the board’s online agenda last month even though it was discussed and voted on at the December meeting.

Newark now joins other districts that have made it easier for non-resident employees to send their children to school in the communities where they work.

The New Jersey School Boards Association has identified more than 40 districts that offer free or reduced-price tuition for the children of employees, according to a list provided by the organization. The list is based on a review of district labor agreements, which is typically where districts establish tuition exemptions for employees, said Janet Bamford, the association’s communications manager.

Many of the districts on the list waive tuition fees for employees, while others charge employees anywhere from 20 to 60 percent of the normal rate. Still others set restrictions, such as excluding non-resident students who were removed from their previous schools for disciplinary reasons.

In the past, Newark let non-resident teachers enroll their children in the district for free, according to officials and an employee manual. It’s unclear when that changed, but board regulations now state that employees who live outside Newark must pay tuition.

Margarita Hernandez, principal of Wilson Avenue School, said she thinks making it easier for teachers to put their children in Newark schools — regardless of where they live — is a good idea.

“If they’re invested in Newark and they want their kids to attend school in Newark,” she said, “then they should be given the opportunity.”

Update: This story has been updated to reflect that the school board approved the proposal at its Jan. 22 meeting.

Superintendent León calls on Newarkers to help shape his plan for city’s schools

2019-01-17T23:30:36+00:00

Newark Superintendent Roger León unveiled his strategy for transforming the school system at a community forum Wednesday, the first of several meetings where residents will be invited to help shape the plan.

The strategy, dubbed “NPS Clarity 2020,” calls for closer cooperation among schools and between them and the community. The strategy’s premise is that schools must challenge students academically while also attending to their physical and emotional needs.

Over the next few months, officials said, the district will turn the strategy into a detailed, three-year plan with help from families, students, and partner organizations, who will be invited to planning sessions in each of the city’s five wards. The final plan will be released in June.

“How are we going to do this? Everybody in here — all of you,” León said to hundreds of mostly invited guests at Central High School. “There’s a lot of hard work we’re about to do, and we’re not going to be scared about it.”

While Wednesday marked the start of public feedback on the strategy, León has been referencing his plan at meetings for months. Some leaders, including Mayor Ras Baraka and a few board members, have previously urged León to publicly share his plan, along with specific goals he hopes to achieve.

Baraka, who was Central’s principal when León was an assistant superintendent, made a brief appearance at Wednesday’s event to lend his support to León’s vision. He said the two have been working in particular on a plan to get local universities to enroll more Newark Public School graduates.

“I just want people to know that the superintendent and I are on the same page,” said Baraka, who famously clashed with León’s state-appointed predecessor, Cami Anderson. “And it hasn’t been that way for a very long time.”

Baraka is also part of a new advisory committee that will provide input on the plan. The 24-member committee includes teachers, principals, and advocates, along with business, higher-education, and philanthropic leaders.

Newark residents wrote down challenges and opportunities in the district during Wednesday’s forum.

The district hosted a similar series of public forums in 2016 under Superintendent Christopher Cerf, which led to the district’s current three-year roadmap.

The district has hired a Newark-based consultancy, Creed Strategies, to lead the current planning process. The firm’s founder and president, Lauren Wells, is a former advisor to Baraka and previously helped spearhead a high-profile reform effort in Newark called the Global Village School Zone.

Started in 2010, the program lengthened the school day and added extra support services at seven Central Ward schools, including Central High School. It also brought the schools’ teachers together for joint trainings and made sure their courses were in sync so students could easily progress from the elementary schools to Central. However, Anderson abruptly ended the effort in 2012.

Now, Wells is helping incorporate elements of that program’s approach into León’s strategy. At the forum, Wells described some tenets of the strategy: recognizing and addressing poverty’s effects on students; helping schools work together rather than in isolation; taking advantage of the resources that families and local organizations have to offer schools; and measuring student success on a variety of scales.

“They will be risk-takers, they will be sought-after,” she said. “They will pass assessments — and not just the PARCC, but the bar.”

Attendees were also given a document with an elaborate diagram representing the “Clarity 2020” approach, which district employees received at an August conference where León previewed his plans. The diagram features a dozen “keys to 2020,” such as higher education and social services, and six “game changers,” including alumni and internships, but provides no details beyond those broad headings.

The district has not yet posted the document online or announced dates for the forums in each ward. León declined to be interviewed after the event.

Several attendees said they were energized by Wednesday’s forum, which included small-group brainstorming sessions where participants listed challenges and opportunities in the district.

“You don’t usually have a superintendent that asks questions,” said Nitia Preston, the community engagement specialist at Peshine Avenue School. “He’s asking, ‘What change do you want? What strengths do you have?’ I love that.”

As Newark superintendent makes whirlwind changes, some residents seek ‘clarity’

2019-01-16T21:47:25+00:00

A whirlwind of activity. A legion of initiatives. A blitz of meetings. Pick your metaphor — Superintendent Roger León has been busy.

In his first six months as Newark schools chief, León has overhauled the district’s central office; launched a wide-ranging assortment of programs involving high schools, testing, technology, and more; and offered a litany of wildly ambitious promises, including a vow to make Newark “the highest-performing school district in the country.”

León’s maximalist approach has thrilled many residents who find it invigorating to hear a Newark native present a vision of greatness for a school system that, until February, spent two decades under state control. In recent years, the 36,000-student district has attracted national notoriety mainly for its struggles and the pitched battles that erupted when outside reformers tried to reshape the city’s schools.

But León’s jam-packed agenda and sweeping promises have also raised concerns, even among those rooting for him to succeed — an unease that León may be hoping to address Wednesday evening at a community forum on the district’s future.

Observers have privately asked how the new leader’s disparate initiatives fit together, and whether he can pull them all off simultaneously. Occasionally, their frustration has bubbled to the surface, as when some board members refused to approve some of León’s requests until they knew more about his plans or when Mayor Ras Baraka urged León to make those plans public.

Even the name of León’s elaborate strategy — “NPS Clarity 2020” — has baffled some people, who are unsure when it starts and what it entails. They are hoping the forum will address some of those concerns.

As a former Newark Public Schools educator and administrator, León brings a wealth of experience and institutional knowledge to the job, said Antoinette Baskerville Richardson, the mayor’s chief education officer. While León obviously “has a big vision,” she added, it is imperative that he share detailed plans with the public — especially after 22 years of state control, when officials had license to make wholesale changes without locals’ consent.

“I think a lot of stakeholders are looking for more clarity — and it’s up to the superintendent to bring that,” she said. “Folks are looking for substantive plans.”

After a quarter-century working in the district, León started July 1 with strong convictions about what approaches work in schools — and which don’t. But as he’s rushed to reverse policies he considers ineffective and enact alternatives, schools and partner groups have often had to scramble to keep up.

In June, he tried to oust top district officials before informing the school board, which then rejected some of the staffing changes. In September, he axed a program that extended the hours of struggling schools — resulting in scheduling changes just days before classes began. Last month, he cast doubt on a program that brought extra services to several South Ward schools, leaving the schools and their partner organizations uncertain about its future.

At the same time, he has undertaken several efforts of his own. While most new superintendents are eager to start making their mark, León’s aggressive timeline and ambitious agenda have run up against roadblocks.

He is planning a redesign of the city’s high schools, including changes to the admissions process for magnet schools and new career-themed academies inside the traditional schools. However, the new magnet admissions test was recently postponed, and the district has not formally announced the themes and partners of the new academies. Meanwhile, the enrollment period for next school year is already underway.

León has also promised to tackle one of the district’s most dire and long-standing challenges — absenteeism. One in three Newark students missed the equivalent of a month or more of school days last year, qualifying them as “chronically absent.” The crux of León’s plan for getting students to school is to rehire attendance counselors who were laid off by his predecessor. However, labor rules have complicated the rehiring process, leaving many of the counselor positions unfilled five months into the school year.

Other new superintendents might be content with these already ambitious goals: revamping the district’s high schools and combating severe absenteeism. But León has not stopped there. He has personally reviewed student transcripts and conducted teacher trainings; negotiated changes to the city’s enrollment system with charter-school leaders; and ordered comprehensive audits of the district’s teaching materials and facilities.

León has described different parts of his agenda to different audiences at meetings large and small with parents, district employees, students, union leaders, and local philanthropies. However, members of the public who aren’t invited to all of these gatherings and can’t make the public school-board meetings may have a limited view of León’s entire agenda. His administration seldom holds press conferences or posts summaries of his initiatives on the district website, and reporters’ questions often go unanswered. (A spokeswoman did not respond to questions for this story.)

Deborah Smith-Gregory, president of the Newark NAACP and a former district teacher, said she is eager to learn how León will incorporate all of the feedback he has received into a clear plan with measurable goals.

“He’s doing a lot of outreach,” she said. “But after you get all of those opinions, how do you prioritize what you’re going to pay attention to and implement something that can be measured?”

León may begin to answer that question at the forum Wednesday evening at Central High School. A public notice for the event says it will include a discussion of “goals and timelines” for Clarity 2020, along with a 10-year district roadmap León is crafting and various policy reviews he is conducting.

The event will also kick off a series public meetings intended to gather input for a new three-year strategic plan for the district, according to the notice. León’s predecessor, Christopher Cerf, organized a similar planning process in 2016 to create the district’s current strategic plan.

Whether Wednesday’s forum will leave the public with a clearer sense of León’s overarching vision remains to be seen. But some of the superintendent’s most ardent supporters say they already know enough.

“He’s planning to turn this into the most successful district in the state,” said Newark Teachers Union President John Abeigon. “What’s obtuse about that?”

Newark’s rush to create new magnet-school admissions test is raising eyebrows. Here’s what you need to know.

2019-01-11T19:41:47+00:00

In Newark, a new high-stakes exam that every eighth-grader will take next month is raising questions — and not the multiple-choice kind.

The district has been rushing to complete the test, which the superintendent revealed at a parent conference in December, so that students can take it next month. It will determine, along with other factors, which students are admitted to the city’s coveted magnet schools in the fall.

The implications for students’ futures are huge: Students who attend magnets are far more likely than their peers in traditional high schools to graduate and earn college degrees. Yet officials have said little publicly about who’s developing the test, how schools will use it, or even why it’s necessary.

“Why make kids take an additional test unless there’s a very good reason for it,” said Jonathan Taylor, a research analyst at Hunter College in New York City who has studied that city’s controversial high-school entrance exam. “They already have to take enough of these tests.”

The exam appears to be aimed at making Newark’s magnet schools more selective, based on Superintendent Roger León’s belief that they have been admitting some students who are under-qualified or insufficiently interested in the schools’ themes.

“The whole concept that anyone and everyone can get into the magnet high schools — that’s not why they were designed,” León said last month. “You actually have to qualify to get into those schools.”

But the data show that Newark’s six magnet schools already enroll the city’s highest-achieving students (based on state test scores), and very few students who are still learning English or have disabilities, who tend to perform less well on standardized tests. León’s move comes as New Jersey’s governor tries to cut back on high-stakes testing, and the mayor of nearby New York City has proposed eliminating a similar gatekeeping test entirely.

Newark’s “magnet schools are definitely enrolling different kids — fewer English language learners, fewer special-education students, fewer students who eligible for free lunch,” said Christopher Tienken, a professor of education administration at Seton Hall University. “I think they should actually be looking at measures that increase the diversity of the schools.”

Beyond the purpose of the test, experts also raised questions about its design, as the district appears to be creating it in-house with the help of local educators. Tests used for high-stakes purposes such as admissions decisions are expected to meet accepted standards and be carefully vetted.

“The test should be validated before using it,” Taylor said. “You don’t have a test, start admitting kids, and then look to see 30 years later, ‘Well, gee, is this a valid test?’”

Officials may have answers to these questions, but they haven’t yet shared them publicly. The district did not respond to questions for this story or make any officials available for comment.

For now, Chalkbeat has rounded up everything we know about the test so far. And we spoke with experts to find out the best practices when introducing a new exam like this — along with the risks.

What’s on the test?

The test will measure students’ English and math skills.

The district is creating the exam itself, with assistance from principals and other school staffers. The educators helped write math questions and shared essay prompts their schools have used to assess students’ reading and writing skills, said Carla Stephens, principal of Bard High School Early College–Newark.

León “had many calls and meetings where he has been consulting with the magnet school principals about the test,” said Stephens, who shared her magnet school’s writing prompt with the district.

The test will also try to assess students’ interest in each magnet school’s unique focus, which includes science, history, and the arts. León, who attended a magnet school, has said he believes some magnet students lack a real passion for the schools’ themes.

“Magnet high schools were always supposed to be a high school where students had an interest in what that specialty was,” he said. “We want the admissions test is to be able to gauge that.”

Who will take it?

All Newark Public Schools eighth-graders will sit for the test on Friday, Feb. 15.

They will do so in their own schools during the school day — a decision that experts applauded. Other districts have been criticized for administering high-school and college admissions tests on the weekends, making it hard for some students to participate.

All non-district students hoping to attend to a magnet school will take the test on Saturday, Feb. 16.

How will schools use it?

Magnet schools will consider the exam scores as they review and rank applicants. The rankings will determine which students are admitted for the 2019-20 academic year.

The scores will be considered alongside factors the schools already look at, including students’ grades, state test scores, and attendance records. Some schools also interview applicants and assess their writing and math skills, while Arts High School holds auditions.

Experts endorsed the district’s decision to have the schools use the exams in conjunction with other admissions criteria, which they said provides a more complete picture of each applicant.

However, school staffers said they have not been told how much weight each of those factors will be given — and whether schools or the district will decide that.

At one of the city’s most selective magnet schools, Science Park, parents and administrators clashed last year over how much weight should be given to applicants’ state PARCC scores. In a compromise, the school lowered their weight, making the PARCC scores count for 70 percent of applicants’ ranking. Now, Science Park and the other magnets will have to factor the new entrance exam into the mix.

Traditional high schools will also use the admissions test scores, León has said. The scores will determine eligibility for new gifted-and-talented programs that León has directed those schools to establish.

Is the test ready?

By the looks of it, not quite.

Students were originally scheduled to take the test this week, but the district quietly postponed the test until February. The district chalked that up to “logistical modifications.” But as recently as last month, officials said they were still revising the exam.

According to someone who spoke with the superintendent, part of the problem was that the school staffers who helped write the test borrowed heavily from assessments that high-school students take during the year.

“He said the questions were basically copied and pasted,” the person said. “It wasn’t good, so they had to redo it.”

And at a parent meeting this week at one of the most selective magnet schools, Science Park High School, Principal Kathleen Tierney said the test is “still being vetted,” according to an attendee.

What do experts say?

Researchers who study testing asked several pointed questions about Newark’s new high-stakes exam.

First, they wanted to know how officials decided it was necessary. They noted that the magnets already look at students’ grades and state test scores.

Taylor, the research analyst at Hunter College, pointed out that entrance exams can be less effective in identifying promising students than officials realize, calling into question their necessity. In a recent study, he found that the exam used to determine who gets into New York City’s elite “specialized” high schools was actually less predictive of students’ ninth-grade achievement than their grades or state test scores from middle school.

The experts also questioned how the district is ensuring the exam meets industry standards — especially when it’s being developed on such a tight timeline.

One key standard is that a given exam does what it’s intended to do; for instance, help a school predict which students will be able to keep up with its rigorous academic program. Another standard is that the exam is not biased against any group, such as girls or black or Hispanic students.

Some experts advised against using the test results in high-stakes admissions decisions before it has been shown to meet those standards.

“What they should be doing is piloting this test for at least one year,” said Tienken, the Seton Hall professor. “Test design is a multi-year process.”

Kurt F. Geisinger, director of the Buros Center on Testing at the University of Nebraska, said that trying out an exam on a sample of students before its full launch can help detect biases — but that can be difficult to do without having questions leak out. Either way, he said, the district should expect to continuously improve the exam.

“These things do take time to build,” he said. “You can’t expect them to be perfect year one.”

Newark delays launch of new magnet-school admissions test by a month

2019-01-09T03:29:50+00:00

Newark officials have postponed a new high-stakes test that will be given to students hoping to attend the city’s most sought-after high schools.

Eighth-graders were originally supposed to take the brand-new exam this Friday or Saturday. But the district quietly changed the test dates to Feb. 15 and 16 on its enrollment website, without providing an explanation.

A district spokeswoman on Tuesday attributed the change to “logistical modifications.” School staffers said they first heard about the scheduling change last week.

The delay adds to uncertainty surrounding admissions to six “magnet” schools that are the district’s top-performing high schools.

In recent years, each magnet school has set its own admissions criteria, which have included students’ grades, state test scores, attendance records, interviews, and auditions. But last month, with the enrollment process for next school year already underway, the district’s new superintendent announced that every aspiring magnet student would have to sit for a new test in January.

Officials said the test would assess applicants’ reading and math skills as well as their interest in the schools’ themes. But they have not shared other important information, such as how much weight the test results will be given relative to the other admissions criteria that schools will continue using.

Even as families try to figure out how the test will affect their children’s chances of getting into one of the coveted magnet schools, officials were still tweaking the exam as recently as last month.

“Right now, we are in the process of finalizing the test,” said Superintendent Roger León at the December school board meeting, adding that he planned to add “a couple of questions.”

“I’m looking forward to providing a really good quality [exam],” he said, “that will be worth our students’ time.”

The district spokeswoman did not respond to detailed questions Tuesday about how the test was created or what will be on it.

Karen Gaylord, who works with parents at Science Park High School, said she believes the later test date will allow families to focus on applying to schools without worrying about the new test.

Families have until Feb. 15 to submit applications — the same date when Newark Public Schools students will now take the magnet-school test. (Students in non-district schools, such as private or charter schools, will take the test the following morning.)

But Gaylord said she is still waiting for information from the district about how the new test will be used. For example, she was not sure whether each magnet school will decide whether to give more weight to students’ grades or their exam scores, or whether the district will set the rules.

“These are still questions marks for me,” she said.

‘Zero student achievement’: Fate of Newark’s $10M ‘community schools’ program is in doubt

2019-01-07T19:46:21+00:00

Three years ago, Newark unveiled a high-profile experiment: Rather than close low-performing schools in the city’s impoverished South Ward, the district would try to revive them with an infusion of extra services and staffers.

It was a major victory for Mayor Ras Baraka, who convinced the district’s state-appointed superintendent to devote $10 million in private funds to the effort, and for local activists and teachers unions who had long endorsed this “community-school” approach — transforming schools into service-rich hubs able to treat the many ailments, from hunger to asthma to mental-health crises, that can impede some students’ learning.

Now, with the program still in its infancy, Newark’s new superintendent — a homegrown educator who is close to the mayor, the union, and those same activists — is declaring it a failure.

“I have zero student achievement. I have poor attendance. And I have a lot of people who are getting money in their wallets,” Superintendent Roger León said at last month’s board meeting, before promising big changes. “I assure you the city will see what a true community school is when we move forward in actually bringing one about.”

Beyond those remarks, León has not spoken publicly about the South Ward community schools effort or his plans for an alternative approach. He declined to be interviewed for this story.

But people who have spoken with the superintendent, including Baraka, say León is dismayed by the program’s uneven implementation and disappointing early results for students, which even some community-school supporters acknowledge. Those familiar with León’s thinking say he envisions a broader, citywide effort that draws from an earlier community-school program called the “Newark Global Village School Zone,” which a previous superintendent abruptly ended.

It could be a risky move to try to create community schools throughout the city when the district has yet to sustain them on a small scale. To be successful, the district will need parents and educators to embrace the model and partner organizations to lend financial and technical assistance.

Baraka, the former principal of the high school that was the centerpiece of the “Global Village,” said he believes that León can garner the support of those groups — but first he must share his vision with the public.

“He needs to articulate that, tell people — and I told him that,” Baraka said, adding that local philanthropies, nonprofits, and universities are eager to aid León’s efforts. “What they need now is instruction. That’s where you get a lot of anxiety from people.”

Yet even if León reveals his plan and secures public support for it, he will still likely face the same challenges that have imperiled community-schools efforts in other districts, including high costs, the difficulty of improving schools’ academic programs while simultaneously rolling out new social services, and the pressure to show positive results quickly. And, as León himself may demonstrate, new district leaders have a tendency to overhaul or scrap their predecessors’ programs before they have had time to bear fruit.

“Roger’s got to learn from the past,” said Pedro Noguera, an education professor who previously helped run the Global Village. “There’s a lot of frustration with promises that have been made and not fulfilled.”

“Here’s some money. Run with it.”

The “South Ward Community Schools Initiative” kicked off in Dec. 2015 to great fanfare. It promised to strengthen the teaching at five low-achieving, high-poverty schools while also bringing in medical and mental-health services for students and involving their parents in decision making.

Mayor Ras Baraka announced the South Ward Community Schools Initiative in Dec. 2015 alongside then-Superintendent Christopher Cerf and one of the program’s architects, Lauren Wells.

A three-year pilot program, it was billed as an alternative to closing troubled schools and opening charter schools — controversial policies that Baraka and local activists had railed against. In a coup for those critics, Superintendent Christopher Cerf agreed to fund the program with leftover money that Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and other private donors had supplied to bankroll the earlier reforms.

The effort was hobbled, however, by a chaotic launch, according to experts and current and former officials.

The program’s planning phase in early 2016 was rushed, and its leadership was muddled. An outside group hired to help oversee the effort, Strong Healthy Communities Initiative, left just as classes started that fall and was not replaced for several months. And the district and mayor’s office, which had joint control of the program, did not agree to a governance structure until 2017.

Most controversially, more than $6 million of the $10 million allocated to the program over three years was spent in year one, according to Ronald Chaluisán Batlle, executive director of the Newark Trust for Education, a nonprofit brought in to help manage the program beginning in 2017. Chaluisán Batlle said records he found after arriving indicated that about 30 teachers and other school workers had been hired in the first year. Experts strongly discourage schools from using grants to pay employees because the positions may prove unsustainable after the seed money runs out.

