SB30 Slate Runs Unopposed, Ranks 2nd In NYC
BY RICHARD GENTILVISO

Four years after Mayor Michael Bloomberg replaced community school boards with community education councils, the Community Education Council for District 30 (CEC 30) held its second election of officers.

Running unopposed, Jeannie Tsavaris-Basini was unanimously re-elected president at the July 11 meeting held at I.S. 230 in Jackson Heights. Other officers, also running unopposed and unanimously elected were, Lavinia Galatis as first vice-president, Yolanda Baricevic as second vice-president, Catherine Yankopoulos as recording secretary and Shing Won as treasurer.

Community education council members serve twoyear terms by selection of the executive boards of the local parent-teacher associations of each of the districts' schools. With this process for CEC members scheduled to take place again next spring, the number of certified, elected and functioning PTAs is critical to the CEC selection.

District 30 schools have a 70 percent compliance rate for school PTA elections and certifications, ranking them second citywide, according to the Department of Education (DOE) liaison for CEC 30. But while CEC 30 has an active base of parent-teacher organizations and a strong PTA president's council. a June 14 report issued by Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer found many community education councils are not operating as smoothly as is CEC 30.

Stringer's report, based on a telephone survey of about 70 percent of the 56 CEC members in Manhattan school districts in April and May, said the DOE is not giving CEC members the training or information they need. The Stringer survey was reported in the June 14 New York Times.

According to the Times report, CEC members are not doing what they are supposed to be doing and are not even sure exactly what that is. Stringer, a former state Assemblymember who served on the Assembly Education Committee, said under state law the local community education councils are required to submit an annual report card for their school district making public results of standardized tests and other data.

At its June 13 meeting, CEC 30 passed a resolution approving an evaluation of Local Instructional Superintendent in Region 4, Dr. Philip Composto, the community superintendent for District 30, but no action on a yearly report card for the school district was taken.

In April, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein said that beginning with the 2006-2007 school year in September, more than 1,400 city schools will be issued annual report cards with grades A to F, based largely on standardized test scores.

Schools will be grouped in categories of enrollment, such as income, population, special education and ESL. Each school will be given a grade based on a comparison with other schools in the same grouping.

"Next year, all schools are to be graded on how they are helping with their students' progress," Composto said, and he announced the supervisory appointment of Tessa Alleyne as assistant principal at P.S. 150, Long Island City.

Stringer's report found 61 percent of the councils surveyed did not know what a district report card was or said their council had not yet given one this year. In addition, 42 percent said their CEC failed to have a quorum at least once in the past year and 71 percent responded that at least one CEC member had resigned.

In the "Summer 2006 Guide for Parents and Families" recently distributed by the DOE, Klein wrote to parents, "I encourage you to become more familiar with the Citywide and Community E d u c a t i o n Councils prior to next spring's selection of new members."

New York City's public school principals, assistant principals, supervisors and administrators have been without a contract with the city for three years now. More than 50 percent of principals in city schools have left the system over the past five years, according to a report in the May 22 Times.

Eight parents and the Chancellor's Parents Advisory Council were ready to file a lawsuit on July 13 in state court challenging the ban on cell phones in city public schools, according to the New York Sun. The suit will claim the ban is illegal under state law and violates the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.