PHIL On FIRE:  New York Public School Standardized Test Scores Plunge!
Surprised? Not.

When the results of New York City test scores in reading and math weren’t released this past June, I knew something was wrong. As a parent with two kids attending NYC public schools, I’ve witnessed firsthand the amount of test preparation my kids have been made to put up with. I’ve been an outspoken critic of the myth of Mike Bloomberg’s “Control” of our schools for the last five years. The Mayor’s claims of advances in education was his main claim of achievement when he ran for his third term. I still have the flyers he mailed me, to prove it!  Today the latest round of test scores are out, and it ain’t pretty.

On the math exams, only 54% of third-graders through eighth-graders passed, compared with 82% the year before—a stunning decline of 28 percentage points.

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When guessing takes the place of knowing, something’s wrong with test scoring—certainly in the New York public schools. And the release of national test scores last month has shown the extent to which our local schools are not doing their job.

What’s happened to local test scoring to make it look better than it is? Are the alleged “improved” scores all for show? As a parent of a fourth grade student and a kindergartener, I’m concerned.

Turns out the number of answers required to pass the NY standard test has been lowered each year since 2004, when Bloomberg was elected to office. It has become so easy for a student to pass that as a recent Daily News story put, “Despite Mayor Bloomberg’s plan to end ‘social promotion,’ sixth-graders can score high enough on state English exams to move to the next grade—just by guessing.”

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Last month, the New York City Council, after much public haggling, finally approved a multi-towered residential complex on Kent Avenue, between Division and the Schaefer Landing in Williamsburg, called Rose Plaza. Several major concessions from the developers were worked out by Council Member Steve Levin. The rookie council member fought for and won an increase in the proposed affordable housing from 20 to 30 percent.

Levin also managed to achieve a density at 5.0 FAR (Floor-Area Ratio¹) with a reduction of units from 801 total units to 754 units. He also got developers Isaac and Abraham Rosenberg to go from zero to 14 four-bedroom units, all affordable. The deal also includes 40 three-bedroom apartments, of which only eight were originally proposed as affordable, to 60 three-bedrooms units that are all affordable. Not bad. Kudos to our new council member!

(Rose Plaza luxury housing development includes 754 residential units in three towers of 18, 24 and 28 stories.)

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