“That first year, schools were essentially told, ‘Here’s some money. Run with it,” said Mateus Baptista, a former education policy advisor to the mayor, who blamed the district for the lax oversight. “There was no strategy, no intentionality.”

To some: “It’s working.” To others: It “has not been implemented.”

Despite the bumpy rollout, resources eventually began flowing to schools.

Antoinette Baskerville Richardson, the mayor’s chief education officer, spoke during a community-school forum in the South Ward in Dec. 2018.

Students got free dental exams and after-school tutoring. Teachers were trained on how to help students cope with trauma. Parents attended weekend workshops and, at Belmont Runyon School, picked up fresh fruit and vegetables from a community food pantry.

Attendance workers were hired to closely monitor chronically absent students — a widespread problem at the pilot schools — and Rutgers University partnered with Malcolm X Shabazz High School to provide additional support. The district also successfully applied for more than $23 million in federal school-improvement grants, which paid for extra staffers and training to improve the culture at the five schools.

Charity Haygood, principal of Avon Avenue School, said she has been able to hire a full-time social worker, who has counseled students dealing with the loss of a parent or thoughts of suicide. The attendance counselors, who live in the neighborhood, have worked with parents to make sure their children had uniforms and a way to get to school, she said. As a result, fewer students are regularly absent.

“It’s working,” Haygood said. “There’s an impact.”

However, it’s hard to discern an impact at all the schools. Apart from Avon, they continue to suffer from above-average absenteeism rates for the district, according to November attendance figures. And only Avon and Shabazz saw modest gains in their English and math test scores last year; the other three schools saw declines in one or both subjects.

Experts warn that it’s too soon to expect significant results, and that a more sophisticated data analysis is needed to isolate the program’s effects. An outside evaluator, Metis Associates, has been hired to conduct such an analysis this school year — though Superintendent León does not appear to be waiting for that assessment to come to his own conclusions.

In August, Metis completed an initial evaluation based on interviews and site visits, which contained both good and bad news for the program. The evaluators said it had made “significant progress” since launching. But they also catalogued a number of remaining obstacles, including the lack of a data system to track the services provided and outcomes achieved; a need for more training and resources, according to school staffers; and “tensions and a lack of clarity” about the role of the district, the mayor’s office, and the program’s nonprofit partners.

Even some community-school proponents believe the South Ward effort has not lived up to its potential.

Viva White, a social worker whose son is in the fifth grade at Belmont Runyon, said the school has offered some new services such as free haircuts, vision screenings, and the family food pantry. But she has not seen the sort of systematic changes — revamped classroom materials that better reflect students’ experiences, discipline policies centered on conflict resolution and peer mediation, parental input in key school decisions — that researchers say are hallmarks of successful community schools.

“I believe it can work and turn around academic achievement, behavior problems, morale,” White said. However, so far, she added, “The model has not been implemented the way it needs to be.”

The district declined to authorize Belmont Runyon’s principal to be interviewed for this story.

“A 10-year effort, not a two or three-year project”

The question that close observers are asking now is whether Superintendent León will try to shore up and build on the South Ward community schools program or scrap it and start his own effort from scratch.

Supt. Roger León spoke at a South Ward back-to-school event in Aug. 2018 at Shabazz High School.

Experts, who note the enormous health and academic challenges faced by many students at the five schools, say that community-school programs typically require an extended period to take root. It would be a waste, these experts say, to abandon the initiative — a fate that has befallen similar initiatives in Newark before.

“They need to see this as a 10-year effort, not a two or three-year project,” said Jane Quinn, the former director of the Children’s Aid National Center for Community Schools, which has provided technical support to the South Ward program.

León has already provided signs that he is skeptical of extending the program.

The top district officials who were overseeing it — including the program director, Brooke Tippens, the chief academic officer, and two assistant superintendents — have all been ousted, reassigned, or quit. León or his deputies did not meet with them before their departure to be briefed on the program, according to three former officials. And their replacements have often been absent from leadership meetings with the mayor’s office and the Newark Trust for Education.

“We haven’t had regular representation from the district,” said Chaluisán Batlle of the Trust. “We’ve been working to get that.”

Last month, representatives of city agencies, nonprofits, and universities that support the South Ward program met with the mayor and superintendent to discuss its progress. But León stunned some listeners when he described his vision for the district but did not mention the program, according to attendees.

“People in the room were like, ‘Oh, my God, he didn’t say anything about community schools,’” one person recalled.

Antoinette Baskerville Richardson, the mayor’s chief education officer, said she has no doubt that León will incorporate community-school tenets into his yet-to-be-revealed plans for the district. However, it is unclear whether the South Ward program will continue in its current form.

“Whether there will be community schools is not the question,” she said. “What this means for the South Ward Community Schools Initiative is the question.”

“We want a seat at the table.”

As León crafts a long-term strategy for the district, he has been looking back at the “Global Village” — an effort spearheaded by researchers from New York University in 2009 that focused on seven Central Ward schools, including Central High School, where Ras Baraka was principal.

Modeled on the famed Harlem Children’s Zone in New York City, the program was designed to improve schools in a single high-poverty neighborhood while also connecting students and their families with healthcare, healthy food, and affordable housing. Using public and private funds, the schools extended their hours, brought together their teachers for joint trainings, and made sure their courses were aligned so students could progress seamlessly from the elementary schools to the high school.

But, as is common in urban school systems, the program fell victim to a change in district leadership. In 2012, the new superintendent, Cami Anderson, pulled the plug on the Global Village and replaced it with her own school-improvement program. Now, Leon may be pursuing the same strategy, but with a twist: out with the old and in with the older.

Since becoming superintendent, León has reached out to people who were connected with the Global Village, including former principals and the program’s architects — Noguera, now a professor at University of California, Los Angeles, and Lauren Wells, a former NYU research director who became Baraka’s chief education advisor. Wells is now helping León develop his district plan.

According to Baraka, León has said that he wants to “replicate” the Global Village, but on a wider scale. In response to emailed questions asking whether León planned to continue the South Ward program or bring back elements of the Global Village, a district spokeswoman replied “yes” to both.

Wells, while declining to go into detail about León’s plans, said in an interview that she does not believe it is an “either-or” choice between the South Ward program or the Global Village, as both adopt a community-school approach. The key, she added, is to make sure schools work together using similar strategies.

“The city,” she said, “needs coherence and collaboration.”

As León and his advisors privately determine their next steps, some Newark residents are calling for more “community” in community schools. At a recent forum in the South Ward, Maggie Freeman, a local activist and political leader, said families should be involved in designing community schools and shaping their future.

“We want a seat at the table to determine what’s on the menu,” she said. “We don’t just want to be spoon-fed.”

Highlights from a momentous year for Newark schools — and a preview of what’s ahead

2018-12-21T23:28:48+00:00

A re-empowered school board, an ambitious new superintendent, a growing charter sector, a looming absenteeism crisis.

Phew. It’s been a big year for education in Newark.

In our first nine months covering Newark schools, Chalkbeat has documented the major changes and enduring challenges shaping New Jersey’s largest school system. Below, revisit highlights from the year that was — and get a sneak peek of the year ahead.

The school board regains the keys to the district

On July 12, 1995, a 20-member squad of state officials stormed into the Newark Board of Education headquarters and told the district’s top officials to pack up. After a judge found “failure on a very large scale” in the schools and “nepotism, cronyism and the like” among the board, the state was taking over.

Fast forward to 2010, when Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg announced a $100 million grant to Newark (soon matched by $100 million from other outside donors) to bankroll a district-wide overhaul. It was led by Cami Anderson, a lightning-rod superintendent appointed by the state.
The controversial changes included school closures, a revamped teachers contract, a new school-enrollment system, and the rapid growth of the city’s charter-school sector. They eventually led to some academic gains, but also incited a political uprising that forced Anderson out. She was replaced by Christopher Cerf, a milder leader who nonetheless shared her agenda.
On Feb. 1, 2018, citing those gains and board reforms, the state ended its decades-long takeover of Newark’s schools. The city’s elected school board regained provisional control of the 36,000-student district and its roughly $1 billion. It was a hard-won victory for local activists and politicians, including Mayor Ras Baraka, who rode into office largely by opposing Anderson’s agenda.
Just weeks after the return to local control, the board held its annual elections. The three winning candidates were backed by a powerful coalition comprised of Baraka, a North Ward councilman, and the charter-school sector. With that election, the coalition helped seat all nine of the board’s current members.
In November, Newark voters overwhelmingly opted to keep the board elected rather than appointed by the mayor. However, only a fraction of voters actually participated in the referendum.
What’s next: The board must abide by the rules of a 73-page transition plan in order to regain complete control of the district in 2020. A new state “accountability office” is expected to issue a preliminary report on the district’s progress early next year.

After a secretive search, a new schools chief is chosen

Newark Superintendent Roger León

Earlier this year, the newly empowered school board made what could be its most consequential decision — the choice of a new superintendent.

Candidates were selected through a nationwide search, as stipulated by the state-crafted transition plan. But the search committee deviated from the plan by adding a fourth candidate after three finalists were already chosen.
State Sen. Teresa Ruiz reportedly backed the move to add an additional candidate. A Newark power broker, Ruiz is a longtime ally of Roger León — a Newark educator who emerged as one of the four finalists.
The school board was nearly split between León and another Newark native, former interim-Superintendent Robert Gregory.
But on May 22, the board agreed to unanimously back León, who rose through the Newark Public Schools ranks from star student to teacher, principal, top official, and finally, its first-ever Hispanic superintendent. His selection was seen by many as a rebuke to the era of outsider-led school reform.
What’s next: Picking a superintendent was just step one. Now the board must approve his desired policy changes and, by July 1, rate his performance.

Superintendent León gets to work

Roger León — a consummate Newarker well-known by school parents and politicians alike — faces sky-high expectations as the city’s first locally chosen schools chief in a generation. As one activist put it, “They expect him to be superman.”

Before even taking over on July 1, León tried to oust many of the district’s top officials who had been hired by Cerf or Anderson. The school board promptly rejected some of the staffing changes — highlighting the new power dynamics under local control.
León soon faced the first big test of his young administration: whether to keep Anderson’s controversial enrollment system, which created a single application for most of the city’s traditional and charter schools. After navigating pushback from charter leaders on one side and charter critics on the other, León preserved the system for another year.
Other challenges have bubbled just below the surface. They include under-reported student suspensions and starkly unequal college outcomes for students who attended the city’s traditional high schools versus its magnet schools. Some charter schools have offered to help the district with this college challenge, while others have attracted controversy for wrongly ejecting students.
Meanwhile, León has been crafting a grand strategy for the district — a 10-year roadmap set to begin in 2020. While some observers have applauded his ambition, others have demanded that he reveal his short-term plans and the goals he hopes to achieve this school year.
What’s next: While he hasn’t shared many details, León has promised big changes next year — including a district restructuring and a high-school overhaul.

The district’s absenteeism crisis shows no signs of abating

Newark students arriving at school on the first day of class.

Newark has long suffered from one of the worst student absenteeism rates in the state. Despite León’s promise to get every student to school, the problem has not gone away.

In August, León summoned the district’s entire workforce — all 7,000 or so employees — to a downtown sports arena. There he announced several whopping goals, including a district-wide attendance rate of 100 percent.
That is an exceedingly tall order — and according to some experts, impossible — in a district where one in three students was considered “chronically absent” after missing 10 percent or more days of the 2017-18 school year.
In September, he launched a back-to-school campaign complete with calls to every student’s home and specially made buttons. It appears to have helped: 91 percent of students showed up the first day — the highest rate since 2013, when former-Superintendent Anderson kicked off her own attendance campaign.
But in December, León released data from the first three months of school that underscored a fact well-known to researchers: Solid daily attendance rates can mask persistent absenteeism problems. The data showed that more than 20 percent of students are already chronically absent this year — with about 3,200 students having missed the equivalent of two weeks of class.
Experts say the district must help schools target those frequently absent students, rather than focusing mainly on school-wide attendance. To aid that effort, some student-researchers have been surveying their peers about the personal hardships and punitive policies that keep them out of class.
What’s next: The district’s absenteeism rate will continue to be closely watched by the state and local activists. It remains to be seen whether León will unveil a more comprehensive plan to attack the problem.

Amazing work unfolds in Newark classrooms

Despite the district’s steep challenges, Newark’s schools are filled with remarkable students and educators — some of whom we’ve spotlighted this year.

At the First Avenue School, teacher Lourdes Reyes drew on her experience as a parent when pushing her students with autism to achieve.
At Central High School, basketball coach Shawn McCray imparted his wisdom on players on and off the court.
At Barringer High School, student Kristal Sepulveda is building a new life after fleeing the hurricane that ravaged Puerto Rico.
And across the city, student activists are replacing sit-ins with policy proposals as they try to ensure the district’s success in the era of local control.
What’s next: Chalkbeat hopes to highlight more of the extraordinary work happening in Newark’s schools next year. Please send us your suggestions, sign up for our newsletter, and join our continuing conversation.

‘We’re doing it to help all of us’: In Newark, student-researchers ask their peers why they miss school

2018-12-18T19:33:00+00:00

With one in three Newark students considered chronically absent last year, a team of researchers has set out to discover why so many students are missing so much school.

To solve that riddle, the team has held focus groups and surveyed high school students at summer school programs, churches, and supermarkets. Many researchers have conducted similar studies, but this team is different — it includes students interviewing their peers about their shared struggles with attendance.

“We’re speaking in a language they understand,” said Manuel Mejia, a sophomore at Rutgers University-Newark who attended Newark’s Arts High School. “We’re not here to research them as a separate group — we’re doing it to help all of us.”

The research team includes students from Newark’s traditional, charter, and county-run high schools, alongside students from Rutgers University-Newark. They are part of a Rutgers-based program, called New-Ark Leaders of Health, where students aged 14 to 21 research public-health challenges and propose solutions.

Earlier this year, the 17-member team decided to focus on absenteeism. They considered it a matter of public health because of the dire consequences for chronically absent students, who tend to have lower grades and higher dropout rates, and are at greater risk of entering the criminal-justice system and facing poverty as an adult.

Newark suffers from unusually high rates of chronic absenteeism, which is defined as missing 10 percent or more of days in a school year — the equivalent of about a month of class. Unlike truancy, which refers to unexcused absences, this category includes anytime a student misses school — whether because of illness, a suspension, transportation difficulties, or other causes.

Last year, 33 percent of students were chronically absent. In the first three months of this school year, about 22 percent of students already are, with more likely to join them as attendance typically dips as the year wears on. And yet, because absences can accumulate gradually as students miss a few days one week then another day weeks later, many never realize the academic danger they’re in.

“I was basically chronically absent and I did not know,” said student-researcher Kutorkor Kotey, an 11th-grader at Bard High School Early College Newark, who said she missed several days one month. “Our main focus is to bring awareness to people.”

The research project was funded through a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to the Abbott Leadership Institute, a Rutgers-based group that provides leadership training to Newark families and students, in partnership with the mayor’s youth and college-affairs office. The students who were selected to participate earn a small stipend.

In the spring, the team submitted a research plan to an institutional review board at Rutgers. After they tweaked a consent form to make it easier for high schoolers to read, the board approved it. By then it was summer, so the team targeted students in summer school and out in the community. They administered about 100 surveys and held two focus groups.

The student-researchers focused on high schoolers partly because those are their peers. But that is also the age also when chronic absenteeism spikes. Last year, nearly 40 percent of ninth-graders were chronically absent — a risk factor that greatly diminishes their odds of graduating on time.

To the average adult, that might sound like lots of students playing hooky. But the researchers knew from personal experience that many absent students would like to attend school — yet an array of obstacles often stand in their way.

“There’s always this narrative that people from Newark are perceived to be, from an outside perspective, lazy, poor, drug-ridden, and that’s why people are chronically absent,” said Simone Richardson, a Rutgers senior who helped lead the research team. “But what we’ve seen is that a lot of it is because of these oppressive structures.”

The researchers uncovered a heap of reasons why high schoolers miss school, from dentist appointments to unreliable city buses and concerns about gang violence on the path to school — or once they arrive. Often they are grappling with adult responsibilities, such as getting younger siblings to class or working after-school jobs, that make it hard to show up to school on time or at all.

One of the researchers, Eric Bellamy, who is in the 12th grade at Malcolm X Shabazz High School, described his own struggle to balance school and work. After classes end at 2:40, he rushes to a downtown seafood restaurant where he works as a cook and server from 3 to 9 o’clock, he said. It’s often 10 p.m. before he’s taken the bus home and can even think about homework.

As one of nine siblings, he said, he cannot rely on his mother to help pay for school-related expenses like a tuxedo and photos for prom.

“I’m not going to depend on my mom,” he said. “So I just have to thug it out and continue with the job.”

In some cases, schools themselves deter students from attending. Bellamy said school can sometimes feel like jail — “a cell that has more freedom,” as he put it. Other students mentioned strict uniform policies, unappetizing lunches, or ineffectual teachers that make them want to say away. Still others cited school policies that mark students absent after they have been late several times, and that block students with multiple absences from participating in extracurricular activities or even lead to suspensions, perversely adding to the days away.

“Schools don’t really get down to why that student is late,” said Israel Alford, a Rutgers senior who coordinates the research project. “Rather, they jump to, ‘Hey, let’s just punish this kid, maybe that will motivate them to come on time.’”

One of the main factors that the team heard time and again was mental health. Many students said they were coping with trauma or battling anxiety or depression. School guidance counselors are often overworked and under-qualified to address students’ mental-health needs, they said. Meanwhile, the schoolwork they must manage alongside their other responsibilities just adds to the stress.

Kayla Killiebrew, a 12th-grader at a charter high school run by North Star Academy, said she sometimes babysits her younger nephew on the weekends, which prevents her from completing her homework.

“Then I wake up in the morning stressed and I don’t want to go to school,” she said, explaining that she dreads having to tell her teachers she didn’t do her work. “There’s just so many factors in school that will add onto the stress I’m already having. So I’d rather just stay home and deal with it.”

The team is planning to conduct another round of surveys in high schools early next year, but first the group needs the district’s permission. They are hoping the new superintendent, Roger León, will sign off since he has said improving attendance will be cornerstone of his agenda.

Once the student researchers have finished gathering and analyzing their data, they intend to publish their findings along with policy recommendations. Their mission is to make sure that student voices inform any plan to improve attendance in Newark.

“Students know why they’re chronically absent,” Alford said. “The problem is that no one’s asking them.”

Newark’s absenteeism problem persists as thousands of students miss several days this year, new data show

2018-12-14T03:35:22+00:00

Thousands of Newark students have already missed multiple school days this year, newly released data show, even as the district’s new superintendent makes improving attendance a top priority.

About one in five students missed more than a week’s worth of class during the first three months of school, according to the district data. Those roughly 8,000 students are already considered “chronically absent.”

Newark has long grappled with exceptionally high rates of chronic absenteeism, which is defined as missing 10 percent or more of school days in an academic year for any reason. Students who miss that much school tend to have lower test scores, higher dropout rates, and greater odds of getting in trouble with the law.

The district’s new superintendent, Roger León, has promised to attack the issue — even going so far as to set a district goal of 100 percent attendance. But the new data, which León released this week, show how far the district has to go.

Nearly 9 percent of of the district’s 36,000 students have already missed the equivalent of more than two school weeks, according to the data. Those 3,200 or so students are labeled “severely chronically absent.”

Experts say that tracking and publicizing attendance data, as León has done, is the first step in combating absenteeism. Now, some district leaders are calling for the next phase of work to begin — analyzing why so many students are missing class and taking steps at the district and school level to help get them to school.

“It’s great that we have all this great data,” Newark Board of Education member Kim Gaddy said at a board meeting last month. “But if you have the data and you’re not using the data to change the situation, we won’t do any justice to our children in this district.”

Students who missed six or more school days from September through November qualify as chronically absent. If they continue at that pace, they are on track to miss the equivalent of a month or more of school by June. Students who missed 10.5 days or more during those three months count as severely chronically absent.

The early data show that Newark’s long-standing absenteeism patterns are continuing. The chronic absenteeism rates over the past three months were about the same as in 2016, according to the data.

The problem remains most acute among the district’s youngest and oldest students: 41 percent of pre-kindergarteners were chronically absent this November, as were 45 percent of 12th-graders. At least a third of students at five high schools — Barringer, Central, Malcolm X Shabazz, Weequahic, and West Side — were severely chronically absent last month.

While absenteeism rates varied among schools, they tended to be highest in the city’s impoverished South Ward.

“I’m concerned particularly about the South Ward,” Gaddy said at the Nov. 20 board meeting. “That’s where our children need the most assistance.”

León, a former principal who became schools chief on July 1, has already taken some early steps to improve attendance.

His most visible effort was a back-to-school campaign called “Give Me Five,” where he ordered every district employee to call five families before the first day of school. The campaign, for which León himself recorded robocalls to families, appears to have made a difference: 91 percent of students showed up the first day, the highest rate of the past four years, according to district data. (In 2013, when former Superintendent Cami Anderson launched her own attendance campaign, about 94 percent of students attended school the first day.)

The district also eliminated some early-dismissal days, which typically have low attendance. And students with mid-level test scores whom León has targeted for extra support have had better attendance this year than their peers, officials said.

However, León hit a snag trying to enact the crux of his attendance plan — reinstating more than 40 attendance counselors whom Anderson laid off years ago to cut costs. The state’s civil service commission has said the district must offer the jobs to the laid-off counselors before hiring anyone new, León told the board — forcing the district to track down former employees who, in some cases, have moved to different states. Only eight counselors have been hired to date, but León said he hopes to fill the remaining positions next month.

Meanwhile, León is arguing that some of the responsibility for improving attendance falls on families. At November’s board meeting, he said some parents and guardians “believe that, in fact, they can keep their children home” from school. At a parent conference this month, he took that message directly to families.

