The situation with public schools in America is nothing short of a moral crisis, particularly where low-income children of color are concerned. In New York, more than a quarter of a million students are trapped in persistently failing schools.
This says nothing of the consistently middling performance of all students, as the results on the National Assessment of Educational Progress — a k a "the nation's report card" — have shown for decades. Persistent mediocrity is also a crisis.
As you might expect, opinions differ on how to improve education in New York state. But you might not expect that some in the system claim that there is no crisis at all.
Karen Magee, the head of New York State United Teachers, offered, "There is no epidemic of failing schools" — a surprise to the 250,000 students who attend them.
Denying the truth, these folks argue that all we need is more money. I support funding public education, but New York already spends more per pupil than any other state and double the national average — and what do we have to show for it?
The statistics are striking: Only 23 percent of low-income students graduate from high school ready for college, compared to 50 percent of students who are not economically disadvantaged.
Among African-American students, only 17 percent can read at grade level; only 20 percent can do math at grade level; only 15 percent graduate from high school ready for college.
Gov. Cuomo has looked at the evidence and rightly called for fundamental reform of our broken system. Since teachers and teaching quality are critical to fixing our schools, his first step is to find a meaningful way to identify high-performing teachers and those who struggle.
A strong teacher-evaluation system will allow us to reward and retain the best teachers, replicate best practices, and ensure that those who need improvement get extra training.
The governor also proposes tenure reform. Teachers can now get tenure after three years; that's not enough time for anyone, let alone a teacher charged with the education of our young people, to demonstrate long-term potential.
In fact, a 2012 survey of 10,000 teachers showed on average they believed it should take 5.4 years to acquire tenure.
A strong teacher-evaluation system will allow us to reward and retain the best teachers, replicate best practices, and ensure that those who need improvement get extra training.
So before taxpayers sign off on the salary and vast job protections that tenure brings, we should see how well teachers perform for five years before rewarding them with it. Having to prove you can do the job for five years before you get tenure — I think most New Yorkers will see that as plain common sense.
Perhaps the most critical piece of the governor's education agenda has to do with students trapped in persistently failing schools, 93 percent of whom are students of color and 82 percent of whom are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch.
Gov. Cuomo wants receivers appointed to oversee failing schools and districts, taking his cue from the Massachusetts model that has successfully spurred improvements in struggling schools. Kids in these schools need dramatic intervention and they need it now.
Trying to shift the focus away from the evidence, the teachers' unions have tried to frame all this as the governor attacking teachers. As a political tactic, this is understandable: Unions generate their revenue and political power based on how many members they have, not on how well students perform.
Sorry: The point of these reforms isn't to belittle teachers or teaching — the point is that both are vitally important.
No one understands the value of great teachers better than those who support changing our education system, the governor included. It is because we appreciate good teaching that we want bold changes that raise the quality of teaching and enhance the profession. The governor's reform agenda puts a premium on great teachers and treats them like the professionals they are.
One wonders what action we'd take if kids in Scarsdale or Chappaqua were facing the same dire situation as kids in Bedford-Stuyvesant and Buffalo's East Side. All children deserve our urgent support.
It's time to silence the education deniers and follow the evidence. Our kids have been waiting for us to give them the education system they deserve. Let's not make them wait any longer.
Derrell Bradford is executive director of NYCAN, an education-reform advocacy group based in Manhattan.
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