Richardcyoung.com

The Online Home of Author and Investor, Dick Young

  • Home
  • How We Are Different
  • About Us
    • Foundation Principles
    • Contributors
  • Investing
    • You’ve Read The Last Issue of Intelligence Report, Now What?
  • Your Survival Guy
  • The Great Reset
  • COVID-19
  • My Rifles
  • Concentrate on Dividend Record and Compounding
  • Your Security
  • The Swiss Way
  • Dick Young
  • Debbie Young
  • Key West
  • Paris
  • Dick’s R&B Top 100
  • Liberty & Freedom Map
  • Your Health
  • Ron Paul
  • Bank Credit & Money
  • Freedom Force
  • Dick Young’s Safe America
  • Bank for International Settlements

The Tragedy of NYC Schools

October 7, 2015 By Debbie Young

Why does NYC Mayor Bill de Biasio want to protect the entrenched interests of an education system in which only 19% of black students in district schools are working on grade level? Nicholas Simmons, a vice president in the Success Charter School network, writes in the WSJ that he worked in the same building as Wadleigh Secondary School, in which not one student in grades six through eight met state standards in math or English.

Last month, instead of acknowledging the astounding lack of learning at schools such as Wadleigh, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio proposed a hodgepodge of feel-good programs. He will create new Advanced Placement courses that students from Wadleigh won’t be prepared to take. He will enlist “literacy specialists” to try to counter chaotic classrooms and poor instruction. In short, he will do nothing effective.

Mr. Simmons taught math at Success Academy Harlem West, a public charter school, in which the students eat in the same cafeteria, exercise in the same gym and have recess in the same courtyard as students who attend Wadleigh Secondary School. The difference is that Mr. Simmons’ students were two floors above Wadleigh and were attending Harlem West thanks to winning an admissions lottery.

The poverty rate at Wadleigh is 72%; at Harlem West, it is 60%. At both schools, more than 95% of students are black or Hispanic. About the only difference is that families at Harlem West won an admissions lottery.

My students do not have easy lives. Many are in households in which no English is spoken, or have moved in and out of homeless shelters. Others shoulder the primary responsibility of raising younger siblings. Yet we set high expectations. Our school day runs from 7:30 a.m. to 5:15 p.m., and teachers spend evenings and weekends speaking with families about their children’s progress. This blueprint works. Rigorous, well-designed and joyful schools can overcome the challenges of poverty.

Spending over $20,000 per pupil puts New York City No. 2 for amount spent per student among the 100 largest school districts in the U.S. Mr. Simmons argues that “excellent public schools should not be a privilege enjoyed only by those lucky enough to win an admissions lottery; they should be the standard.” Read more here.

Related Posts

  • Success Comes to NYC Schools
  • NYC and the Tragedy of Tenure
  • Hillary—Now Against Charter Schools
  • Author
  • Recent Posts
Debbie Young
Debbie, editor-in-chief of Richardcyoung.com, has been associate editor of Dick Young’s investment strategy reports for over three decades. When not in Key West, Debbie spends her free time researching and writing in and about Paris and Burgundy, France, cooking on her AGA Cooker, driving her Porsche Boxter S through Vermont and Maine, and practicing yoga.
Latest posts by Debbie Young (see all)
  • The Assault on “Our Democracy” - March 1, 2021
  • The Political Downside of Stoking Fear - February 26, 2021
  • Gov. Newsom Discovering the Power of the Pen - February 25, 2021

Dick Young’s Must Reads

  • You Need to Seek Some Shelter for When Things Get Ugly
  • The Common Ground of Democracy is Sinking Beneath Americans’ Feet
  • Gold/Silver Coins No Longer Allowed in Safe Deposit Boxes
  • Could this Be the Vanguard GNMA Winning Edge?
  • “The Losses are Taking a Toll on Their Health”
  • Who Are Those Urging Violence?
  • Johnson’s Landslide Tory Victory Crushes Corbyn the Communist
  • Protection While Traveling in France
  • The Simple, Elegant Power of the Retirement Compounders
  • Rich States, Poor States this State is Dominant Once Again

Disclosure

RSS Youngresearch.com

  • Welcome to the Interest Rate Prediction Business, JACK!
  • Democrats Have a Plan: Don’t Get Too Attached to Your Capital Gains
  • Petrified Snow/Ice Fishing? How about a Boat? and More
  • Bubble in Tech Stocks Will Cause “Clean Out” in Markets
  • COVID Chaos: New York and California vs. Florida and South Dakota
  • Time for the Fed To Stop Babying the Bond Market
  • Richard Young Reports: 50+ Years with Fidelity and Wellington
  • Deep Survival, Who Lives, Who Dies, and Why
  • Herd Immunity by April?
  • Corporate Bond Yields: What You Can Earn Today

What’s Responsible for the Global Decline in COVID Deaths?

The Assault on “Our Democracy”

Teaching A Family Investment: Warren Buffett’s Annual Letter and You

Gov. Noem’s South Dakota Success a Stark Contrast to Gov. Cuomo’s New York Failures

General Gives Disturbing Speech on the Future of U.S.-Russian Relations

Trump: At CPAC “Let There Be No Doubt, We Will Be Victorious.”

Copyright © 2021 | Terms & Conditions | About Us | Dick Young | Archives