“I don’t care if school ends at 10 and they’re only going to come for an hour, and half an hour is on a bus,” he told several hundred parents who showed up for the daylong summit. “When I tell you that your child is coming to school, it’s your job to make sure the child comes to school.”

Afterwards, several parents and school employees said they welcomed León’s tough talk on attendance.

“It was about parents ensuring kids are in school and they are doing good,” said Bilikis Oseni, who has a child in first grade at Camden Street School. “Attendance is very key.”

Still, Newark families face many obstacles in getting their children to school, according to a 2016 report on chronic absenteeism among young students. Parents cited a lack of school busing, asthma and other childhood health problems, and work schedules that make it hard to drop off their children in the morning. High school students listed uninspiring classes, mental-health challenges, and safety concerns when traveling to school as reasons why they don’t show up, according to a 2017 report.

At the November board meeting, several members asked León whether he planned to dig deeper into the causes of absenteeism.

“I was looking through all the statistics here in the packet,” said Andre Ferreira, the board’s student representative, who attends Science Park High School. “But there were none that looked towards having a survey of students themselves telling you why they aren’t coming to school.”

León noted that he held forums with high-school students in September where he stressed the importance of showing up. He also said he has a student-only email address that some students have used to explain why they miss school.

“So I’m gathering data that lets me know why a particular student in fact hasn’t been to school,” he said. “Ultimately, we would have to do that for every single student, in every classroom, in every grade, in every school. That’s really the work — and it’s hard to do.”

Peter Chen, who co-authored the two reports on chronic absenteeism in Newark, said the superintendent had taken a crucial first step by raising awareness about the city’s attendance challenges. The district also appears to be sharing attendance data more regularly with schools, he said.

The next step is for the district to help schools identify and assist students who are chronically absent. The central office can do that by sharing effective attendance strategies, training school workers on how to support students’ social and emotional well-being, and offering grants to fund schools’ own attendance campaigns, he added.

“This is something that requires tailored, school-level responses,” said Chen, who is a policy counsel for Advocates for Children of New Jersey. “The district can help support some of that — but it’s not something that’s easy to impose from on high.”

Want to attend one of Newark’s coveted magnet schools? Get ready to take a test.

2018-12-08T01:21:35+00:00

Newark students will soon face a new hurdle when trying to snag seats at the city’s most popular high schools.

Next month, any student who wants into one of the city’s six magnet schools will have to take a new exam that gauges their academic prowess as well as their interest in each school’s theme.

“If you would like to go to any of those schools,” Superintendent Roger León told parents at a conference Wednesday, “you better get ready for the test to get in.”

The exam, which will be given to students on Jan. 11-12, has not yet been announced on the district’s enrollment site. In fact, the test itself is still being developed and logistical details, such as where students will take it, are still being determined, officials said.

In addition to the new test, each school will also begin interviewing applicants, León said — something only two magnet schools did last year, according to an admissions guide. It’s unclear whether the interviews will take place this admission cycle. If so, schools may have to schedule dozens or even hundreds of interviews in the coming weeks.

Meanwhile, enrollment for next school year began on Dec. 3 and continues through February — giving students and schools little time to prepare for the new requirements.

“I know as much as you know right now,” one principal said. “Obviously the superintendent is revamping some items, but he hasn’t really shared the details with everyone.”

The district-run magnet schools, which have themes such as science and American history, include some of the city’s most sought-after high schools. Last year, nearly 1,800 eighth-graders listed a magnet school first on their high-school applications even though the schools had space for only 971 students.

The magnets, which vastly outperform the district’s six traditional high schools, already screen applicants. They look at grades, state test scores, attendance records, and — in the case of Arts High School — an audition or visual-art portfolio, when deciding which students to let in.

But even with those screens, some admitted students are not prepared for the rigor of work at the magnets or lack a strong interest in their programs, León said.

“The idea is to make sure that students who choose to go to these schools are going to meet whatever are the demands of that school,” he told Chalkbeat. “It’s not that your parents have the right to choose for you to go.”

Even as he moves to make magnet schools more selective, León — who became superintendent in July — also hopes to make traditional schools more appealing to top students.

On Wednesday, he also announced plans to create gifted-and-talented programs at each of the traditional high schools. To qualify, students will also take the new magnet-school exam.

León did not go into detail about what the programs will entail. But he may be drawing from his previous experience as principal of University High School, a magnet school that advertises a gifted-and-talented program on its website. Students must test into the program, which includes a “rigorous curriculum” in English, math, and another language, according to the site.

“Students are going into magnets because they think that’s where they can get their high-performing education,” he said. “Now they’ll be given a reason to not do that.”

The traditional schools will also develop specialized “academies” to train students for various careers, including engineering, teaching, and health services. Each school will partner with a higher-education institution and a professional organization to develop those programs.

Many Newark schools have tried to offer vocational programs, but often struggle to find qualified teachers and meet the stringent requirements to receive federal funding. It’s unclear how the district will help them overcome those challenges, especially if the timeline is also aggressive.

Traditional schools, for their part, seem eager for any support they can get. Angela Mincy, principal of Barringer High School, said the school created an honors program last year in an effort to retain high-achieving students.

“If I don’t create an isolated experience for them, I will lose them,” she said in an interview last month, adding that the goal is to keep attracting more and more top students. “The hope is that one day, one honors track will become two will become three.”

With their selective admissions and college-oriented courses, the city’s magnet schools have long been seen as a refuge for high-achieving students who cannot afford private school. County-run vocational schools, which also screen applicants, are another popular option along with some charter high schools — though they often have few seats left over for students who did not attend their lower-grade schools.

The district’s traditional, or “comprehensive,” high schools are viewed by many families as schools of last resort. On nearly every academic measure — attendance rates, test scores, college enrollment and completion — the traditional schools lag far behind the magnets.

In a sense, this disparity is built into the system. Magnet schools are designed to enroll academically and artistically accomplished students. Traditional schools take the rest, including almost all students who are still learning English and the majority of those with disabilities.

Other cities have begun to rethink this practice of tracking students into separate schools according to ability — at least as measured by a single test. In New York City, where a debate has raged over admissions to the district’s coveted “specialized” high schools, the mayor has proposed scrapping the schools’ entrance exam. Instead, he said, they should reserve spots for the top students from every middle school.

Some Newark parents have floated a similar plan for the city’s most exclusive magnet school, Science Park High School. Instead, Superintendent León is pursuing the opposite approach — adding new entrance exams for all magnet schools. In other cities, exam schools tend to be highly segregated by race and class, favoring families with the wherewithal to help students prepare for the exams or pay for test prep.

León said he expects the new magnet exams will measure students’ reading and math proficiency, as well as their interest in each school’s particular focus, such as science or technology.

“The whole concept that anyone and everyone can get into the magnet high schools — that’s not why they were designed,” said León, who graduated from Science High School. “You actually have to qualify to get into those schools.”

Karen Gaylord, Science Park High School’s community engagement specialist, said some teachers and parents may grumble about the new test because they haven’t had a chance to prepare students for it. But she noted that families had become “resigned” to entrance exams when magnet schools used them in the past.

She also said many people would welcome the admissions interviews as a way for students to highlight skills and interests that aren’t reflected on their transcripts. The question, she said, is how schools will carry out these changes on such a tight timeline.

“It feels like there are so many opportunities to get this right,” she said. “I’m just not sure we’re going to get them all in this year. The clock is ticking.”

In Newark, universal enrollment was in danger. So charters started planning a separate system.

2018-12-06T02:16:23+00:00

For much of this year, the fate of Newark’s joint district-charter enrollment system was uncertain.

So even as charter leaders negotiated changes to the shared system with the district’s new superintendent, they began quietly developing a backup plan in case it fell apart, according to a charter-sector memo obtained by Chalkbeat.

Beginning this spring, the sector began exploring a charter-only enrollment system, the October memo shows. This fall, the sector ramped up its contingency planning: It hired the district’s recently departed enrollment director to draw up plans for a charter-only system.

Ultimately, their efforts proved unnecessary — at least for now. Last month, after prodding from the superintendent, the Newark school board agreed to retain the joint enrollment system for at least another year.

Still, the behind-the-scenes planning shows how seriously some charter leaders took the threat that the five-year-old enrollment system, called Newark Enrolls, could unravel. And it illustrates their fear of returning to what many charter proponents consider the bad old days, when each charter school had to convince families to apply to it separately because no universal application form existed.

Michele Mason, executive director of the Newark Charter School Fund, an advocacy and school-support group, said the sector was simply doing it “due diligence” in case negotiations with the district over Newark Enrolls broke down. She added that the sector developed a plan for how to create a charter-only enrollment system, but did not actually build one.

“We’re trying very hard to keep one system because we believe that’s in the best interest of kids and families,” Mason said. “But things could change here in Newark, and somebody could change their mind on one system, so we were just committed to not being caught flat-footed.”

The citywide enrollment system, originally called “One Newark,” has been divisive since it launched in 2014. It upended the tradition of families registering in person at their neighborhood school or entering admissions lotteries at individual charter schools. Instead, they could list up to eight district or charter schools on a single application before being matched to one school.

Early on, the new computerized system failed to match some students with any school and sent some siblings to schools in opposite ends of the city. Meanwhile, charter critics saw it as a scheme to divert students from the district into charter schools.

In 2016, the city school board passed a resolution to dismantle the system. But the move was mainly symbolic because the district was still under state control. Then, in February, the state ended its 22-year-long takeover and handed control back to the school board. Suddenly, the future of Newark Enrolls was in doubt.

Around that time, a few board members undertook a review of the enrollment system, which included talking to charter leaders. The charter leaders were left with the impression that some board members wanted separate district and charter enrollment systems, according to the charter memo.

At that point, sector began developing “contingency plans” for a charter-only system, the memo says. The idea was that if families could not longer apply to district and charter schools through a single system, they at least would not have to apply to each charter school separately.

Charter leaders’ fears grew in late June when the district’s new board-selected superintendent, Roger León, forced out dozens of administrators and top officials — including two who oversaw enrollment, Kate Fletcher and Gabrielle Ramos-Solomon. The board blocked their firing but both eventually resigned, leaving the enrollment office without a leader.

Around the time of León’s leadership shakeup, the Newark Charter School Fund hired a “research group” to study the computer program the district uses to match students with schools “so it can be replicated if needed,” according to the memo, which did not name the group.

Then tensions appeared to ease. In July, León assured charter leaders that he would protect the joint enrollment system. The two sides began negotiating the terms of an annual agreement that spells out how the system should operate.

Worried about the lack of leadership in the enrollment office and potential staff reductions, charter leaders pushed for a provision in the agreement that says the district must maintain “the quality and quantity of personnel necessary” to operate Newark Enrolls. The district accepted that change then proposed its own — an end to the practice of sending charter schools extra students to offset those who leave over the summer — which became a major sticking point. (The final agreement does not explicitly ban or allow the practice.)

Amid those talks, the charter sector hired Fletcher, the former district enrollment official, to develop a plan for “operationalizing” a charter-only enrollment system, according to the memo. That included contacting possible vendors and staffers to run the system, the memo says. (Fletcher did not respond to an email seeking comment.)

Eventually, district and charter leaders settled on the language of the agreement. At a board meeting on Nov. 12, Superintendent León made a forceful case for keeping the joint enrollment system, saying it eased the application process for parents and gave them more options. The board voted to approve it.

However, the vote was more a temporary truce than a permanent end to the battle over Newark Enrolls.

Board Member Leah Owens, who abstained from the vote, said during the meeting that the system was costly for the district to maintain and amounted to a district endorsement of charter schools. Board Member Reginald Bledsoe said he was only voting for the agreement because the district had not yet created an alternative enrollment system.

“We talked at great length with the community that we wouldn’t be moving forward with this system,” Bledsoe told the superintendent during the meeting. “When will this plan come to a halt?”

Newark’s new superintendent defended the enrollment system. Now can he make it work?

2018-12-05T01:28:02+00:00

The first big test for Newark’s new schools chief was ensuring that families had a way to apply to schools. His next assignment: making sure the enrollment system works.

Superintendent Roger León, who began in July, passed the first test last month. After hashing out an agreement with charter-school leaders, he convinced the Newark school board to retain the city’s 5-year-old enrollment system for another year. The system, called “Newark Enrolls,” lets families use a single form to apply to most district-run or charter schools rather than filling out separate applications — a point León emphasized when asking reluctant board members to vote for keeping the controversial system.

On Monday, families could begin using the system to apply to schools for the coming academic year — marking the start of the next test for the new administration. Already, signs have emerged of the challenges ahead.

The district has not yet published a new enrollment guide with updated information about each school, though officials say it is coming. More pressingly, León has yet to announce a new head of the enrollment office, whose leaders he ousted during a central-office shakeup.

Charter leaders are paying close attention. Just weeks ago, when it was still unclear whether the board would vote to maintain Newark Enrolls, the sector hired one of the district’s former enrollment chiefs to develop contingency plans for a charter-only enrollment system, according to a charter memo obtained by Chalkbeat.

Michele Mason, executive director of the Newark Charter School Fund, said the sector was simply doing its “due diligence” to prepare for the possibility that Newark Enrolls could be scrapped. Now that it has been preserved, she said, she expects 13 of the city’s 18 charter-school operators to participate.

She added that their focus now is on how the new administration manages the system, which more than 12,000 families rely on each year to apply to more than 70 schools.

“It’s going to be a steep learning curve,” she said. “We have to be patient.”

The application period for the 2019-20 school year began Monday and continues through Feb. 15. Then a computerized system will match each student to one school based on the family’s selections, available space, and rules that give preference to certain students. Students should receive their matches by April 15.

In the past, the district has published a thick school directory to help families pick schools. Last year’s 116-page guidebook include each school’s state test results, attendance rate, and available seats, along with details about its extracurricular activities and partnerships.

Mason said she thought the book might have been delayed by negotiations between the district and charter leaders over the cross-sector enrollment agreement, which dragged on for several extra weeks this year. It was during those negotiations that the sector hired Kate Fletcher, the district’s former executive director of enrollment, to devise plans for a backup enrollment system, according to the memo.

Charter-school leaders said district officials told them they would receive one-page fact sheets about their schools to pass out at a citywide enrollment fair this Saturday. A district spokeswoman said families would receive “a guide of schools and services” at the fair.

Tave Padilla, the school board member who heads the committee that oversees enrollment, said Tuesday he was surprised to learn that the guidebook had not yet been published or posted online.

“I’m going to call NPS and ask where is that book,” he said, using an acronym for the district. “That’s very important.”

The guide is a tool for families as they apply to up to eight schools among the dozens of traditional, magnet, and charter-school options. Stacy Raheem, a staffer at Unified Vailsburg Services Organization, a West Ward community organization, said she relied on the book last year when she helped about 40 parents apply to kindergarten.

“It had different things in it that would let parents make a more informed decision,” she said.

But an employee at another preschool, who declined to be named because she was not authorized to talk to the press, said parents could manage without the directory. They can attend the enrollment fair, research schools online, or ask friends or school workers for recommendations, she said.

“All of our parents here are word-of-mouth referrals,” she added.

The district’s enrollment office has been in a state of flux since León became superintendent.

His first move as schools chief was to force out 31 top officials and administrators, including Fletcher and Gabrielle Ramos-Solomon, the former enrollment chief. The board blocked their firings, fearing disruptions to enrollment, but both still decided to leave.

Their departure appears to have rattled the charter sector. Charter representatives negotiated a provision into the new enrollment deal saying the district must maintain “the quality and quantity of personnel necessary” to effectively operate the enrollment system.

For now, most charter leaders are waiting and carefully watching.

Dina Velez, principal of Newark Educators’ Community Charter School in the Central Ward, said the enrollment process appears to be running smoothly so far and the enrollment office staff has been helpful.

“No system is perfect,” she said, but added, “I haven’t had a negative experience.”

Civics 101: New course will teach Newark students how to tackle local problems

2018-11-29T21:15:18+00:00

Newark students will learn to become “citizen problem-solvers” through a new training program coming soon to the city’s high schools, the mayor and schools chief announced Wednesday.

What is a citizen problem-solver? Exhibit A is Bradley Gonmiah, a Science Park High School senior who at a school-board meeting this summer urged the district to adopt the free course. A few weeks later, and with the encouragement of other engaged citizens, the board voted to do just that.

“Bradley made a powerful pitch for solution civics that was embraced by the school board and embraced by the superintendent,” said Harry Pozycki, a New Jersey-based attorney who created the program. “So now we’re off and running.”

The 10-session course will be incorporated into the American history class that students are required to take in the 11th grade. Students will learn to identify problems in the city, file public-records requests as they gather information, and propose research-based solutions to city officials.

The course is structured around “The 21st Century Citizens Manual,” a self-published book written by Pozycki and distributed by The Citizens Campaign, a 20-year-old nonprofit co-founded by Pozycki and his wife, Caroline. The group has provided 2,220 free copies of the book to Newark Public Schools and helped train 27 social-studies teachers.

Newark will become the first district to require that all high-school students take the course. Individual schools have offered the course in a handful of other New Jersey districts, including Plainfield, where students encouraged officials to add a section about the environment to the city’s master plan — which the officials did, according to Rob Horowitz, a spokesman for the Citizens Campaign.

The course is part of a larger effort by Newark’s new superintendent, Roger León — an avid Newark booster and public-school graduate — to foster a greater sense of civic pride and duty among students.

Leading up to this month’s midterm elections, he partnered with Rutgers University on a campaign that registered about 600 high-school students to vote. And he plans to introduce courses on New Jersey and Newark history in elementary schools, he said Wednesday.

“In Newark, we understand that we are preparing the next generation of citizens and leaders,” León said.

The high-school program is part of a larger “civic city” campaign that Mayor Ras Baraka unveiled Wednesday. It includes a related civics course at Rutgers University-Newark that will be open to students and the public, along with the “Newark Civic Trust,” a group the Citizens Campaign helped form three years ago that brings together residents to propose solutions to local issues.

It was through that group that Gonmiah, the Science Park student who is also a co-leader of the Newark Students Union, first learned about the civics course.

After Wednesday’s announcement at City Hall, Gonmiah said he was excited to see city leaders endorse the program, which he hopes will help students realize “they have the power to actually change things.” But like any good citizen problem-solver, he said wouldn’t rest until the plans are carried out.

“All of these things are cool,” he said. “But we have to make sure it’s actually implemented.”

In deal with union, Newark agrees to pay raises for teachers with graduate degrees

2018-11-29T02:46:58+00:00

Newark teachers are due for a $2.5 million windfall this year, and hundreds more can expect hefty raises in the future, thanks to a new agreement between the district and the city teachers union.

The agreement stems from an arbitrator’s finding that the district violated several provisions of the 2012 teachers contract, which was touted at the time as a national model. In the document inked this month, the district agreed to make several payments demanded by the arbitrator and to negotiate pay raises for teachers who earn advanced degrees — ending a feature of the 2012 contract that replaced such raises with one-time bonuses for teachers who completed a controversial training program.

While the terms of the raises must still be negotiated, they could prove costly to the district. The union estimates that between 200 and 300 teachers who earned degrees in recent years are eligible for retroactive raises which, in the past, ranged from $2,500 to $4,000 depending on the type of degree.

The payments highlight the bind that Newark’s new superintendent, Roger León, finds himself in as he tries to enact his own policies while at the same time confronting costly unresolved matters left by the previous two superintendents — all without the massive influx of private funding that bankrolled many of his predecessors’ efforts.

In fact, the contract settlements may be the least of León’s worries.

At a school-board meeting this month, León said a legal matter triggered by the previous administration has temporarily blocked him from hiring attendance counselors — a key component of his plan to combat the district’s severe absenteeism problem. And, without giving specifics, he cited a fine related to employee health insurance that the district incurred in 2015 but never paid.

The current price tag: At least $48 million, León told the board.

“P.S., I began on July 1,” he quipped — a pointed reminder that his financial headaches, for now, are largely inherited.

The agreement between León and the Newark Teachers Union includes $1.7 million for various groups of teachers who were shortchanged under the terms of the 2012 contract, according to the 2017 arbitration decision. (Former Superintendent Christopher Cerf appealed the decision, but a superior-court judge recently upheld it.)

It also includes $816,000 in raises for the district’s highest-paid teachers, which stemmed from a clause in last year’s contract enabling the new administration to renegotiate raises. León agreed to increase salaries by the maximum amount allowed by the contract — from 2.95 to 3.25 percent.

The most far-reaching — and expensive — part of the agreement is likely to be the pay hike for teachers who earn postgraduate degrees.

The 2012 contract did away with the district’s traditional salary system, which put teachers with master’s or doctorate degrees on a higher pay scale. Instead, the contract allowed for teachers who completed a district-approved graduate program to earn a one-time bonus of up to $20,000.

Then-Superintendent Cami Anderson and Cerf, who at the time was state education commissioner, had two goals in pushing for the change. One was to reduce costs. Calling the graduate-degree raises “prohibitively expensive,” Anderson said during an arbitration hearing that the district expected to pay for the one-time awards with private money that wealthy donors, including Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, had provided to finance an overhaul of the district.

The other objective was to spur changes in teacher-training programs. District officials did not believe that most universities had sufficiently revamped their programs to prepare teachers for the state’s new, more rigorous “Common Core” learning standards that teachers now were expected to help students meet. The idea was to award bonuses only to teachers who attended Common Core-aligned programs, which would pressure colleges and universities to update their approach.

“This was all to incentivize the higher-ed community to do more, better, faster,” Anderson said in her testimony, “and also about rewarding teachers who were bettering themselves — not on the old way of teaching, but on the way that the new Common Core would demand.”

The contract called for a committee with representatives from the city’s teachers union and higher-education to recommend criteria for the district to use in approving programs. However, the district never convened that committee, according to the arbitrator’s findings.

Instead, more than two years after the contract was signed, the district on its own approved a single program: the Relay Graduate School of Education, a relatively new and controversial institution with close ties to the charter-school sector. Only teachers who completed that program could earn the $20,000 bonus.

