Mayor Bill de Blasio and Department of Education (DOE) Chancellor Carmen Fariña today announced that 64 more schools will become Progressive Redesign Opportunity Schools for Excellence (PROSE) schools, allowing them to suspend DOE and union rules to lengthen school days and alter rigid student-teacher ratios – two practices that some charter schools already utilize.
The move comes as Albany is deciding on renewal of mayoral control over city schools, and as de Blasio again voiced his opposition to lifting charter school caps.
“Our public schools have educators and parents hungry to innovate new ways to reach their students,” said de Blasio. “The reforms we are seeing through the PROSE program would have been unthinkable in a district school just a year or two ago, especially at this scale. We are unlocking new teaching practices that we can learn from and bring to more and more students across the City.”
United Federation of Teachers (UFT) union President Michael Mulgrew said that doubling the size of the PROSE program shows the excitement that teachers, administrators, and school staff have in being given the freedom to come up with their own ideas on how to best improve their schools.
“With the UFT and the Department of Education working together in this way, we can move education in New York City, and be a model for the rest of the country,” he said.
But parents and education advocates that want more choice in public education called de Blasio’s promotion of the PROSE program along with his stated opposition to lifting the cap on charter schools the ultimate in hypocrisy.
“It’s no surprise that hundreds of struggling schools are seeking the freedom of charter schools, only to have union regulations tie their hands,” said Jenny Sedlis of StudentsFirstNY and Jeremiah Kittredge of Families for Excellent Schools in a joint statement.
“The small scale of Mayor de Blasio’s PROSE program does nothing for the 50,000 on charter school waiting lists, ensuring that PROSE will ring hollow as long as the Mayor stands with his union allies in opposing a cap lift and depriving families of school choice,” they added.
But all concerned does appear to agree that Albany should extend mayoral control.
“We should continue mayoral control because it’s the right thing to do and we should raise the cap on charter schools because it’s also the right thing to do,” said Steve Zimmerman, Co-Director of the NYC Coalition of Community Charter Schools.
