Last week, the Board of Regents announced its election of Dr. David Stenier as New York State Education Commissioner.
The position is an important one for all school children in New York. It holds broad powers to enforce laws, issues rules, and perform oversight functions.
Along with our partner organization, the Alliance for Quality Education, and other allies, we’ve created a document called the “Sound Basic Education Covenant.”
We’re working to have hundreds of organizations around the state support the covenant, and we’ll present it to Dr. Steiner encouraging him to endorse the document and to create a task force to oversee its implementation.
The text of the document is below. If you’re interested in signing on as an organization, contact [email protected].
We are requesting that David Steiner, the new Commissioner of Education, endorse this Sound Basic Education Covenant with the students of the State of New York, many of whom have been consistently denied their constitutionally guaranteed right to a sound basic education, and their parents and families. By supporting this agenda, the Commissioner of Education is embracing the Declaration, sharing in the Principles, and committing to provide the leadership needed to advance the Priorities outlined herein.
Declaration:
The fundamental responsibility of the Commissioner of Education is to deliver a “sound basic education” to all the students of the State of New York. The people of New York are entitled to a Commissioner of Education who is committed to educational accountability, who provides leadership and vision, who is committed to full transparency so that all New Yorkers have access to information relevant to their children’s academic future, and who implements and enforces the law and the Commissioner’s regulations in a way that is consequential for all parties involved. As the primary public official responsible for the education of New York’s students, the Commissioner of Education must provide the public leadership necessary to ensure that all students have access to their constitutionally guaranteed right to a sound basic education.Principles:
ACCOUNTABILITY: Proven effective practices, effective teachers, and equitable resources to help students achieve the highest possible outcome. At graduation every student should be college, job market, and citizenship ready.
LEADERSHIP: Vision, guidance, support and advocacy to provide a sound basic education for every student.
ENFORCEMENT: Commitment to timely enforcement of relevant laws and regulations in relation to all school districts.
TRANSPARENCY: Access of parents and community members to the educational process and to the decision-making procedures of local school districts and the State Education Department.Priorities:
- Broaden the definition of student achievement beyond test scores and graduation rates to include preparation for college, the job market, and citizenship–which are the objective purposes of the “sound basic education” that is every New York student’s constitutional right.
- Close the achievement gaps related to race, language, income, and disability and require straightforward, clearly understandable, and publicly accessible reporting by school districts within their local communities on actions taken and progress made in closing these gaps.
- Prioritize the specific needs of English language learners (ELL) through the creation of a senior level director who will be responsible for developing and implementing a strategy for increasing ELL outcomes. Ensure that school districts utilize those state aid formula dollars that are generated based upon ELL enrollment to invest in proven programs and services to support ELL success.
- Build on the successes of the Contract for Excellence and overcome the shortcomings in its implementation by fully and thoroughly enforcing the law and Commissioner’s regulations including but not limited to, the public disclosure and participation process, student achievement targets, and investing in best practices. Expand this model of accountability to cover more funding resources and more under-performing schools and districts in a manner that ensures effective coordination between and consolidation of planning and accountability tools.
- Provide early childhood education, starting from birth with full-day services for three-and four-year-olds as the Board of Regents has envisioned.
- Provide a rich and diverse educational environment that will provide every student with broad-based opportunities including but not limited to arts education, physical education, high quality after school programs, career and technical education, and transition services for students with disabilities.
- Require every school district to identify and deliver the educational resources students need to meet the new requirement that all general education students must earn a Regents diploma to graduate high school to ensure that this new standard is a pathway to success as opposed to a roadblock.
- Open up the process by which decisions are made at the district and state level, by providing real opportunities for parents, students, and community members to provide meaningful input and participate in the process – which requires that they receive substantive information about allocation of resources, school district and school accountability status, educational decision-making, and evaluation and analysis of data regarding resource investments and student outcomes.
- Convene a Task Force that includes the members of the Board of Regents, the Commissioner of Education, senior level State Education Department personnel, and representatives of parent and community organizations to monitor and assess the fulfillment of this contract and to generate joint recommendations and action steps to achieve the principles, goals and outcomes outlined is this Covenant.