The arbitrator, James Mastriani, said last year that the district must actually convene the selection committee and determine which degrees will merit a bonus payment. Teachers who previously earned degrees from approved programs would then be eligible for the applicable bonuses.

However, the deal between León and the union abolishes that bonus program and restores a version of the old system, where teachers with graduate degrees from any institution received higher pay.

The value of their degrees going forward will be determined next year, when the two sides negotiate a new contract to replace the current one, which expires on June 30. Crucially for the union, the salary increases will also grow members’ pensions — a benefit not offered by the one-time bonuses.

“Instead of continuing to try and make an unwieldy, tainted system work,” Newark Teachers Union President John Abeigon wrote Monday in an email to his members, “we got the district to agree in writing to work with us on putting the original time-tested system back in place during our next contract negotiations.”

The agreement adds that any employee who earned a graduate degree since the start of the 2012 contract will be eligible for a retroactive salary increase. Union officials pointed out that it does not put any restrictions on those degrees — meaning hundreds of teachers could eventually get checks with sizable back payments.

In an interview Tuesday, León insisted that this was not a blanket pay hike. Instead, he said he would push during negotiations to give raises only to employees who earned advanced degrees that are relevant to their jobs or teaching assignments.

“We will review every single one of those people’s degrees,” he said.

It will not be clear until after next year’s contract negotiations how much the raises will cost. It’s possible they could eventually dwarf the price of the $20,000 bonuses if teachers who receive the salary bumps remain in the district for many years.

León said he did not expect that. He added that, with the private money that paid for many elements of the 2012 contract now spent, it would be hard for the district today to afford the bonuses.

“Where am I going to get that money from?” he said.

‘No secret agreements’: Newarkers demand details of district-charter enrollment deal

2018-11-17T00:22:55+00:00

This week, the Newark school board approved a lengthy legal agreement spelling out the details of the enrollment system that thousands of Newark families will use to apply to schools for the coming year.

Didn’t hear about it? You’re not alone.

The board OK’d the deal at a hastily arranged meeting Monday that few people in the community knew about or attended. State rules require that any changes to the district’s enrollment system “be publicly and transparently articulated before adoption.”

It’s unclear whether any changes were made — which would have triggered the transparency rules — because the board did not publicly discuss the details of the deal before voting, and the district has not made the agreement public.

Deborah Smith-Gregory, the president of the Newark NAACP, who attended Monday’s meeting, said she was disappointed that the board did not reveal any specifics about this year’s enrollment deal. Now that the district is back under local control after decades of state rule, she said, the elected board must commit to greater transparency.

“They have to do things differently,” she said. “They have to keep in mind that they’re a public entity — and they’re accountable to the community.”

The agreement describes in minute detail the inner workings of the five-year-old enrollment system, called Newark Enrolls, which allows families apply to most district and charter schools using a single application. The district and charter schools that opt into the system must sign the agreement each year.

The Newark Board of Education ratified the deal during a special meeting Monday — when schools and the district’s central office were closed. The meeting was scheduled to accommodate a charter school whose own board planned to vote on the agreement Tuesday. The timeline is tight because the citywide period for applying to schools begins Dec. 3.

The public agenda for Monday’s meeting, which mostly consisted of the board and Superintendent Roger León talking behind closed doors, did not mention the agreement. Just four community members were present for the public portion, when León and a couple board members made general comments about the controversial system, which critics contend funnels students into charter schools.

Then, without any public discussion of the agreement’s details — including a proposed change that León and charter leaders had debated in private — a majority of board members voted to approve it.

John Abeigon, president of the Newark Teachers Union and a fierce critic of charter schools, said both the district and its charter-school partners should disclose the terms of the deal.

“There should be absolute transparency,” he said.

The district’s current leadership is not the first to keep details of the enrollment system under wraps.

León, who began July 1, inherited it from his state-appointed predecessors, Cami Anderson and Christopher Cerf. One of only a handful of systems nationwide that combine district and charter admissions, proponents say it eases the enrollment process for families while helping to more evenly spread high-needs students across schools. Critics say it was designed to steer students and resources into the charter sector.

The system is dictated by the annual agreement between Newark Public Schools and participating charter schools. Apart from the news website NJ Spotlight, which published the agreement when it was first announced in 2013, it does not appear to have been released to the public since then — even as it has doubled in length, filling 20 pages last year.

In 2015, after Anderson touted the agreement at a state legislative hearing, saying it had created “greater equity and consistency” in admissions, several lawmakers asked to see it.

“No one seems to know about it,” said Assemblyman Ralph Caputo during the hearing.

After Anderson resigned, Cerf’s administration continued to renew the agreement each year. In an email, Cerf, who stepped down in February, said, “The document was always publicly available and was frequently discussed publicly.”

But community activists who have long scrutinized the enrollment system said they do not recall the district ever publicizing the agreement.

“I do not remember ever seeing this document, ever seeing it published anywhere, ever seeing it on the [district] website where we could find it, ever even discussing it in a thorough manner,” said Wilhelmina Holder, a longtime activist and critic of the enrollment system. She added that the new administration and school board should release the latest document to the public.

“No secret agreements,” she said. “You voted on it. If you’re discussing it, then why can’t we have a say in it?”

Absent the agreement, families have other ways to learn about Newark Enrolls. The district publishes a thick enrollment guidebook each year with information about every school, and hosts an annual admissions fair. It also maintains an enrollment website featuring a family-friendly video that illustrates how the system works.

But the agreement offers a uniquely detailed look under the system’s hood — and describes features that are not widely known, according to a copy of last year’s agreement that Chalkbeat obtained.

For instance, it alludes to a “third party” that programs the algorithm used to match students with schools based on the terms set forth in the agreement. The district plays “no active role” in the actual assignment of students to schools, the document says.

It also stipulates that the district must send charter schools as many students as they request. In return, charters must admit all students assigned to them — even if that pushes their enrollment above the limit set by the state, according to the 2017 document.

That practice of assigning schools more students than they currently have space for, called “overmatching,” is done to offset attrition that happens as some families inevitably leave the district before the next school year starts. It became a sticking point in recent closed-door negotiations between León’s administration and charter schools.

León wanted to end the practice, despite charter leaders who said it was critical for filling their seats. People in the charter sector said the final agreement still allows overmatching, though León told Chalkbeat that he believes the practice is unnecessary because charters can pull students from their waitlists to replace those who leave.

In an interview after Monday’s vote, León said no major changes were made to this year’s agreement.

Board chair Josephine Garcia, who made no public comments about enrollment during Monday’s meeting, declined to be interviewed immediately afterwards and did not respond to emails later in the week. However, she was overheard saying after the meeting that the district would eventually “rebrand” the enrollment system.

Chalkbeat contacted the district several times after the meeting to request a copy of the agreement. On Thursday evening, an official provided a public-records request form, which Chalkbeat submitted.

As of Friday, the district had not released the document.

Newark will keep universal enrollment for now — even as key dispute between charter schools and city appears unresolved

2018-11-14T16:26:39+00:00

Newark will keep its universal enrollment system for at least another year, despite critics who say it poses a grave threat to the district by allowing families to easily opt into charter schools.

The city’s board of education voted Monday to preserve the controversial enrollment system, called “Newark Enrolls,” which lets families use a single online system to apply to most traditional and charter schools. Just two years ago, the board tried to dismantle the system, arguing that it drained students and funding from the district as it fueled the charter sector’s rapid growth.

But, on Monday, the board appeared persuaded by the district’s new superintendent, Roger León, who said it is their duty to make it easy for families to send their children to whatever schools they choose — even private and parochial schools, which León said he hopes to eventually invite into the enrollment system.

“That families today go through one system and have one application makes their life a lot less cumbersome,” he said. “It’s our responsibility to make sure that whatever they choose, they get.”

However, certain key details — such as how the system will handle “overmatching,” a process in which more students than typically show up are assigned to a school to address possible attrition over the summer — appear to still be the subject of some disagreement.

León’s full-throated defense of school choice is sure to surprise some community members, who had expected the former Newark Public Schools principal to rein in the charter sector after years of swift expansion under his state-appointed predecessors. Yet León has been open about his admiration for some of the city’s high-performing charter schools and his disdain for the district’s previously decentralized enrollment system, which favored families with the wherewithal to wait in long lines for coveted district-school seats or to apply separately to multiple charter schools.

Politics also may have played a role in the current system’s survival. In recent days, charter school advocates asked state Sen. Teresa Ruiz — a Newark power broker who is close to León — to help prevent changes to the system that they oppose, according to people in the charter sector.

Newark Enrolls also may have benefited from its relative popularity. A survey of 1,800 people who used the system this year found that 95 percent were “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with the enrollment process. And a phone survey of 302 Newark voters last month commissioned by the charter sector found that 52 percent of respondents favored the system, while 26 percent opposed it and 21 percent were undecided, according to a summary of the results obtained by Chalkbeat.

Yet charter schools — which now serve about one-third of city students — remain a lightning rod in Newark. Critics say they sap resources from the district while failing to serve their fair-share of needy students. In March, Mayor Ras Baraka called for a halt to their expansion.

Board Member Leah Owens, a former district teacher who is critical of charter schools, argued before Monday’s vote that more was on the line than the fate of the online application system.

“This is about, What is the future of Newark Public Schools going to look like if we continue to legitimize the idea of having privately run public schools?” she said during the meeting. “When we bring these schools into our enrollment system, we are saying that this is OK and that competition will improve the schools.”

Launched in 2014, the so-called “universal enrollment” system allows each family to apply online to up to eight traditional, magnet, or charter schools. A computer algorithm then assigns each student to a single school based on the family’s preferences, available space, and rules that give priority to students who live near schools or have special needs.

In the past, the district has allowed charter schools to specify how many students they want the district to assign them. Most request more students than they have space for to account for the attrition that invariably happens as some families move over the summer or enroll in private schools.

That practice, known as “overmatching,” became a flashpoint in the recent negotiations between León’s administration and charter schools, which must sign an annual agreement to participate in the enrollment system.

León’s side revised the agreement to eliminate overmatching, according to a person involved in the talks. Some charter leaders, worried the change would leave them with empty seats and reduced budgets, considered pulling out of the system.

The threat appears to have worked. The agreement that the board approved Monday still allows for overmatching, according to people in the charter sector. (The district has not made the agreement public, and officials did not respond to a request from Chalkbeat Tuesday to release it.)

“I don’t know anything about how that happened exactly,” said Jess Rooney, founder and co-director of People’s Preparatory Charter School. “All I know is that [León] got the message that that was of great concern, and he did a lot of work to address that concern very quickly.”

Charter leaders celebrated the agreement the school board ratified Monday, which they believe protects overmatching — a process they consider crucial for filling their rosters before classes start.

However, it’s not clear that León shares their interpretation.

In an interview Monday, he said the district would only send as many students to charter schools as they are authorized by the state to serve — even if they request extra students to offset attrition. If charters lose some students over the summer, they can replace them with students from their waitlists, he added.

“The legislature determined that there is a cap that they have,” León said, “and we’re sticking with that.”

Former district officials said that relying on charter schools to fill empty seats with students from their waitlists can disrupt district schools, which may abruptly lose students whom they were assigned. But León said that was not a concern, because charters can only pull students whose top choice had been a charter school.

“They have a right to pull that student because that student is not at their preferred school of choice,” he said. “That’s fine.”

Families can begin applying to schools for next school year on Dec. 3, León said. On Dec. 8, the district will host an admissions fair with representatives from traditional and charter schools.

In the meantime, the board of each charter school that plans to participate in universal enrollment must approve the agreement. Last year, 13 of the city’s 19 charter-school operators signed on.

Michele Mason, executive director of the Newark Charter School Fund, said she would defer to the district on “the implementation question” of overmatching. Other charter leaders insisted that the issue had been settled, and overmatching would continue as it has in the past.

Either way, Mason said she expects the same number of charter schools to join this year. She added that she was heartened by León’s remarks at Monday’s board meeting.

“I really do believe he values the options that charter schools give students and families,” she said.

As León pushes for changes, some charters consider leaving Newark’s unified enrollment system

2018-11-09T18:23:00+00:00

Newark families could have a harder time applying to certain schools this year if changes sought by the district’s new superintendent spur some charter schools to pull out of the city’s common enrollment system, charter advocates say.

Superintendent Roger León is pushing for the system to no longer assign schools extra students to offset attrition over the summer, according to people briefed on negotiations over the enrollment system. The practice, known as “overmatching,” helps both district and charter schools plan for the coming year, but it also ensures that charter schools fill their seats — something León appears less willing to help with than his charter-friendly predecessors.

The dispute means that district and charter leaders are still hashing out rules for the five-year-old common enrollment system just weeks before applications are due to open. Now, some charter schools are considering withdrawing entirely — potentially triggering a return to the fragmented application process families faced before universal enrollment launched in 2013, charter proponents say.

“Realistically, it’s possible that could happen,” said one of the people briefed on the talks who, like the others, asked to remain anonymous while negotiations continue. “We’re really late in the game right now.”

The dustup marks another instance where León appears eager to roll back his predecessors’ policies — even if it means moving quickly, before all the potential consequences are known.

On the first day of classes, he told principals he was eliminating extra hours for struggling schools, forcing them to scramble to reset their schedules. And before even taking office on July 1, he pushed out dozens of top officials — a move the school board, which was not consulted in advance, partially blocked.

One of those officials was the district’s head of enrollment, Gabrielle Ramos-Solomon. She oversaw the universal enrollment system, called “Newark Enrolls,” which lets families apply to most of the city’s traditional, magnet, and charter schools using a single application. After a chaotic launch that outraged many parents, the system today gets high marks on user surveys. Yet it remains controversial among critics of charter schools who view it little more than a ploy to funnel students into the privately managed schools.

One feature of the system is that it assigns schools — both charter and district — more students than they have space for. This “overmatching” is done to account for the attrition that occurs each year as some students leave the city or decamp to private or county schools. A former district official estimated that most schools lose between 5 to 20 percent of their assigned students that way.

Now, overmatching has become a sticking point in the negotiations, according to those with knowledge of the talks, as León has proposed ending the practice.

It is unclear why, and the district did not make León available for an interview. One possibility is that doing so might appease critics without dismantling common enrollment, which León has said he wants to keep.

But some people in the charter sector believe the superintendent, wanting to retain as many students as possible in the district, is loath to send charters extra students. That prospect has alarmed some charter school operators who fear they could end up with unfilled seats and reduced budgets, as school funding is based on enrollment.

To illustrate how overmatching works, a person connected to the charter-school sector gave an example of a high school with 100 available ninth-grade seats. In the past, the enrollment system might assign the school 115 students based on the assumption that roughly 15 students would not end up attending. If the system only matched 100 students to the school, then it could be left with 15 open seats.

“At an independent charter school, when those 15 students don’t show up, there’s no money coming from anywhere else to adjust their budget,” the person said. “That could put them out of business.”

If the district stops sending charter schools extra students, those schools are likely to start admitting more students from their waitlists. If that happens, district schools may suddenly lose students who were on their rosters. They would then have openings that are likely to be filled by students who arrive midyear, who are often some of the most challenging students to serve.

“District principals hate losing kids to charter waitlists,” the former district official said. “It creates a lot of instability.”

León met with charter-school representatives Thursday, but no final agreement was reached. Even if the two sides work out a compromise, the district’s board of education and each of the boards overseeing the participating charter schools must still vote on the plan.

They have limited time to do that without disrupting the normal admissions cycle. Typically, families can start applying to schools for the following year in the first week of December.

Newark Public Schools spokeswoman Tracy Munford said enrollment would start at the same time this year even though the district-charter enrollment agreement has not been finalized.

“This is in progress and we look forward to it being completed soon,” she said in an email.

Meanwhile, some charter school leaders have discussed the possibility of forming a separate charter-only enrollment system if they decide to withdraw from Newark Enrolls. The heads of smaller charter-school organizations are most concerned about the proposed changes, according to a person familiar with their thinking.

Last school year, 13 of the city’s 19 charter school operators participated in the joint enrollment system. (The others each handled their own admissions.) Most families who used Newark Enrolls were matched with one of the top three choices on their applications — 94 percent who applied to kindergarten got a top pick, as did 70 percent who applied to ninth-grade.

Assigning schools more students than they have space for allows additional students to be matched with high-demand schools, said Jesse Margolis, an education researcher who has studied Newark’s enrollment system. The schools end up with roughly the right number of students because some of those on their rosters never show up. And students who would have been assigned to a less popular school if the system hadn’t overmatched instead get to attend one at the top of their list.

“Overmatching is a way of helping kids get their preferences,” said Margolis, who co-wrote a favorable report about Newark Enrolls commissioned by the district’s previous superintendent, Christopher Cerf. “And it helps schools have stable, predictable enrollments.”

Correction: This story has been updated to remove an inaccurate explanation for why some charter schools are more wary of a change to enrollment rules than others.

After 120 days on the job, Newark’s new superintendent is asked: Where’s your plan?

2018-11-01T04:42:36+00:00

Newark’s new superintendent didn’t hit the ground running — he hit it at an all-out sprint.

Days before his official start on July 1, Roger León ousted many of the district’s top officials. Soon after, he assembled a new leadership team, reorganized the district’s central office, and made a series of sweeping promises — to boost attendance, overhaul struggling high schools, revamp summer school, raise test scores, and make the district “second to none.”

But as the dust settles and León hits the four-month mark in office, his bosses now say they want to know the strategy behind his team’s multi-pronged approach. How do the disparate initiatives he has sketched out fit together? And how does he plan to realize his audacious vision for the district — including perfect student attendance and passing scores for every student on the state tests, which no large urban district has ever achieved?

Members of the Newark Board of Education, which voted in May to make León the city’s new schools chief, say it’s time for him to submit a coherent plan with clear goals they can hold him to. While insisting that they continue to support León, some board members have threatened not to approve any more of his funding or staffing requests until he provides them with a written plan.

“Things are coming in piecemeal, and we don’t have any real goals because we’re [only] seeing pieces of his plan,” Board Member Kim Gaddy told Chalkbeat on Wednesday. “He articulates his plan from his head, but I have not seen it in written form.”

Until she receives a such a plan, Gaddy added, “I can’t continue to support contracts and employment because I don’t see how it’s connected to this larger picture.”

That is no idle threat. At Tuesday evening’s board meeting, Gaddy and Board Member Leah Owens both declined to vote on any items related to district personnel, finance, and operations. (Board Chair Josephine Garcia also abstained from the personnel vote but did not specify why. She did not respond to a request for comment.)

During the meeting, Owens said she is “very excited” about some of the changes León has made. But she said that she and other members have repeatedly asked León to provide a written strategy with measurable goals, which they can use to evaluate his performance as required annually by state law.

“Without me knowing clearly what the goals of the superintendent are, I cannot appropriately evaluate him,” she said. “And I cannot vote yes even to resolutions and votes that I would normally say yes to.”

All of the items that the nine-member board voted on Tuesday passed. Still, some members who approved the proposals expressed concerns about communication between León and his staff and the board.

In an interview Wednesday, Board Member Tave Padilla echoed Gaddy and Owens, saying that he supports León and the parts of his agenda that he has revealed. He added that León has been “very accommodating” in providing the board with most of the information it has requested.

But he noted that the district’s power dynamics were realigned when the state put the board back in control of Newark’s schools in February, ending a 22-year-long state takeover. No longer appointed by the state with the power to do as they please, the city’s superintendents must now earn the board’s approval.

“You can’t think you’re going to throw stuff out, and we’re going to rubber stamp it,” Padilla said. “It’s not like that anymore.”

Board members have pushed back against León’s proposals before. In June, the board blocked the firing of nine of the 31 officials that León tried to force out, and voted down three assistant superintendents he sought to hire. Some members complained that León had rushed the staffing changes and offered buyout packages without their approval — all before he officially began as superintendent.

At the time, León downplayed the resistance as the board simply doing its due diligence. Undeterred, he continued to move forward with his agenda.

In August, he summoned all 7,000 or so district employees to a meeting inside a sports arena where he offered a glimpse of an intricate plan he crafted with his inner circle of advisors. It involved forming specialized academies inside traditional high schools, rehiring laid-off attendance workers, and reviewing district policies in areas such as grading and discipline.

Superintendent León announced three district campaigns during an all-staff meeting in August, but provided few details.

He also announced three “campaigns” — 100 percent attendance, passing scores by all district students on the state PARCC exams, and “#1: Second to None” — but did not go into detail about what they entail. And he debuted several smaller initiatives, such as an awards program for high-achieving students and a series of breakfast meet-and-greets with families.

León and his deputies discussed some of those efforts at later board meetings. But they have not released the plan in writing, which would allow board members — and the public — to provide feedback and track the administration’s progress.

“It needs to be in one document,” Owens told Chalkbeat. “And it should be something that’s available publicly.”

It’s also unclear what intermediary targets León hopes to hit this school year on the way to his long-term objectives. With one in three students chronically absent last school year, it’s essentially impossible for the district to achieve perfect attendance by June. However, the plan could set an interim goal for this year, such as a specific increase in attendance or decrease in chronic absenteeism, Gaddy said.

“I have to be able to connect your plan to some achievement outcomes for our students,” Gaddy said. “And that’s not asking for too much.”

In addition to a comprehensive plan, several board members said they want more time and information about proposals before being asked to vote on them at board meetings. During Tuesday’s meeting, Board Member Reginald Bledsoe told the board chair that too many items were being added to meeting agendas shortly before votes are held.

“The number of items that have come before this board at the last minute is unacceptable,” he said. “This has never been like this before.”

In a follow-up interview, Bledsoe said the board has had only “minor communication issues” with León and his office, adding that he believes board-district communications have improved under León’s administration. He also said he expects León to present the board with his plan shortly.

“I am hopeful that a written plan is coming soon for this school year from Superintendent León with clear goals,” he said in a statement. He added that he stands by León “100 percent,” because “when he succeeds, we all succeed — our schools, parents, teachers, students and our overall community.”

A district spokeswoman did not respond to a request to interview León. But as he was leaving Tuesday’s board meeting, he was asked to comment on Board Member Owens’ statement that she would not approve his proposals until she receives a written plan.

“I will speak to her about it,” he said.

In Newark, reporting lapses hide thousands of student suspensions from public view

2018-10-16T13:00:50+00:00

This story is part of a partnership between Chalkbeat and the nonprofit investigative news organization ProPublica. Using federal data from Miseducation, an interactive database built by ProPublica, we are publishing a series of stories exploring inequities in education at the local level.

Newark schools are suspending thousands of students, the majority of them black, according to 2015-16 federal data collected by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights.

But because of reporting lapses, those suspensions are nowhere to be found in the state’s published school report cards, where parents typically turn to seek out such data. Instead, the reports give the false impression that Newark has all but eliminated suspensions.

The flawed reports reveal the district’s longtime struggle to track suspensions — a data challenge that has impeded efforts to stop schools from inappropriately removing students or punishing students of one race more harshly than others.

ProPublica has compiled the federal data, which many people never see, in a new user-friendly portal, allowing the public to explore racial inequities across districts and schools. Using the tool to analyze suspensions in Newark, Chalkbeat found stark disparities between schools and between students of different races — troubling patterns masked by the inaccurate state reports.

The state and federal suspension rates for individual schools differ dramatically, creating uncertainty about schools’ actual discipline practices. Current and former district officials say the federal data is more reliable than the state’s figures, which they attributed to reporting failures at the school level.

For example, the state’s 2015-16 “school performance report” for Weequahic High School in Newark’s impoverished South Ward says its suspension rate was zero. But the federal data indicate that Weequahic, where 98 percent of students were black, gave in-school suspensions to 233 students — an astonishing 70 percent of the student body. (In addition, 31 students received out-of-school suspensions.)

“You’d get suspended for anything,” recalled Daquis Henry, 18, about his freshman year at Weequahic. Henry, now a senior, said suspensions have become less common under the school’s new principal, but, in the past, the policy made him consider staying home.

“It’d be like all my friends are suspended,” he said. “What’s the point of me coming?”

District-wide, 2,087 students received out-of-school suspensions in the 2015-16 academic year, or 6 percent of the total enrollment, according to the federal data. About 960 students received in-school suspensions, or 3 percent of the enrollment. (Students who received both types of suspensions are included in both counts.)

The state did not publish district suspension rates that year. But in 2016-17, it reported that 1.1 percent of Newark students received out-of-school suspensions, and 0 percent received in-school suspensions — an improbable number in a state where nearly 53,000 students were given in-school suspensions that year.

The federal data show that more than one-fourth of students who received out-of-school suspensions in 2015-16 hailed from just three Newark high schools, where the vast majority of students were black. The schools were Central, Newark Early College (now part of West Side), and Malcolm X Shabazz.

The state report for Shabazz indicated its suspension rate was 0.6 percent, but the federal data show it gave out-of-school suspensions to 246 students — or 44 percent of its student body. It also gave in-school suspensions, which the federal government defines as being removed from the classroom for at least half a day, to 161 students. (Damon Holmes, the school’s former principal, disputed those numbers, saying he recorded a 24 percent suspension rate that year — still about three times the statewide rate.)

If suspension rates are as high as the federal data suggest — or even close — the consequences for affected students are potentially grave. Research has shown that suspensions impair students’ academic performance, and that suspended students are more likely to drop out of school and become ensnared by the juvenile-justice system. (Six percent of Weequahic students and 14 percent of Shabazz students dropped out in 2015-16, compared to just 1.2 percent statewide.)

And Newark’s black students appear to be bearing the brunt of the district’s harshest punishments. In 2015-16, black students made up 73 percent of those who received out-of-school suspensions as well as 67 percent of students who were referred to law enforcement, which includes receiving a ticket or being arrested, although they accounted for just 46 percent of the overall enrollment.

By contrast, Hispanic students, who made up 45 percent of Newark’s district-school enrollment that academic year, represented just 25 percent of students who received out-of-school suspensions and 29.4 percent of those referred to law enforcement.

This racial disparity mirrors national trends, where black students make up 15.5 percent of the enrollment but 39 percent of suspended students, according to a Government Accountability Office analysis of 2013-14 data. The 28 percentage-point gap between enrollment and suspensions for Newark’s black students exceeds the 23.5 gap that exists nationally.

Andrea McChristian, an associate counsel at the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice, said the inaccurate state reports hinder efforts to pinpoint which districts and schools are pushing the most students out of class — and, potentially, into the criminal-justice system.

This gap and lack of transparency is especially troubling in light of New Jersey’s stark racial disparities in youth incarceration: Black youth are more than 30 times more likely than their white peers to be detained or committed to a juvenile-justice facility.

“We have to look at the reasons at the front end — what’s the funnel?” McChristian said. “The schools seem like a logical place to start.” But she noted, “It’s hard to quantify that without the data.”

The state’s annual report cards, which include Newark’s inaccurate suspension information, are designed to give the public a view of each school’s performance according to a range of metrics, including test scores and attendance. The reports are a critical tool for families in a “choice” system like Newark’s, where parents are encouraged to compare schools’ performance before ranking them on applications during the open-enrollment process.

However, the state relies on districts to provide much of the data in the reports, including suspension rates. The suspension numbers that Newark submitted were incomplete because many schools, until recently, did not log suspensions in the district’s online database, called PowerSchool, according to district officials.

“It was really a matter of reporting,” said Tashia Martin, a special assistant in the district’s Office of Student Support Services, which oversees discipline policy. “Some schools may not have been reporting in the way that they should have.”

Instead, some schools recorded discipline incidents and responses in third-party systems, such as Google Sheets. Beginning in 2016, the district began to retrain school personnel on how to input suspension data in PowerSchool, Martin said. The district has provided three trainings this school year on discipline policy, including data entry, she added.

“I’m confident that our numbers will be more accurate this year,” she said.

She and other officials said the federal data from 2015-16 is more accurate than the state reports because district officials gathered any missing data from schools.

“A few years ago, when we did not have the right protocols in place, and schools were doing whatever they wanted to do, we had to do a lot more legwork,” Martin said. Because of that “follow up with schools to collect the data, the CRDC report should be accurate,” she said, referring to the federal survey.

But even the federal data is incomplete, according to documents obtained by Chalkbeat.

Newark Superintendent Roger León is faced with a suspension-tracking challenge that has long bedeviled the district.

In April 2017, Newark Public Schools officials informed the Office for Civil Rights that suspension data was “missing entirely” for two schools and “a few data elements” were unavailable for several other schools in the 2015-16 survey that the federal government collected. The district promised to “improve the consistency and comprehensiveness of suspension data” in the next survey, which is compiled every two years and will cover 2017-18, by retooling the district’s data system, training school personnel, and monitoring data collection, according to an “action plan” submitted to the federal agency.

The flaws in Newark’s responses to the 2015-16 survey came after the district failed to submit any data at all for the previous 2013-14 survey — making it one of only a few dozen districts out of 17,000 nationwide not to complete the legally required survey.

A U.S. education department spokesman did not immediately reply to inquiries about Newark’s survey responses. But in an email exchange last November with McChristian, the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice associate counsel, an official from the civil rights office said that Newark was an outlier.

“The CRDC is mandatory and we have very high response rates,” the official wrote. “However, there are always some districts that do not submit, for whatever reason. As an example, for the 2015-16 school year, there are 17,000+ school districts and only 34 did not submit data.”

Michael Yaple, a New Jersey Department of Education spokesman, said that districts have previously had to submit suspension data in different forms to the state and federal governments. The state has recently put in place a new data-reporting system that should result in fewer differences between the suspension rates reported at the state and federal level, he added.

“The NJDOE is working to continuously improve our data-reporting systems so residents can have better conversations in their communities about the needs of their students,” he said in an email. “In the next few years, the public can expect to see fewer discrepancies between the two collections.”

Lisa McDonald, who was principal at Weequahic High School in 2015-16, could not be reached for comment. The current principal, Andre Hollis, noted in an email that he arrived at the school in October 2017. He said he has tried to steer the school toward “restorative practices,” which are designed to help students reflect on their actions and make better choices rather than being sent out of school.

“We currently record suspensions in PowerSchool and use Restorative Practices to reduce the number of suspensions,” he said.

District officials said they review suspension data each month and follow up with schools that have unusually high rates or disparities between students according to race, gender, or special-education status.

However, the office that reviews discipline data has gone without a leader since June, when she and other top officials were forced out by the new superintendent, Roger León. Now, it falls on León to improve the district’s suspension reporting, whose challenges predate his administration.

“The fact that we’re in transition and these important questions are being asked is a good thing,” said Matthew Brewster, executive director of the superintendent’s office. “That helps us get to a place where we need to be.”

Another year, another Newark attendance campaign. Can León succeed where others have failed?

2018-09-26T22:25:24+00:00

As the final days of summer melted away last month and Newark families began stuffing backpacks and straightening uniforms, district officials commenced their own back-to-school tradition: They launched a new attendance campaign.

In late August, the new superintendent, Roger León, summoned the district’s entire workforce to a hockey arena to announce, among other initiatives, a plan to achieve perfect attendance in every school — an audacious and improbable goal in any district but especially so in a system where nearly one in three students is considered chronically absent. It’s part of an age-old battle — as well as a new push locally and nationally — to ensure students show up daily for class.

Before long, families were fielding calls from district employees, who had each been assigned five households to remind of the school year’s Sept. 4 start date, and from León himself, who recorded a back-to-school message. At a local principal’s request, the manager of a ShopRite supermarket even spread the word over his store’s loudspeaker.

“We want to make sure that students come to school everyday,” León told reporters after August’s all-staff meeting. “Every day matters.”

Nationwide, districts are trying to boost attendance this school year — raffling off gift cards and even cars for perfect attendance and conducting home visits — as states, including New Jersey, begin factoring absenteeism rates into school and district ratings under the Every Student Succeeds Act, the new federal education law that replaced No Child Left Behind in 2015.

In May, Gov. Phil Murphy signed new legislation requiring schools where 10 percent or more of students are chronically absent to create corrective plans. In Newark, 62 of 64 district schools had absenteeism rates that high in the 2016-17 school year, the latest for which data is publicly available.

The nationwide crackdown on absenteeism is backed by extensive research showing that students who are chronically absent — typically defined as missing 10 percent or more of the days in a single school year for any reason — are at serious risk of having lower grades and test scores, dropping out of school, and becoming ensnared in the juvenile-justice system. Low-income students, who make up three-fourths of Newark’s enrollment, are among the most likely to miss school.

But as León, a 25-year Newark Public Schools veteran who became superintendent on July 1, is sure to find, recognizing an attendance problem is one matter — solving it is quite another.

His two immediate predecessors also launched ambitious campaigns to improve attendance. But as they tried to slash through the thicket of obstacles that keep students from school — problems with health and housing, transportation and school culture — both watched their initiatives to combat absenteeism fizzle as school employees struggled to carry out the plans.

Indeed, by the end of the 2016-17 school year, the district’s chronic absenteeism rate was actually higher than in 2011-12, when the first of León’s two predecessors took the reins. Whether León will learn from their mistakes — or fall into similar traps — remains to be seen.

“The bottom line is that the superintendent can say whatever he wants,” said Pastor Van Ness Roper of True Deliverance Christian Life Church, an education advocate who was recruited to help with the first attendance campaign. “But if your staff and those you give the plan to don’t implement it, it’s just a wasted idea.”

Big ambitions, disappointing results

Former Superintendent Cami Anderson launched a campaign called “Attend Today, Achieve Tomorrow.”

Five years ago, Newark’s then-state appointed superintendent, Cami Anderson, declared an absenteeism “epidemic” and insisted she had the cure.

Like León would later do, she unveiled an attendance campaign at the start of the 2013-14 school year with a lofty goal — to cut absenteeism in half within three years. If successful, the campaign, called “Attend Today, Achieve Tomorrow,” would expose students to 1 million hours of learning they would have otherwise missed, Anderson said.

Before school started, district officials asked religious leaders to adopt schools and bodegas to stop selling snacks to students during school hours. They asked community-based organizations to post back-to-school flyers and call families using scripts the district provided.

But almost immediately, the plan ran into challenges.

Three former Anderson officials said her administration struggled to stay focused on the campaign as they scrambled to enact a host of other sweeping policy changes — including a district overhaul Anderson announced in December 2013, which sparked widespread protests.

Amid that backlash, some community and parent leaders were reluctant to support Anderson’s attendance drive, even though it was relatively uncontroversial. Meanwhile, school leaders were hard pressed to meet the demands of the new campaign — which involved creating attendance plans, developing reward programs, scheduling community events, and following up with frequently absent students — without the help of attendance counselors, whom Anderson had laid off that July as a cost-cutting measure.

“There was no systemic way to deal with the attendance issue after she got rid of the attendance counselors,” said Antoinette Baskerville Richardson, a school board member at the time who is now the mayor’s education advisor. “Somebody has to be responsible who doesn’t have 100 other responsibilities.”

Officials at the time said the counselors had done little to combat absenteeism and insisted that principals and teachers needed to play a bigger role in raising attendance. But Anderson’s campaign also appeared to have a limited impact — rather than falling by 50 percent as projected, the chronic absenteeism rate was basically unchanged after three years.

Meanwhile, the firing of the 46 attendance counselors would continue to dog Anderson. In 2016, an administrative law judge sided with the Newark Teachers Union in a lawsuit challenging the layoffs, though the state education commissioner later overturned that decision. And during an earlier legislative hearing, a state lawmaker argued that the layoffs had doomed Anderson’s attendance plan from the start.

“You don’t gut out the social support network in a system like Newark,” said former Assemblywoman Sheila Oliver, now Murphy’s lieutenant governor, at the Jan. 2015 hearing, “and anticipate that we’re going to have great improvements.”

Fine-tuned policies amid daunting obstacles

Former Superintendent Christopher Cerf (center, in purple tie) aimed for better implementation of the district’s attendance policies.

Three years after the launch of Anderson’s attendance campaign, she was replaced by a new superintendent, Christopher Cerf, who in an instance of district déjà vu, newly declared absenteeism “an issue of crisis proportions” in Newark’s schools.

At an Oct. 2016 school board meeting, he said the crisis did not stem from a lack of attendance policies. For example, teachers were required to record daily attendance by 10 a.m., and schools were to call, write, and finally meet with families as absences accumulated. The problem with these plans, Cerf said, was the lack of follow-through.

“We do not believe those policies and procedures have been consistently implemented,” he said at the board meeting, “and that is on us.”

His administration set out to fix that.

Teachers were urged to take daily attendance so that schools would have reliable data to analyze. “School support teams” — the group of employees in every school who had inherited the tasks of the fired attendance counselors — were asked to review the data and come up with rewards and interventions. High schools had to establish daily “advisory” periods when faculty members would meet with a small group of students — an effort to forge personal connections strong enough to draw teenagers to school.

But a program that the district piloted during that same period, modeled off one used in New York City, suggested that schools also need more supports — not just better policy implementation — to reverse patterns of absenteeism.

At five South Ward schools that had been outfitted with extra social services through a “community schools” initiative, part-time “success mentors” were hired to work closely with students who were repeatedly absent and with their families.

Early data showed the mentors were having a positive impact on attendance — so much so that officials had hoped to place mentors in additional schools, said Brad Haggerty, Cerf’s chief innovation officer, adding that Cerf stepped down in February before the additional mentors were added. The planned expansion was a tacit acknowledgement that schools needed more people-power to curb absenteeism.

“That’s the direction we were going in — to give more people resources,” Haggerty said, adding a caveat that he believes extra personnel dedicated to attendance will only be effective if school-based teams share in the work. “You’re not going to solve that with one person.”

And some barriers to attendance go beyond policies and resources. In 2016 and 2017, the nonprofit Advocates for Children of New Jersey published reports based on interviews with students, parents, and educators that explored the tangle of factors behind Newark’s chronic absenteeism rate, which exceeds the level even in other high-poverty New Jersey districts.

Among younger students, the causes included high asthma rates and a lack of busing for students who live less than two miles from school. Among high schoolers, boring classes, long or dangerous commutes, and adult responsibilities such as caring for younger siblings or holding down jobs were cited. One student told the researchers: “I’ve gotta go out and make money. I’ll worry about school tomorrow.”

“You can’t simply mandate your way out of these kinds of issues,” said Peter Chen, who co-authored the reports with Cynthia Rice. For instance, the district can set a deadline for submitting daily attendance, he added, “But that’s not going to suddenly make students live closer to schools or their asthma go away or not have to work a job to support their family.”

A ‘refreshing’ promise to send backup

Superintendent León called his back-to-school campaign “Give Me Five!”

If one lesson of the past five years is the stubbornness of the district’s absenteeism problem, Newark’s new superintendent appears undaunted.

Superintendent León has set a goal of every school reaching 100 percent attendance. (Experts caution against focusing solely on attendance rates, noting that schools with high average daily attendance can still have a core group of chronically absent students.) For now, he sees his role as largely that of a cheerleader, but aims to provide more personnel in time.

“Right now, what we do is, we say, ‘The objective’s high — you figure out how to get there,’” he said in a recent interview.

He has promised to restore the attendance counselors — a move welcomed by many educators and community leaders. But, in a nod to the past, where the presence of counselors often did little to improve attendance, he insisted that schools must partner with these counselors rather than simply outsource attendance efforts to them.

“The last thing that needs to happen is for people to walk away saying, ‘Oh, attendance is going to be solved because now we have the attendance counselors,’” he said. “No, everyone has to worry about attendance.”

León pointed to his back-to-school campaign as an early success, saying this year’s first-day attendance rate was higher than last year’s. The real test, however, will be whether schools can maintain any initial gains throughout the year — when rates tend to sag — while at the same time driving down chronic absenteeism among the third of students who miss roughly a month or more of class each year.

Already, some educators say they are heartened by León’s early moves. Maria Ortiz, principal of Luis Muñoz Marin School, said the message conveyed by the back-to-school campaign and attendance counselors is that the district leadership is committed to helping schools improve attendance, rather than simply ordering them to do so.

“I don’t feel like we’re doing this alone,” she said, “which is really refreshing.”

In the coming weeks, Chalkbeat will dig deeper into Newark’s absenteeism crisis. Do you have questions you want answered? Thoughts on what causes students to miss school? Or promising attendance practices you want to highlight? If so, please take this brief survey. You can also email me at pwall@chalkbeat.org.

Newark’s post-grad paradox: More students are entering college, but few earn degrees

2018-09-19T22:39:11+00:00

When it comes to college, Newark faces a good news-bad news paradox.

More students than ever are graduating high school and enrolling in college, according to a new report. Yet fewer than one in four Newark students earns a college degree within six years of graduating high school — leaving many with limited job prospects in a city where an estimated one-third of jobs require a four-year college degree.

Now, city officials are promising to build on the report. They want to ramp up the rigor of high-school classes and create more early-college programs to increase the odds of students entering college and leaving with a degree.

“How do we teach our children to perform — to graduate?” Mayor Ras Baraka asked at a press conference Wednesday to mark the official release of the report of Newark students’ college outcomes. “We got them in the door,” he said of students who attend college. “Now how do we make them stay?”

The city’s plans, to which Superintendent Roger León is lending his support, reflect a growing recognition that simply getting students into college is not sufficient — and can even backfire if they drop out before graduation, leaving them with college debt but no degree.

Until recently, the charge given to high schools in Newark and across the country was to foster “college-going cultures.” And these efforts showed promising results: On average, 51 percent of Newark Public School students who graduated high school between 2011 and 2016 immediately enrolled in college, up from 39 percent who did so between 2004 and 2010, according to the report by the Newark City of Learning Collaborative, or NCLC, and Rutgers University-Newark’s School of Public Affairs and Administration.

But entering college didn’t guarantee its completion. Of those students who started college straight after high school, only 39 percent earned a degree within six years, the report found.

As a result, educators and policymakers have begun to think harder about how to help students “to and through” college — to ensure they actually earn degrees. Toward that end, Baraka and the NCLC — which includes roughly 40 colleges, schools, nonprofits, and corporations — has set a goal of 25 percent of Newark residents earning college degrees or comparable credentials by 2025.

Today, just 19 percent of Newark adults have associate degrees or higher — compared to 45 percent of adults across New Jersey and 40 percent nationally.

Superintendent León, who began overseeing the city’s schools on July 1, said his main strategy for supporting these efforts will be to expose students to challenging work early on.

“If we don’t do something dramatically in classrooms to improve instruction and make it rigorous,” León said after Wednesday’s event, then students are “getting into college but they’re not completing it.”

Source: “Post-Secondary Outcomes of Newark High School Graduates (2011-2016)” report. Note: The four-year rate is an average of the classes of 2011 to 2013. The six-year rate is from the class of 2011. Graphic: Sam Park/Chalkbeat

For starters, León said he wants high schools to offer more college-level classes. In the 2016-17 school year, just 21 percent of Newark students were enrolled in one or more Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate classes — compared to 42 percent of students statewide.

He also vowed to raise the quality of instruction in the district’s traditional high schools. Only 14 percent of their graduates earn college degrees within six years, compared to 42 percent of graduates from the city’s selective magnet schools, the report found.

To do that, León said he will create specialized academies within the traditional schools modeled on the magnets, which have specialized themes such as science, technology, or the arts. The academies, which will partner with colleges, will most likely feature admissions criteria similar to those of magnet schools, which select students based on their academic and attendance records, León added.

And, for the first time, all ninth-grade students this academic year will take the Preliminary SAT, or PSAT, León said Wednesday. An additional 1,100 eighth-graders who passed at least one of their seventh-grade PARCC exams will also take the PSAT when it’s administered on Oct. 10.

Since 2016, the district has provided the PSAT to all 10th and 11th-grade students. But León said that giving the test to younger students will focus their attention on college and help identity those who are ready for advanced classes. The PSAT is designed to help students prepare for the SAT, which is used in college admissions, and to qualify for National Merit Scholarships.

The district, which was under state control for 22 years until February, is getting some assistance in its effort to improve students’ college outcomes.

For instance, KIPP, the national charter-school network with eight schools in Newark, is sharing its strategies for helping students choose the right college with guidance counselors at three district high schools.

And the higher-education institutions in the Newark City of Learning Collaborative, including Essex County College and Rutgers University-Newark, plan to create more “dual-enrollment” programs that allow high-school students to earn college credits, said NCLC Executive Director Reginald Lewis.

“We’re all going to do a better job,” Lewis said, “of making sure that once Newark residents get in our doors, that we help them persist.”

‘I am the children’s superintendent,’ Newark’s new schools chief promises students

2018-09-07T23:15:26+00:00

When Roger León was still a high school principal, it was easy enough to gather his students in the auditorium and give them a pep talk.

Now that he’s superintendent of New Jersey’s largest school district, he needs a much bigger venue.

So during their first week back from summer break, all 12,500 eighth through 12th-graders in Newark Public Schools piled onto yellow school buses and rode to the Prudential Center in downtown Newark, where they filled the stands as León addressed each grade individually over the course of September 5-7. Alternating between administrator and emcee, and with the aid of the arena’s Jumbotron, he detailed graduation requirements, set sky-high expectations, and — for the ninth-graders — explained how they could join a trip to Orlando, Fla.

Behind all the specifics, the larger message he sought to convey was clear: Students are the raison d’être of his young administration.

“We’ve had many superintendents,” León said Thursday to the city’s ninth-graders, whose school-color shirts turned the stands into a palette of red, blues, and black. “We’ve had the state-operated-school-district superintendent, the community superintendent, the reform superintendent, the return-to-local-control superintendent.”

“I am none of those,” he told them. “I am the children’s superintendent.”

León, a 25-year veteran of the city school system who became schools chief on July 1, has had a busy few weeks.

Before school started on Tuesday, he summoned the district’s entire workforce to a staff meeting last week, also at the Prudential Center. At a separate meeting, he shared his ambitious goals for the year with the school board. Behind the scenes, he began making policy changes, including eliminating a program that extended the hours of struggling schools.

But the first week of school was mostly about the students.

On Tuesday, accompanied by the mayor and television crews, he visited the high school he graduated from (Science Park), the high school where he was principal (University), and the neighborhood school he attended as a child (Hawkins Street). At this last stop, he reverted to educator mode, offering encouragement to an eighth-grader who said he hoped to one day join the Navy (“We need great men and women in our armed forces — I’m proud of you”) and using a marshmallow to give seventh-graders an impromptu lesson on fractions.

During his Thursday meeting with ninth-graders, he shared his lofty goals for the year: perfect attendance at every school and all students passing the state PARCC tests. He announced that all ninth-graders this year will take the PSAT, a practice college-admissions exam usually taken by sophomores and juniors, eliciting some alarmed “What?!”’s from the crowd.

He also unveiled a new incentive program called “Newark’s Academic Challenge for Kids.” If the ninth-graders meet a long list of requirements each year — including maintaining a GPA of a least 2.5, pass the state tests, and participate in an extracurricular activity — then they will be eligible to go on a class trip to Florida in 2022.

“We’re trying not to leave anyone behind,” he told them, adding that they will still have to pay $800 to cover expenses.

After the meeting, as the students snapped selfies and headed back to their buses, León acknowledged that the convocation had been as much for his benefit as the students’. Having charged his employees the previous week with getting every student to pass the state exams — last year, only a quarter of students passed the math tests — he wanted to remind himself why it was necessary to set such a lofty goal, even if it borders on the impossible.

“That data wasn’t just numbers — it was these kids right here,” he said. “I needed to see them. I needed to bring faces to those numbers.”

If the talk galvanized León, it did the same to some students.

Jessica Jimenez, a ninth-grader at Bard High School Early College Newark, said she found the superintendent’s message “very inspirational and very motivating.” It also left her hoping León keeps up his end of the bargain.

“All the promises he made,” she said, “I really hope he fulfills them.”

In victory for teachers union, Newark superintendent scraps longer hours for low-performing schools

2018-09-07T15:54:37+00:00

Newark’s new superintendent is eliminating a program that extended the hours of struggling schools, which the teachers union has long attacked as ineffective and unfair to educators.

Teachers at roughly 30 schools will no longer receive $3,000 annual stipends for the extra hours, a provision written into the current teachers contract, which extends to 2019. Instead, all 64 district schools will get extra funding for before and after-school programs, Superintendent Roger León said in an email to employees on Tuesday.

The changes will go into effect Monday, Sept. 10, resulting in new hours for the affected schools just days after the new school year began. The district is still working to adjust pickup times for students who are bused to school, according to León’s email. A few of the schools will phase out their extended hours later in the year, the email said.

“We will not continue to do the same things as before and be surprised when the results do not change,” León wrote, adding that cutting the extra hours would save the district $5 million.

In an interview with Chalkbeat Thursday, León said the move is intended to create more uniformity among schools and the services they provide. Now, all schools will get additional money to pay for programs outside of the regular school day, which schools can tailor to their individual needs, though students who are struggling academically will continue to receive “intensive” support, he said.

“Ultimately, the idea would be by October having completely different after-school and before-school programming that meets the needs of each respective school,” León said.

The extended time was first included in the teachers contract in 2012 as part of a larger improvement plan for the targeted schools, which was developed by Cami Anderson, Newark’s former state-appointed superintendent. The plan also designated some low-performing schools as “renew” schools, where teachers had to reapply for their positions and work longer hours.

Anderson also closed some schools and gave principals new hiring authority. Both actions left dozens of tenured teachers without positions, so Anderson created a fund to pay those teachers to perform support duties in schools. In 2014, that fund for “employees without placement” cost the district $35 million out of its nearly $1 billion budget, though by last year the fund had shrunk to $8 million for about 100 unassigned teachers, according to officials.

León said in Tuesday’s email that he was also eliminating the fund, which he said would save the district another $6 million. The teachers union president said he believed all the unassigned teachers now have placements, but the district did not respond to a request to confirm that.

León is also removing the “renew” and “turnaround” labels from low-performing schools, citing their “progress and student achievement,” according to the email.

“I applaud everyone’s efforts at renew or turnaround schools and acknowledge what has been accomplished,” he wrote.

Now that León has abolished his predecessors’ school-improvement program, he will be expected to create his own. Many schools remain mired in poor performance, even as the district overall has made strides in recent years.

When the teachers union agreed to the extended hours in its 2012 contract with the district, it was hailed nationally as a major breakthrough in efforts to revamp troubled schools. But even as the union agreed last year to keep the provision in its current contract, union officials have assailed the turnaround effort as a failure.

NTU President John Abeigon told Chalkbeat on Thursday that the program had been a “scam” and “nothing more than extended childcare.” He added that the stipend teachers received amounted to about $7 per hour for the extra time they worked.

In 2016, a district-commissioned survey of 787 teachers at schools with extended hours found that two-thirds of teachers at schools where the extra time was spent on student instruction said the time was valuable. But in a survey the union conducted in April, the 278 teachers who responded gave the extended hours low ratings for effectiveness in boosting student achievement.

Some teachers in the union survey praised the longer hours, saying their schools used them effectively to lengthen class periods, run after-school clubs, or allow teachers to plan lessons or review student data. But others said the extra time was squandered, leaving staff and students exhausted with little evidence of improved student outcomes to show for it. (Students’ pass rates on state tests stayed flat or declined at most “renew” schools in the first years of the program.)

The union also has complained that many teachers felt compelled to work the extra hours because those who refused to could be transferred to different schools. Under the terms of the original extended-day agreement, teachers were required to work an extra hour per day and attend trainings during the summer and some weekends.

In León’s email to employees, he said every extended-day school had set different work requirements and “none are consistent with the original design.” The longer days may also be contributing to high teacher turnover in those schools, he wrote, adding that principals of schools with regular hours told him they did not want to extend their hours.

Abeigon, the union president, applauded León’s decision to scrap the extra work hours.

“He came to the conclusion that we expected any true educator to reach: that the program was not working and was never going to work,” he said.

León said Thursday that he is now working on a new turnaround program. Once it’s ready, he promised to share the details with affected families before publicly announcing which schools are part of it — an effort to avoid the student protests that erupted when Anderson identified her “turnaround” schools.

He also said he was still considering whether he would ever close schools that fail to improve or to reverse their declining enrollments. Anderson’s decision to shutter nearly a dozen long-struggling schools continues to fuel resentment among her critics even years later.

“I think the whole idea of how much time does a school get to correct itself is a very important one and I’m going to need to be really reflective on it,” León said. “I’ve seen what closing schools does with people who do not feel that they were aware of it or a part of fixing it.”

Newark officials deliver a message to students on first day: Keep showing up

2018-09-04T21:38:33+00:00

At Hawkins Street School Tuesday morning, eighth-grade teacher Jasmine Johnson was at the whiteboard writing her students’ goals for the new school year — complete all assignments, get into a great high school — when in walked two unusual visitors: Newark’s mayor and schools chief.

Luckily for Johnson, Mayor Ras Baraka’s message was also about goals — namely, the lofty goal of perfect attendance.

“Try your best to get here and be in these seats every single day,” the mayor told the students as a phalanx of TV cameras captured his remarks from the back of the room. “It’s very, very important. The superintendent is super focused on that.”

Superintendent Roger León, who started in July and is the city’s first locally selected schools chief in more than two decades, told employees last week that he wants the district to achieve 100 percent attendance. That is a hugely ambitious, if not impossible, goal considering that the average daily attendance was 90 percent in 2016-17 and — even more troubling to experts — about 30 percent of students were chronically absent.

To assist in the effort, León has promised to rehire the attendance counselors who were laid off by former Superintendent Cami Anderson and to restore the truancy teams that in the past roamed the streets searching for students who cut class. He also ordered every district employee to call five students’ families before the start of the school year to remind them that school began Tuesday.

“It’s important for everyone to worry about student attendance,” León said during the all-staff meeting at the Prudential Center last Tuesday.

At a school board meeting that evening, district officials said that an analysis of state test data had shown a strong connection between attendance and test scores: Students who regularly showed up to class earned markedly higher scores.

Research shows the reverse is also true. Students who are chronically absent, meaning they missed 10 percent or more of school days, tend to perform worse on tests and are more likely to drop out of school and enter the criminal-justice system.

Peter Chen, a staff attorney at Advocates for Children of New Jersey who co-wrote a report on Newark’s high-school absenteeism problem last year, said in an August interview that schools often take a compliance-driven approach to attendance. After students miss a certain number of days, staffers may call or write home and inform families of the problem.

He said that a more effective, but also more resource-intensive, strategy is to analyze why certain students are frequently absent — for instance, are they suffering from mental-health challenges or struggling with school work? Then social workers and other staffers should try to help remove those obstacles that are keeping students out of class, Chen added.

He also pointed out that León’s state-appointed predecessors, including Anderson and Christopher Cerf, also came up with plans to reduce absenteeism. But top-level mandates only go so far, Chen said.

“What we’ve seen is that leadership at the top matters,” he said. “But on a day-to-day basis, what happens in school buildings is often more a function of the school-building leadership.”

Seventh-graders listened to Superintendent León on Tuesday.

At Hawkins Street, Principal Alejandro Lopez said his school’s attendance task force had already devised its own plan to boost attendance.

Students with perfect attendance each week will earn “Hawk bucks,” named for the school mascot, and be entered into raffles to win prizes. Also, the three classes with the highest attendance rates at the end of the year will take a trip to Six Flags Great Adventure theme park.

Meanwhile, support staff will look for ways to help students who are frequently absent. In 2016-17, 45 percent of Hawkins Street students missed more than 10 days of school. Getting them to show up every day this year will be hard, Lopez said — but doing so is crucial.

“If you’re not present, you’re not going to learn,” he said. “There’s no substitute for that.”

After leaving Johnson’s room Tuesday morning, Mayor Baraka and Superintendent León stopped by a seventh-grade math class where teams of students were building towers out of noodles and marshmallows.

León told the class that he had attended Hawkins Street as a child, before growing up to become a teacher, principal, and now, superintendent. Baraka, another Newark Public Schools graduate and former principal, told the students he loved them and would make sure they got whatever they needed to succeed.

After the city officials left to visit two high schools, 12-year-old Angeles Rosario said she was excited about the new school year — and dance classes, in particular. That the mayor had chosen to visit her school first on Tuesday only added to her excitement, she said.

“There are many other schools in Newark,” she pointed out, “but he decided to come to ours.”

Live on a Jumbotron, Newark’s new superintendent shares his big plans with 7,000 district employees

2018-08-29T22:57:15+00:00

School hasn’t started yet in Newark, but the district’s students and staffers are already learning that their new boss intends to do things differently.

Roger León, a former principal and administrator who became superintendent on July 1, asked all high school students to attend orientation sessions this week.

He ordered every district employee to call several students’ families in the coming days to remind them about the start of school on Sept. 4.

And he summoned all 7,000 or so of those employees — everyone from teachers to custodians to central-office staffers — to the Prudential Center in downtown Newark on Tuesday for a meeting that was part pep rally, part strategy session.

León’s remarks at the all-staff event Tuesday morning, and a school board meeting that evening, offered the fullest picture to date of the new superintendent’s intention to shake up the district, which returned to local governance in February after 22 years under state control — even as he provided few details about how he plans to accomplish the remarkably ambitious goals he laid out, including having every student pass the state exams.

“We’re going to get someplace incredible; we’re going to get there fast,” he said on the Prudential Center stage, his image projected onto the arena’s Jumbotron screens. “There are going to be stories told about the work ahead.”

León spotlighted some sobering data, which showed the steep climb ahead.

He began with individual schools’ pass rates on the 2018 PARCC exams, which the state has shared with districts but not yet released publicly. The data showed that less than a quarter of students passed the math exams at 24 of the district’s 37 elementary schools, which were listed in order from highest to lowest-performing on the oversize screens. Among 15 high school programs, 12 had fewer than 25 percent of students pass the math tests — including Eagle Academy for Young Men of Newark, where just seven students passed.

León did not share the districtwide pass rates for 2018. But in 2017, 24.4 percent of Newark students were proficient on the PARCC math tests, compared to 43.5 percent statewide. In English, 32 percent were proficient, meaning they scored at a level 4 or 5, compared to 55 percent statewide.

León also highlighted the district’s troubling attendance figures. Nearly 10,800 of the district’s 36,000 students were “chronically absent” last academic year, meaning they missed more than 18 school days, according to data León presented. The numbers suggest the district’s chronic absenteeism rate, which was 30 percent in 2016-17, has barely budged. Research shows that students who frequently miss school tend to perform worse on tests and are more likely to drop out of school and enter the criminal-justice system.

“We have a lot of work to do,” León said at the board meeting, where officials presented more detailed data.

Against that backdrop, León announced several goals for the coming school year that are hugely ambitious, if not entirely improbable.

First, he called for 100 percent attendance. (The district’s average daily attendance in 2016-17 was about 90 percent.) Second, he set a goal for all students to achieve proficiency on the PARCC exams. (Last year, the state set a target of 31.5 percent of Newark Public Schools students to achieve proficiency in English and 24.6 percent in math.) Finally, he said the district should be “second to none,” but did not explain how that would be measured.

The district has not released a public document detailing León’s goals or his plan, and a spokeswoman did not respond to emails asking her to elaborate.

Without going into detail, León touched on a number of changes he is planning, which he said will help put the district on an upward trajectory.

To boost attendance on the first day, León is asking every employee to call the homes of five students — a campaign he is calling “Give Me 5!” He is also planning to bring back attendance counselors, who in the past were responsible for calling families and searching the streets for absent students. Former Superintendent Cami Anderson laid off 46 attendance counselors in 2013 to help balance the district budget, but León said he would restore those positions using $4.3 million in savings that he said were the result of his recent move to force out 31 central-office administrators.

“Effective tomorrow, we will have a [job] posting for attendance counselors,” León said at the staff meeting, drawing cheers. The police department will also provide some officers to join the counselors on truancy patrols, he added.

.@PruCenter welcomes the Newark Public School teachers and staff who will shape the lives of the next generation. Here’s hoping the 2018 District Staff Convocation is a success! @NPSvoices @CityofNewarkNJ pic.twitter.com/ZdFAoR9MgO
— Jim Leonard (@Jim_Leonard13) August 28, 2018

He also introduced a plan to address the stark divide between the district’s six magnet schools and seven traditional high schools. The magnet schools, which admit students based on their academic records or artistic talents, have far higher test scores and graduation rates and lower absenteeism and dropout rates than the traditional schools, which must admit anyone who enrolls.

Part of his plan involves pairing up traditional and magnet schools to participate in joint staff training and share curriculum. Each traditional school will also establish a specialized program related to the theme of its partner school. For instance, Weequahic High School will develop an engineering program with the help of its partner magnet school, Science Park.

León gave employees a document illustrating his vision for the district titled “NPS Clarity 2020.” The framework features a flow chart tracing students’ movement through the school system, a dozen “keys to 2020,” and six “game changers,” including alumni, internships, and “wraparound services.”

Many of the planned initiatives are not likely to begin until next year, including the specialized “academies” at the traditional high schools and the truancy patrols. Meanwhile, León said his administration is reviewing the district’s policies around graduation, discipline, and grading.

Even if the new superintendent’s vision will take time to materialize, several educators said they were energized by hearing his plans. Many rode in yellow buses to the arena wearing matching shirts with their schools’ logos. Afterward, Gregory Holtz, a drama teacher at East Side High School, said it was a powerful experience to see thousands of district employees come together to meet their new leader.

“This is like a new beginning,” he said.

After weeks of planning, Newark’s new superintendent starts rolling out changes

2018-08-22T23:10:09+00:00

From security protocols to school start times, Newark’s new superintendent is ready to start making his mark on the system, he announced at Tuesday’s school board meeting.

Superintendent Roger León, a 25-year veteran of the Newark school system, has kept a low public profile since taking the helm of the district on July 1. But behind the scenes, he has been quietly meeting with hundreds of school stakeholders as he crafts a detailed plan that he intends to lay out in the coming days, he said during the five-hour board meeting.

“On the 22nd of May, you made a very important decision,” León told the board, citing the day he was selected to lead the district, “and the superintendent takes it very, very seriously.”

Beginning on May 23, León began conferring with a wide range of people who have a stake in the school system — union leaders, philanthropists, alumni, parents, higher-education officials, district employees, school board members, students, and the mayor, he said. He also sat down with Newark’s charter-school leaders, surprising some observers who expected the former district school teacher and principal to be less accepting of charters than his predecessors, who encouraged the charter sector’s expansion.

He called that pre-July 1 transition planning his “running start.” The current phase is his “first 100 days,” he said, before dropping some hints about the coming changes.

School safety agents will soon scan the ID cards of all school visitors, whose information will be entered into an electronic database, board members said during the meeting. Their names will be cross-referenced against an online database of registered sex offenders. The district has already purchased the scanning equipment from a company called LobbyGuard, which will replace the handwritten visitor logs that schools currently use.

“We want to make sure that everyone who’s entering into our buildings to conduct business — whether it’s at our schools or our central office or any of our locations — is actually screened properly,” León said, adding that the scanners will be installed in every school over the course of the coming academic year.

Board Member Leah Owens asked whether the district had considered how the security change could affect immigrant families, especially those who are undocumented and may lack official ID cards or be leery of having their information stored in a district database. Eric Ingold, the district’s executive director of safety, said that safety agents will manually enter the contact information of visitors without ID’s, which the district will not share with law enforcement agencies unless they have a warrant.

“That information does not go beyond the district,” he said. “That information stays internally.”

León also said he wants to establish more consistent procedures across schools. That will involve setting a standard time when every school will open its doors in the morning and a set time — from 6 to 8 p.m. — when schools will hold evening parent meetings.

“We cannot be a district where everything is a different day and a different time for everything,” he said. “We will create order in this administration.”

Next Tuesday, León will address all district employees — from teachers to janitors to assistant superintendents, he said. He plans to unveil more of his agenda then, and delve into more substantive issues, such as students’ academic progress, that he did not discuss at length at the board meeting. (A spokeswoman could not immediately say whether the event would be open to the public or the press.)

One initiative he previewed, called “Give Me Five,” will require every school employee to keep tabs on five students. While León did not go into detail about the campaign, it appeared to be a way to ensure that students are showing up to school and staying on track academically. Last school year, nearly one in three Newark students was chronically absent, meaning they missed 18 or more school days.

At one point during Tuesday’s board meeting, León shared that a few times this summer he had to take a break from the intensive planning sessions with his team. “I needed to get away from them and they needed me to get away from them,” he said, drawing chuckles from the audience.

On those days, he left his office and met with students — a practice he developed during his years as a principal, he said. This time, he visited with high-school students attending summer school.

“I share with you that they gave me the energy and the revitalization to move forward,” he said.

Forget sit-ins and walkouts. Newark student activists try new tack under local control

2018-08-03T21:42:48+00:00

Though technically on summer break, the leaders of the Newark Students Union arrived promptly Wednesday morning at the Weequahic High School library to speak at the school’s summer “bridge” program, which is designed to ease incoming ninth-graders’ transition to high school. Their objective: Recruit new members.

Three years ago, the student union attracted national attention when its members occupied the district’s headquarters and helped stage a citywide school walkout that drew thousands of students into the streets. They were protesting the policies of a state-appointed superintendent, who resigned shortly thereafter, and joining calls for the state to return control of Newark’s schools to the local school board, which happened this February.

With those victories notched, the Newark Students Union is trying to recast its mission from attacking state policies to proposing solutions in partnership with Newark’s elected board and newly chosen superintendent. Still, they plan to call out local officials who fall short — constructive criticism that NSU co-leader Bradley Gonmiah likened to a friend telling you your breath stinks.

“Your best friend is supposed to be real with you,” said Gonmiah, a senior at Science Park High School, to the incoming Weequahic students. “Now that they’re close to home,” he said, referring to board members and the district leadership, “we should talk to them and actually have an ability to make change.”

The Newark Students Union was founded in 2012, shortly after the state appointed Cami Anderson, a former New York City school official, to push through aggressive changes bankrolled by $100 million from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. The changes, which included school closures, principal layoffs, and a switch from neighborhood schools to a lottery-based enrollment system, were carried out with little warning or public input, outraging many families.

Weequahic students listen to the presentation by the student activists.

As tensions escalated, NSU mobilized and went on the attack. Its members shut down a board meeting and in Feb. 2015, staged a four-day sit-in in the district’s main office, taking turns napping on couches and eating donated pancakes until Anderson agreed to meet with them. A few months later, the union was again on the frontlines, as students walked out of class and into the streets, shutting down a busy intersection.

After helping to force Anderson’s exit and speeding the district’s return to local control, NSU’s leaders graduated, and the group went dormant. Then last year, Gonmiah got the idea to revive the union. He had become increasingly interested in district policy after getting involved in a campaign to change the admissions policies at Science Park, the highly selective magnet school he attends. He began to see a connection between his school’s disproportionately large number of white students and its cutting-edge facilities.

“I got enraged,” he said.

As he discussed the idea with fellow student activists, including Azé Williams, a junior at Science Park, they determined that the student union needed a new approach better suited to the new era of local control. They decided to focus more on policy proposals than protests, which is what the original NSU was best known for.

“It has that reputation of rebellious teenagers who are just trying to get out of school,” said Williams. “They’re not going to take us seriously if we just continue to protest and not actually sit down and talk about the solutions to our problems.”

A rebooted NSU held its first meeting on Feb. 1, the day the state handed back authority to Newark’s school board, and came up with several proposals. The union, whose meetings usually attract about 10 students from a half-dozen schools, wants full voting privileges for the board’s student representative, who currently serves in a solely advisory capacity. The NSU is also lobbying for a program that would allow high schoolers to mentor younger students and encourage under-represented groups to apply to magnet schools. Gonmiah has floated the ideas at school board meetings, where he is regularly one of the few students in attendance.

The current NSU members also met with the new superintendent, Roger León, a Newark native and former principal, who they said has been receptive to their input. And, in an effort to promote their expanded mission of “civic engagement” while also recruiting new members, the NSU leaders asked principals for permission to speak at their summer bridge programs. Weequahic was their first stop.

Newark Students Union members Bradley Gonmiah, Aishat Jimoh, and Azé Williams.

About 20 ninth-graders attended the weeklong program, which began Monday and was more summer camp than summer school. They took personality tests, went scurrying through the Art Deco building on a scavenger hunt, and learned the school’s fight song. On Wednesday, they built contraptions out of straws and cotton to prevent dropped eggs from cracking — a team-building exercise that also stretched their problem-solving muscles — and came up with intricate handshakes.

“Yesterday, we said that we’re a family now,” said Vice Principal Natica Brown, who heads up the summer program, to the students. “In order to be a family, you have to be able to greet your family.”

During the NSU presentation, the students listened respectfully as Gonmiah, holding a clipboard against his black T-shirt, recounted the group’s history. But when Williams asked how the school system could be improved, the floodgates opened.

Better school lunches, air-conditioned classrooms, lessons that connect to the real world, the rising high schoolers suggested. Why had the district shut down some of their neighborhood schools and never replaced them, others wanted to know. And why had some of their middle schools offered almost no instruction in social studies or science?

“How are you supposed to apply to Science Park High School if you didn’t have science in seventh grade?” Gonmiah asked.

When the discussion turned to a “Student Bill of Rights” that NSU is crafting, one young woman said that students need a platform to speak their minds.

“That’s what the Newark Students Union does,” Williams said. “But you have to participate.”

After the presentation, Vice Principal Brown said NSU’s message of civic activism aligns with the school’s. She recalled how Weequahic students organized a panel discussion this year on issues of racial justice raised by the film “Black Panther,” and the student council negotiated an exception to the school’s cell-phone ban — students with good grades and behavior can now use their phones during lunch.

“Our students definitely have a voice,” she said. “And I always encourage them to follow it.”

Nearby, a half-dozen students sat around a table snacking on chips and fretting about the fast-approaching start of high school. Their anxieties included getting lost on the way to class, being surrounded by “tall people,” and an ominous-sounding tradition called “Freshmen Friday,” which they had heard older siblings whisper about.

“I’m low-key scared,” said Sabriya Roberts, who attended BRICK Peshine Academy. Her fellow Pehsine alum, Dreon Servil, agreed.

“It’s going to be a whole different ballpark,” he said.

They were encouraged, however, by the morning’s older visitors. They weren’t sure if they would join the student union, but it gave them hope to imagine one day influencing the decisions that shape their lives.

“To be able to get a position to voice your opinion, to have the power to change the way adults think,” Servil said, “that’s beautiful.”

Newark gets new crop of principals, including one for troubled Shabazz high school

2018-07-25T18:07:44+00:00

One of Newark’s most troubled high schools will have a new principal this year, along with several other schools, after the school board approved Superintendent Roger León’s appointments on Tuesday.

Naseed Gifted, a vice principal at Central High School and a former engineer, will take over Malcolm X Shabazz High School in the South Ward. Once recommended for closure by the state, Shabazz continues to struggle with an extremely high absenteeism rate and a graduation rate far below the district average.

The board also approved more than $167,000 in separation pay for seven administrators whom León forced out of the district, as well as the merger of two separate academies into a single Barringer High School.

The board voted unanimously in favor of the new principals León chose to lead at least eight schools, including East Side High School, the district’s largest school.

“This evening, I have the great honor and privilege of presenting to the community a number of our city’s shining stars,” León said at Tuesday’s meeting, which several of the new school leaders attended.

León, who became superintendent on July 1, did not take questions after the meeting. But, in a press release, the district said that León had revived a principal hiring process that has not been used for nearly a decade.

The process calls for a “School Leadership Council” made up of students, parents, teachers, and others to interview principal candidates who have been pre-screened by the district. The council then selects finalists to be interviewed by the superintendent, who decides on one person to recommend to the board to be hired.

The press release also noted that, “like León,” five of the new principals “were born, bred, and educated in Newark.” By contrast, many of the 31 officials and administrators whom León recently forced to resign or face being fired had been recruited from outside the district by his predecessors.

“It is extremely important to me to lead with superior educators and administrators who at their core represent the best of Newark,” León said in a statement. “The community asked for it, I promised it, today we begin anew.”

At Shabazz, a council that included parents along with current and former teachers interviewed four candidates to replace Principal Damon Holmes, who was dismissed by the district’s interim superintendent in May. They settled on Gifted, who has spent 15 years at Central High School, most recently as a vice principal who oversees the school’s pre-engineering academy.

In an interview at the board meeting, Gifted told Chalkbeat he wants to “revitalize the natural resources” at Shabazz, including its automotive and cosmetology job-training programs. He also hopes to refocus the school on science, technology, engineering and math, or “STEM” subjects, which he said would attract more students to the school and help prepare them for lucrative careers.

“It’s an opportunity to influence more minds to go into STEM fields,” he said. “There’s 1.8 million job opportunities out there, and I want our students to be prepared for them.”

Gifted faces a daunting challenge at Shabazz, a school where violence and disorder were once so rampant that a 2009 state report said it should be shut down.

Today, the school continues to struggle to draw students, with about 460 enrolled this past academic year — down from about 1,200 a decade ago. In 2017, its four-year graduation rate was 61 percent, compared to 78 percent across the district.

The majority of its students miss so much school they are considered “chronically absent,” which is linked to high dropout rates and heightened risks of entering the criminal-justice system. In the 2016-17 academic year, more than 70 percent of Shabazz students missed more than 15 school days — twice the district-wide rate, according to state data.

Still, Board Member Reginald Bledsoe said he is confident that Gifted can turn the school around.

“A year from now, I look forward to hearing about all the positive things that are happening there,” he said.

Shabazz is not the only school heading into the fall with new leadership.

At East Side High School, Vice Principal Michael West will replace Principal Mario Santos, whom León named as his assistant superintendent overseeing high schools. At West Side High School, Vice Principal Akbar Cook will take over for Principal Larry Ramkissoon, who will work on curriculum for the district.

Principal Angela Mincy, who leads Barringer Academy of S.T.E.A.M., will head the reunified Barringer High School. Barringer, long one of Newark’s most troubled high schools, was split into the S.T.E.A.M. and Arts and Humanities academies under former Superintendent Cami Anderson.

The other new principals are: Rosa Branco, First Avenue School; Sandra Cruz, South Street School; Natasha Pared, Rafael Hernandez School; Jill Summers-Phillips, John F. Kennedy School; and Deneen Washington, Belmont Runyon School.

The board on Tuesday also approved a number of other staffing changes, such as promotions and transfers, but did not immediately release the names of those employees.

The separation pay is going to seven officials who were pressured to resign, including $42,000 to former Assistant Superintendent Angelica Allen-McMillan and more than $32,000 to Rolando Bobadilla, a former special assistant in the special-education office.

After the meeting, Board Chair Josephine Garcia said she was excited about the new crop of principals.

“I look forward to ensuring that they move our schools in the right direction,” she said.

As fate of ‘Newark Enrolls’ is debated, top enrollment officials resign

2018-07-19T22:13:06+00:00

The top officials overseeing Newark’s controversial school-enrollment system have resigned just weeks after the school board blocked the new superintendent from ousting them.

Their departure creates new uncertainty for Newark Enrolls, one of the few enrollment systems in the country that allows families to apply to district and charter schools through a single online portal. Proponents say the centralized system simplifies the application process for families and gives them more options, while critics say it undermines traditional neighborhood schools while boosting charter-school enrollment.

Gabrielle Ramos-Solomon, chief of the Newark Public Schools division that includes enrollment, and Kate Fletcher, executive director of the enrollment office, both departed on Friday. The district did not provide information about why they left or who — if anyone — will replace them, and neither of the two could be reached for comment.

Their departure comes after Superintendent Roger León, who took over on July 1, included them among 31 officials and administrators who were given the option to resign or face being fired. Days later, the school board approved all but nine of the dismissals; Ramos-Solomon and Fletcher were among those spared.

Both officials were hired in 2013 shortly before former Superintendent Cami Anderson unveiled the enrollment system, then called One Newark, as part of a sweeping overhaul that also included closing some schools. Parents were outraged by the closures and the system’s glitchy rollout, which left some students without school placements and separated other students from their siblings.

In recent years, Ramos-Solomon has overseen improvements to the system, including tweaking the computer algorithm that matches students with schools to give a greater boost to families who live near their chosen schools. While district data shows that most students are matched with one of their top choices, critics remain wary of the system and some — including some board members — call for it to be dismantled.

León, a veteran Newark educator who was expected by some observers to oppose Newark Enrolls, said in a private meeting with charter-school leaders that he intends to keep the process in place. But he will have to win over the board, whose members have asked the district skeptical questions about the system in recent months, such as why some students are reportedly matched with charter schools they didn’t apply to. (The district says that does not happen.)

Board member Tave Padilla said he was not aware that Ramos-Solomon or Fletcher had resigned, and did not know whether replacements had been lined up. He added that the board had not discussed the fate of Newark Enrolls since a meeting in June where Ramos-Solomon provided information about the system, nor has the full board discussed the matter with León.

“The district now does have the option to keep what we have in place, modify it, or do away with it,” he said. “Whether we choose to do that or not, I don’t know.”

Superintendent León secures leadership team, navigates evolving relationship with board

2018-07-11T21:53:14+00:00

As Newark’s new superintendent prepares for the coming academic year, the school board approved the final members of his leadership team Tuesday and began piecing together a roadmap to guide his work.

The board confirmed three assistant superintendents chosen by Superintendent Roger León: Jose Fuentes, the principal of First Avenue School in the North Ward; Sandra Rodriguez, a Hoboken principal who previously oversaw Newark Public Schools’ early childhood office; and Mario Santos, principal of East Side High School in the East Ward. They join three other assistant superintendents León selected for his team, along with a deputy superintendent, chief of staff, and several other officials.

The three assistant superintendents confirmed Tuesday had first come before the board in June, but at that time none of them secured enough votes to be approved. During last month’s meeting, the board assented to several of León’s leadership picks and to his decision to remove many people from the district’s central office, but it also blocked him from ousting several people.

This week, Board Chair Josephine Garcia declined to comment on the board’s reversal, and León did not respond to a request for comment.

What is clear is that the board and León are still navigating their relationship.

In February, the board regained local control of the district 22 years after the state seized control of the district due to poor performance and mismanagement. The return to local control put the board back in charge of setting district policy and hiring the superintendent, who previously answered only to the state. Still, the superintendent, not the board, is responsible for overseeing the district’s day-to-day operations.

During a board discussion Tuesday, Garcia hinted at that delicate balance of power.

“Now that we’re board members, we want to make sure that, of course, yes, we’re going to have input and implementation,” but that they don’t overstep their authority, she said.

Under state rules, the board is expected to develop district goals and policies, which the superintendent is responsible for acting on. But León — a former principal who spent the past decade serving as an assistant superintendent — has his own vision for the district, which he hopes to convince the board to support, he said in a recent interview on NJTV.

“It’s my responsibility as the new superintendent of schools to compel them to assist the district moving in the direction that I see as appropriate,” he said.

Another matter still being ironed out by the board and superintendent is communication.

León did not notify the full board before moving to force out 31 district officials and administrators, which upset some members. And he told charter school leaders in a closed-door meeting that he plans to keep intact the single enrollment system for district and charter schools — a controversial policy the board is still reviewing.

The district has yet to make a formal announcement about the staff shake-up, including the appointment of León’s new leadership team. And when the board voted on the new assistant superintendents Tuesday, it used only the appointed officials’ initials — not their full names. However, board member Leah Owens stated the officials’ full names when casting her vote.

The full names, titles and salaries of public employees are a matter of public record under state law.

Earlier, board member Yambeli Gomez had proposed improved communication as a goal for the board.

“Not only communication within the board and with the superintendent,” she said, “but also communication with the public in a way that’s more organized.”

The board spent much of Tuesday’s meeting brainstorming priorities for the district.

Members offered a grab bag of ideas, which were written on poster paper. Under the heading “student achievement,” they listed literacy, absenteeism, civics courses, vocational programs, and teacher quality, among other topics. Under other “focus areas,” members suggested classroom materials, parent involvement, and the arts.

Before the school year begins in September, León is tasked with shaping the ideas on that poster paper into specific goals and an action plan.

After the meeting, education activist Wilhelmina Holder said she hopes the board will focus its attention on a few key priorities.

“There was too much of a laundry list,” she said.

Newark school board releases names of officials forced out by Superintendent León

2018-07-06T20:31:21+00:00

The district has released the names of the 31 officials and staffers whom Superintendent Roger León tried to push out in a surprise shake-up in June before he officially took over as schools chief on July 1.

The employees, who include senior officials and lower-level administrators, were given the option of taking a buyout package and resigning or being fired. Most turned down the buyout offers, leaving it up to the school board to decide whether they should be let go. The board, which had not been notified in advance about the shake-up, rejected nine of the proposed dismissals but assented to the rest at its meeting last week.

At the June 26 meeting, the board spent five hours behind closed doors discussing the firings and other personnel changes while members of the public waited. When the board voted in public on the changes — which also included the appointment of León’s chosen cabinet members, including his chief of staff and deputy superintendent — it only referred to the staffers by their initials, even though public employees’ names, salaries, and reasons for being fired are all public information under the state’s Open Public Records Act.

After the meeting, board member Leah Owens said she was not sure why the employees’ names were not announced publicly. She also noted that the meeting’s agenda had not been posted online. (It was posted several days later.)

“It’s my understanding this is public information,” she told reporters. “These are public decisions. This is public money. We are public officials; we’re taking public action.”

Chalkbeat requested the employees’ names from the district’s general counsel’s office, which provided them this week.

Most of the fired officials were hired or promoted by the previous two state-appointed superintendents, Cami Anderson and Christopher Cerf. It’s common for incoming superintendents to replace top-level officials, though some observers were surprised by how many people León ousted.

León has not given any public explanation of the dismissals. On board documents, the reason given is “reorganization.”

Cost-saving might have been one motivation for the firings. At a recent meeting with charter-school leaders, León said the move would save the district more than $4 million — suggesting that he plans to fill the openings with existing employees at their current salaries or to eliminate the positions entirely.

A district spokeswoman declined to comment for this story.

Below is the employee information provided by the district, along with the board’s decision about each employee.

Newark’s district-charter enrollment system is here to stay, new superintendent said in meeting

2018-07-03T23:42:09+00:00

Newark families will continue to use a single system to apply to traditional and charter schools, the district’s new superintendent told charter-school leaders at a meeting last week.

The comments by Superintendent Roger León, which were recounted by people at the meeting, are his clearest statement to date that he intends to preserve the system known as “Newark Enrolls” — even though critics, including some school board members, have called for it to be dismantled. Proponents say the system simplifies the enrollment process for families and gives them access to more schools, while critics say it is meant to boost charter-school enrollment.

León also said that charter schools are a “big part” of his overall vision for the district, and added that he would not force them to help pay for Newark Enrolls, which cost the district about $1.1 million to manage this past school year, according to attendees of the June 27 meeting.

Charter schools, which are publicly funded but privately managed, now serve about a third of Newark public-school students. Yet they remain controversial, with critics arguing that they drain resources and engaged families from the traditional school system. In March, Mayor Ras Baraka called for a halt to their expansion.

As a Newark Public Schools graduate and veteran educator who is popular among many of the city’s charter-school critics, León was expected by some observers to take a harsher stance against charter schools than his state-appointed predecessors, who encouraged the charter sector’s growth. That is why the charter leaders were encouraged to hear León, who officially started as superintendent on July 1, promise to work closely with their schools and retain the joint district-charter enrollment system.

“We heard his words loud and clear,” said Michele Mason, executive director of the Newark Charter School Fund, which convened the meeting. “We walked away feeling confident in his commitment to keeping a unified enrollment system.”

A district spokeswoman did not provide any response on Tuesday.

León spoke for over an hour at the meeting, which was attended by representatives of 14 of the city’s 18 charter school operators, including KIPP New Jersey, North Star Academy, Great Oaks Legacy, and Robert Treat Academy. It was one of a series of private meetings León held in the weeks since the school board chose him as superintendent in May. He also met with clergy members, union officials, district-school principals, and parent leaders.

During the charter meeting, he vowed to visit many of their schools in the fall, according to attendees. He also decried the divisions between some staunch district and charter-school supporters, saying he wants every school to be successful.

More provocatively, León noted that some of Newark’s traditional public schools have lower standardized test scores than the charter schools that were closed by the state in recent years for poor performance, the attendees said. He then reiterated his point that every school, whether district or charter, should be a good option for families.

He echoed some of those ideas in a press release Monday marking the start of his tenure.

“We will promote parent choice and ensure that every student is enrolled in a high-quality school in every ward throughout this city, regardless of school type,” León was quoted as saying in the press release.

The state decides when to shutter charter schools or allow new ones to open; the Newark school board and superintendent have little say in the matter. But the district does control the enrollment system, which was launched in 2013 as part of a sweeping overhaul by former Superintendent Cami Anderson that also involved closing some schools.

One of only a few combined district-charter enrollment systems in the country, it was designed to make it easy for families to apply to multiple schools without having to fill out separate applications or meet different deadlines. The centralized system, which allows families to apply to up to eight schools, was also billed as a way to ensure that schools did not exclude hard-to-serve students. (Since it was launched, magnet and charter schools have enrolled more students with disabilities — though still less than traditional schools.)

Newark Enrolls has become popular with many families, with 95 percent of 1,800 survey respondents this year saying they were “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with it. However, it remains tainted by its early rollout, when some students received no placements or were separated from their siblings, and by the perception among critics that it is a ploy to steer students into charter schools.

Newark Teachers Union President John Abeigon, a fierce charter-school critic, recently called the enrollment system “a failure.”

In 2016, the school board passed a resolution to dismantle it — but the state, which controlled the district at that time, ignored it. This year, the board regained full control over the district. In April, it gained three new members who said during the campaign that Newark Enrolls is seriously flawed.

One of the new members, Dawn Haynes, who is now vice chair of the board, said at a candidate forum that the enrollment system has led to students being assigned to schools far away from where they live. As a result, some students arrive late to school or even end up in dangerous situations as they navigate unfamiliar neighborhoods, according to Haynes.

“It needs to be dismantled,” she said.

León, who was an assistant superintendent under Anderson, said recently that he would “reflect on” concerns that families have with Newark Enrolls. The only change he has floated so far is reinstating an appeals committee that families could turn to if they are unhappy with the school they’re matched with.

Now, both critics and proponents of the enrollment system are waiting for León’s next moves.

If he hopes to preserve the system — and keep charter schools in it — he will need to bring along skeptics on the board, which has promised to review the district’s enrollment policies. He will also have to make his case to critics in the community, such as Johnnie Lattner, a parent organizer who ran for a school board seat.

Lattner, who is a co-founder of the group PULSE, or Parents Unified for Local School Education, said he was surprised to learn that León plans to keep Newark Enrolls because many community members oppose it.

“People selected him because they think he will listen to what the community wants,” Lattner said. “So that’s very concerning to me.”

Meet Roger León, the homegrown educator charting a new course for Newark schools

2018-07-02T10:00:57+00:00

At the start of the school year in 1983, a student named Roger León sat with the other ninth-graders at Science High School waiting for the principal of Newark’s premier magnet school to arrive and welcome them.

Finally, León, the child of Cuban immigrants whose mother spoke only Spanish at home, grew tired of waiting for an adult to take charge.

“Roger, God bless him, got up and started the whole meeting,” said Christine Taylor, the president of Newark’s principals union, who heard the story from a teacher who was present that day.

After that, León became a star of the school’s famed debate team, then a debate coach, a classroom teacher, a principal, a high-ranking administrator within the system’s central office, and, beginning July 1, superintendent of the Newark school system with its 36,000 students and roughly $1 billion budget. It’s the role he seems to have been preparing for his entire life.

“Roger wanted to be the superintendent when he came out of the womb,” Taylor said.

León, who is 49, is assuming the post at a historic moment. Earlier this year, the state concluded its decades-long takeover of the district, leaving behind a higher-performing school system but also a community that is exhausted — some say traumatized — by outsiders promising transformative change. It’s a transition that districts from New Orleans to Paterson are navigating as states hand back control to local school boards that are, in theory at least, attuned to their communities’ needs and accountable to voters.

In May, Newark’s elected school board chose León to become the new superintendent — the first time that board members, rather than state overseers, have made that decision in more than 20 years.

In León, the board found the ultimate insider: A lifelong Newarker who has attended and worked in the city’s public schools his entire life — even during college, when he became a substitute teacher at his former high school. Now, it falls on him to prove that a locally led district can innovate and achieve at high levels, while partnering with the community and eschewing the corruption that helped trigger the state takeover — to make Newark “a beacon of light and hope for our urban districts,” as León has promised.

But even before officially starting Monday, León already got a taste of how hard that will be.

On a Friday afternoon in June, he sent word to 31 district employees — including some top officials hired by the past superintendent — that they could resign or be fired. The move was hailed by some of León’s many supporters as a necessary housecleaning. But critics were disturbed by the swiftness and severity of the cuts, which included several lower-level administrators with ties to León’s predecessors, raising questions about whether the overhaul was about score-settling, not just reorganizing.

The shake-up also exposed the complicated dynamic between León and the school board, where some members had supported a different candidate for superintendent before agreeing to vote unanimously for León. Last week, in a display of their new authority, some members shot down a few of León’s cabinet picks and blocked him from firing several of the 31 staffers.

Now, as León shakes off that setback and steps officially into his new role as superintendent, he is expected to announce his vision and 100-day plan. Supporters of the city’s charter schools, some of whom fear a frostier relationship with León than his predecessors, will be watching closely, along with local business and philanthropic leaders who worry about the district backsliding academically or succumbing to politics. Just as vigilant will be the community activists who expect León to reject the tactics of the self-described reformers under state control who closed troubled schools and encouraged the growth of charters, and the families counting on Newark’s native son to take the district to new heights.

“There are very high expectations,” said Wilhelmina Holder, a longtime Newark activist and fan of León. “They expect him to be superman.”

From ‘underdog’ to homegrown leader

León’s life has been defined by Newark, where he was born after his parents arrived from Cuba in 1966.

“It is the only city that I know, and it is the only city that I love,” he said at a graduation ceremony in June.

He and his three older sisters were raised by their mother in the Ironbound neighborhood, which is home to many Spanish and Portuguese-speaking immigrants. He attended the elementary school around the corner from his house, Hawkins Street School, where he would later return to teach fifth grade.

At Science High School, he joined the renowned debate team. As a senior, he helped defeat the team from affluent Princeton High School to win the state championships. He saw himself not just as a competitor but also as an ambassador for his city, said Jonathan Alston, León’s former teammate who now coaches debate at the renamed Science Park High School.

“He always knew that we were the underdogs,” Alston said. “That people would hear the name Newark and think negative things.”

León coached the Science High debate team for eight years before becoming a teacher and, when he was just 28 years old, the principal of Horton Street School in Newark’s largely Hispanic North Ward. In 2001, after helping to revamp that school, he was transferred to University High School, an underperforming magnet school in the predominantly black South Ward.

At University, he added 19 Advanced Placement courses in everything from Latin to sociology to women’s studies, while extending the school’s hours and offering Saturday classes.

On the school intercom most mornings, he quoted from an inspirational poem about teaching called “The Star Polisher,” telling students that they were “stars” and faculty that their job was to make students “shine.”

“Every child’s a genius,” León told Chalkbeat in an interview earlier this year, pointing out the star-shaped lapel pin he still wears in honor of that poem. “It’s the responsibility of every adult who interacts with them to prove that to the student.”

León is beloved by many of his former students. They recall how he bought them dinner when they stayed late rehearsing a school play, or rewarded their good grades with trips to Broadway musicals.

John Brown, who graduated in 2005, said León was also a fierce advocate for his students. When the staff at a local hospital would not permit the teenager to visit his mother in the emergency room, León drove Brown back to the hospital and demanded that he be allowed in.

“He went off on everyone in the ER from the doctor to the nurses to the security guard,” Brown said. “Next thing I know, I was back there with my mother.”

But as much as León supported his students, he could also be uncompromising. He occasionally kicked out students who violated the rules, according to Noelle Jordan, who graduated in 2007.

“He didn’t take any mess,” she said.

He was similarly demanding of his staff. Former colleagues said he made it clear to teachers when they weren’t meeting his expectations. If they continued to underperform, he would get them to leave.

“He develops people; he gives them an opportunity to fail forward,” said Mario Santos, principal of East Side High School. “But if you’re not cutting it, and you’re not doing right by kids, then it’s an easy decision for him.”

A long climb to the top

León’s ascension to schools chief has been long in the making.

Since 2007, he has served as an assistant superintendent under four consecutive state-appointed superintendents and one interim chief — a testament to his deep knowledge of the district, as well as his political survival skills.

During that time, he worked closely with the community. He met regularly with parent groups and enlisted clergy members, university officials, and school leaders to help rewrite district policies, which included raising the district’s graduation requirements and making report cards easier to read.

He also developed a reputation as a taskmaster, with flashes of a hot temper, according to former colleagues. Working from his office late into the night, he issued directives and demanded compliance. One former principal said that when she insisted on sticking with the summer reading books her school always used, rather than switching to new ones ordered by the district, León threatened to write up the principal and transfer the head of her English department to another school.

“Roger could make your life very miserable if he chooses to,” the former principal said.

León told Chalkbeat that schools were required to follow the district’s summer reading list, but could add to it if they chose.

Even as León fully immersed himself in his role as assistant superintendent, he kept his sights on his dream job.

“He always used to say, ‘I’m going to be superintendent one day,’” said Kathy DiChiara, a former administrator who worked in the district’s central office at the same time as León. (She was also his calculus teacher at Science High School, where she recalled his “tremendous self-confidence.”)

In 2015, the school board, which only had advisory powers then, voted for León to become superintendent. But the state ignored its recommendation and appointed Christopher Cerf, who kept León in his administration but largely sidelined him, leaving León with tasks — such as writing proclamations to honor exceptional students — that were detached from district policy.

But his fortunes changed after Cerf stepped down in February. In the race to replace him, León beat out two applicants who have led large urban districts, as well as Newark’s interim superintendent, A. Robert Gregory.

León got some help from his longtime supporter, state Sen. Teresa Ruiz, who intervened in the selection process by pressuring the state education commissioner to replace a member of the search committee and revise the selection rules. But with the Newark school board making the choice this year, rather than officials in Trenton, he also benefited from his popularity among parent leaders, educators, and activists across the city.

“Roger’s like a rock star,” said Charles Love, a former parent organizer and school-board candidate. “He’s been in all the rooms.”

In the five weeks since his selection, León has been meeting with parents and activists, religious leaders, and labor officials — a way of shoring up support and workshopping policy ideas. On Wednesday, he assured charter school leaders that he does not plan to boot their schools from the district’s enrollment system, according to a person briefed on the meeting, despite calls to do so from critics who say the joint district-charter admissions system was designed to funnel students into charter schools.

Yet León has avoided meeting individually with the district’s top officials, who had hoped to brief him on their work but have mostly been unable to get his ear, according to two district employees. Several of those officials were among the 31 León sought to force out, which they learned through intermediaries or emails; León did not inform them himself.

In an emailed response, León said he held a meeting with the entire leadership team on May 30, received reports in June about each department’s planned work for the coming school year, and held follow-up meetings as necessary.

Meanwhile, León has been looking forward to the day when he, “a little boy from the ‘hood,” will take charge of New Jersey’s largest school district, as he told the graduates of KIPP Newark Collegiate Academy at their June commencement ceremony.

Speaking to the charter school graduates in a hotel ballroom just a few blocks from Newark Public Schools headquarters, León said he understood their nervousness as they, like him, embarked on a momentous journey. He insisted that they need not fear failure because they are up to the challenges ahead — and because, “We are in Newark, New Jersey, my people, and that is not in our vocabulary,” he said to cheers.

Instead, he suggested, what is keeping him up at night is the awesome power over children’s lives that he is about to inherit.

“We are scared,” he went on, “because of what we are about to do, and how profound its impact will be.”

Flexing its new authority, Newark school board blocks some staffing changes sought by incoming superintendent

2018-06-27T18:12:19+00:00

The Newark school board on Tuesday rejected several of the district leadership changes initiated by incoming Superintendent Roger León, dealing him a significant setback even before he begins his new role.

After five hours of closed-door deliberations, the board voted down three assistant superintendents León sought to appoint, and blocked the firing of nine current officials he had hoped to remove.

However, the board did approve several of León’s chosen cabinet members, including former Newark principal Gerald Fitzhugh as his deputy superintendent and current South Street School Principal Havier Nazario as his chief of staff.

Still, the rejections effectively punctured a tire as León seeks to speed through a staffing overhaul before officially taking over the district on July 1. On Friday, he tried to encourage more than 30 district officials to resign by offering buyout packages that had not been authorized or even reviewed by the full board.

The “no” votes sent a message that at least some members intend to assert their new sway over the district and the superintendent, whom the board selected last month. In February, the board regained full control over the district after the state ended its decades-long takeover.

“We made a very clear statement last night, that while Mr. León is the superintendent — and we fully respect that — the ultimate authority is the board,” board member Tave Padilla said on Wednesday.

“He can make any recommendation that he wants,” Padilla added. But, “just because you want it, it doesn’t mean you’re going to get it.”

In a statement provided to Chalkbeat on Wednesday, León said the board has been “methodical and purposeful” over the past month as it reviewed a total of 264 staff changes for next school year — a group of employees beyond the top-level officials discussed at Tuesday’s meeting. It has approved 95 percent of those changes, he added.

“I commend the Board for their diligence and action and extend my appreciation to the community for their patience and support,” León said, calling Tuesday night’s meeting a model of “how democracy works.”

“This is one of many more examples to come of local control at its best,” he added. “I am proud of Newark.”

The other appointments approved by the board include former principal Shakirah Harrington, who will become an assistant superintendent; current Assistant Superintendent Kathy Duke Jackson, who will remain in that role; and Robert Gregory, the interim superintendent who will step down into the role of assistant superintendent. Brenda Liss, an attorney who specializes in education law, will become general counsel.

León had sought to remove 31 district officials and administrations who were hired by his predecessors, former state-appointed superintendents Cami Anderson and Christopher Cerf.

The board agreed to fire 14 of those employees, including Chief Academic Officer Brad Haggerty and Chief Information Officer Troy Fischer.

But it refused to remove several people on León’s list, including Gabrielle Ramos-Solomon, who oversees the district’s controversial enrollment system. Board member Padilla said he was concerned that León had not made clear who would replace Ramos-Solomon, raising concerns that the enrollment process could be disrupted.

Most of the other terminations that were rejected by the board appeared to be lower-level administrators.

León had hoped the buyout packages would convince some of the 31 to leave without having to be fired. The buyouts provide additional pay to employees who resign voluntarily. In exchange, they must waive their right to sue the district and agree not to make disparaging comments about it.

It appears that only eight staffers took the buyouts. While the board approved those, some members were not happy with how the offers were made.

First, the buyout offers, which are known as “separation agreements,” are legal contracts between the board and the employees who accept them. However, multiple board members did not learn about the offers until after they were made.

For instance, board member Leah Owens said she first saw the agreement several days after it was sent to employees, and that was only because she was copied on an email by an employee asking questions about the offer.

Second, the agreements include León’s name and title as “superintendent.” But while the agreements go into effect June 30, he does not become superintendent until July 1.

Third, the staffers were given a deadline of noon Tuesday to sign the agreements — about four days after they received them. However, the agreements that went out Friday said that employees would have 21 days to review them.

“It was rushed,” Owens said about León’s attempted staffing overhaul.

She attributed some of the confusion to the fact that the board and superintendent are still adjusting to the new dynamic under local control. During the 22 years when the state ran the district, the board had only advisory powers, and the state-appointed superintendents could veto board decisions whenever they wanted.

“We’re still learning exactly what the process is,” she said, adding that she hoped the board and superintendent would “tighten up” their communications.

Tuesday’s meeting attracted a capacity crowd to the district’s downtown headquarters. León sat by the wall on one side of the room, while many of the district employees he hoped to fire sat on the other.

One of those employees, Tammi Oliveira, spoke during the public comment portion of the meeting. Now an executive legal assistant in the general counsel’s office, she was previously an assistant to former superintendent Cerf.

She explained that she attended Newark Public Schools, and that her first job in the district was translating calls to the Family Support Center. She asked the board several pointed questions about the buyout offers and whether they knew about the offers in advance.

“I’m not asking this to cause a disruption,” she said, fighting back tears, “but I would like to find closure.”

The board later voted to reject Oliveira’s firing.

Several public-school parents at the meeting said in an interview that they supported León’s effort to remove officials from the previous administrations.

Carol Williams, whose daughter attends Central High School, said the new superintendent needed to bring in staffers who share his “mission, vision, and goals.”

“Not everybody’s going to be a good fit,” she said.

Top Newark school officials ousted in leadership shake-up as new superintendent prepares to take over

2018-06-23T06:34:39+00:00

Several top Newark school officials were given the option Friday to resign or face termination, in what appeared to be an early move by incoming Superintendent Roger León to overhaul the district’s leadership.

The shake-up includes top officials such as the chief academic officer and the head of the district’s controversial enrollment system, as well as lower-level administrators — 31 people in total, according to documents and district employees briefed on the overhaul. Most of the officials were hired or promoted by the previous two state-appointed superintendents, Cami Anderson and Christopher Cerf, a sign that León wants to steer the district in a new direction now that it has returned to local control.

The officials were given the option to resign by Tuesday and accept buyouts or face the prospect of being fired by the school board at its meeting that evening. The buyouts offer a financial incentive to those who resign voluntarily on top of any severance included in their contracts. In exchange for accepting the buyouts, the officials must sign confidentiality agreements and waive their right to sue the district.

Earlier this week, León submitted a list of his choices to replace the ousted cabinet-level officials, which the board must approve at its Tuesday meeting. It’s not clear whether he has people lined up to fill the less-senior positions.

It’s customary for incoming superintendents to appoint new cabinet members and reorganize the district’s leadership structure, which usually entails replacing some personnel. However, many staffers were caught off guard by Friday’s dismissals since León has given little indication of how he plans to restructure the central office — and he does not officially take the reins of the district until July 1.

A district spokeswoman and the school board chair did not immediately respond to emails on Friday about the shake-up.

Some staffers speculated Friday that the buyout offers were a way for León to replace the district’s leadership without securing the school board’s approval because, unlike with terminations, the board does not need to sign off on resignations. However, it’s possible the board may have to okay any buyout payments. And it could also be the case that the buyouts were primarily intended to help shield the district from legal challenges to the dismissals.

León was not present when the staffers learned Friday afternoon that they were being let go, the employees said. Instead, the interim superintendent, Robert Gregory, and other top officials broke the news, which left some stunned personnel crying and packing their belongings into boxes. They received official separation letters by email later that day.

The people being ousted include Chief Academic Officer Brad Haggerty and Gabrielle Ramos-Solomon, who oversees enrollment. Also included are top officials in the curriculum, early childhood, and finance divisions, among others, according to a list obtained by Chalkbeat.

In addition to the 31 being pushed out, several assistant superintendents are being demoted but will remain in the district, according to the district employees.

There was concern among some officials Friday about whether the turnover would disrupt planning for the coming school year.

“I don’t know how we’re going to open smoothly with cuts this deep,” one of the employees said. “Little to no communication was provided to the teams about what these cuts mean for the many employees who remain in their roles and need leadership guidance and direction Monday morning.”

‘It may not bode well.’ State lawmaker intervened in Newark’s superintendent search, its first under local control

2018-06-08T04:30:00+00:00

Newark’s recent search for a new superintendent was designed to be free from political interference. Then a state lawmaker got involved.

State Sen. Teresa Ruiz, a Newark native and one of the city’s North Ward powerbrokers, pressured state officials to remove a state-appointed member of the superintendent search committee, according to a person with direct knowledge of the request. The member was removed and replaced with someone with North Ward connections.

Later, after the search committee chose three finalists, as required by state guidelines, Ruiz called the state education commissioner to demand that a fourth superintendent candidate be added to the list, according to a person told about the call. The chair of the Newark school board, who also has North Ward political ties, made the same request in an email. In response, the commissioner agreed to amend the state guidelines, intended to safeguard against meddling, to allow a fourth candidate.

A few weeks later, the board voted for the new superintendent: Roger León, a longtime Newark educator and administrator backed by Ruiz.

“Congratulations to Roger Leon on his appointment as the Superintendent for Newark Public Schools,” Ruiz wrote on Facebook. “His life’s work has been dedicated to our children.”

The board’s vote last month was an historic occasion — the first time it chose the city’s schools chief since the 1990s, when the state seized control of the district due to corruption and poor performance. Because of the significance of the superintendent selection, both practically and symbolically, state officials included step-by-step instructions for the search in the plan they created to guide the district’s transition back to local control of the schools.

But Ruiz’s backchannel involvement in the process shows how easily those guardrails were cleared as people who weren’t technically part of the search sought to influence its outcome.

“While politics is always a part of urban education, you set up rules to minimize the effect — particularly of elected officials,” said Alan Sadovnik, a professor of education and sociology at Rutgers University-Newark.

He said he saw no evidence the political involvement in this case was based on “corrupt intent.” Still, he added, “It may not bode well if at the very outset, when the whole world is watching, when you’re moving back to local control, the rules are not followed.”

State education department spokesman Michael Yaple did not answer questions about Ruiz’s involvement in the selection process. But he disputed that the education commissioner replaced a committee member, saying that only one person was ever “formally appointed” — appearing to contradict a statement by the state-appointed superintendent in December.

Through a spokeswoman, Ruiz declined to answer any questions about her role in the search.

“The senator is not going to comment on the superintendent search,” the spokeswoman, Jen Sweet, said. “The search is over, and she would like to focus on the future of Newark schools.”

In December, the state education department released a two-year plan that details the steps the district must take to regain full authority over its schools. One requirement was that the board hire a private firm to conduct a national search for superintendent candidates, who would then be screened by a seven-member search committee. The committee was to include three board members, three civic leaders, and one state appointee.

At the board’s public meeting on December 19, then-Superintendent Christopher Cerf said he had urged the state education commissioner to appoint a Newark educator to the committee. Then he announced that the state had heeded his advice: Carolyn Granato, a former Newark principal who currently heads up the district’s special-education office, was the state’s pick.

“She’s the seventh person on the selection committee,” Cerf said.

Yaple, the education department spokesman, said that Granato was never “formally appointed.” He did not immediately respond to an email asking him to explain Cerf’s public statement.

Whether or not Granato was “formally” the state’s pick, she did not last long. Soon after Cerf’s announcement, Ruiz called the state education commissioner at the time, Kimberley Harrington, and insisted that Granato be replaced, according to the person with direct knowledge of the request, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the conversation.

“She aggressively demanded that the former commissioner change [Granato] out,” the person said.

Harrington, who did not respond to requests for comment, declined to choose a new committee member, the person said. But Harrington herself was on the way out.

On Jan. 29, Lamont Repollet became acting commissioner. Chosen by newly elected Gov. Phil Murphy, Repollet was confirmed on Thursday by the state senate — where Ruiz, as the education committee chair, holds considerable sway.

Soon after taking over, Repollet replaced Granato with Jennifer Carrillo-Perez, a real estate attorney who was on the Newark school board in the early 2000s and is currently an Essex County Schools of Technology board member.

Carrillo-Perez is also connected to North Ward politics. She contributed to North Ward Councilman Anibal Ramos Jr.’s campaign in 2011, according to election records, and was a co-chair of an event in April for Ramos’ reelection campaign, according to a post on the councilman’s Facebook page. (Ruiz was listed as a chair of that campaign event.)

Carrillo-Perez did not respond to emailed questions.

In late April, the search committee — with Carrillo-Perez as its state-appointed member — selected three finalists to present to the school board. However, some of the members felt that a strong candidate had been left off the shortlist.

At that point, Ruiz intervened. She contacted Repollet directly to ask that he amend the transition plan to allow for four candidates, according to the person who was told about the call and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Around the same time, search committee member and school board chair Josephine Garcia also asked Repollet to allow a fourth candidate — despite the objections of some of her fellow committee members who wanted to stick with the three candidates whom the group had already agreed to, in accordance with state guidelines, as Chalkbeat has previously reported.

Garcia also has deep North Ward ties. Councilman Ramos backed her in last year’s school-board election, and she was listed as a co-chair of the same April campaign event for Ramos that Carrillo-Perez and Ruiz participated in.

Repollet granted their request. On April 27, he sent Garcia a letter saying he would allow four candidates “in order to provider greater assistance to the district in finding” the right person.

Search committee members have refused to say who among the candidates was the fourth added to the shortlist. But on May 22, after León narrowly won a closed-door poll, all nine board members agreed to publicly vote for León.

The next day, Garcia posted the news of León’s selection on Facebook, adding, “Long overdue.”

Update: This story was updated to reflect that the state senate confirmed Lamont Repollet as education commissioner on Thursday.