New Haven Independent

Posted by: Nothing New | March 31, 2008 8:19 AM

Same old people saying the same old thing. A whole lot of hot air, I could have used it to heat my house this weekend. Most of these people are and have been in positions to do something, and haven't. Now they are complaining about people being mad at them and running candidates against them. I guess becuase they believe they own those elected positions. Yada, yada, yada.

Posted by: Ned | March 31, 2008 9:13 AM

Community center, more taxes, Yale resume pimps, blah, blah, blah...

Posted by: Gary Doyens | March 31, 2008 10:16 AM

Straight talk is so refreshing - the subject may be old, but I appreciate Senator Harp's pointed statements. As has been noted many times on the NHI, there is a complacency at the BOE with regard to student test scores where they are quite happy to see small incremental improvement and a collective sigh of relief that while still getting an "F" they get a little closer to "D-." This is in spite of the fact we spend more on education in New Haven, than just about any district in Connecticut and more than three times what they spend in other communities across the country. We are throwing millions of dollars at education - way in excess of state minimums - and its not significantly changing anything.

The idea that the city needs an "office of prisoner re-entry" is just silly. DeStefano can't pay for what he's already signed up for - why add, yet something else? Who in Community Services has expertise in the complicated, systemic and often multi-generational issues of ex-cons? Is there a demonstrated track record, expertise? None has been published. There are good programs already in existence - what's wrong with working through them - expanding them? Matos would do well to spend her energy lining up the grants she needs to operate the city i.d. program before launching yet another controversial program of dubious need for which she has neither the money nor any known expertise.

Why do you need City Hall to re-open Q House? The city has no money - we are a half billion dollars in debt, are selling city assets to plug overspending holes, have underfunded city employee pensions and healthcare to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars and taxpayers are looking at an 11% property tax hike this year.

If you really believe in re-opening Q House - raise the money, get the volunteers and just do it. City Hall is not the answer - you are.

Posted by: cedarhillresident | March 31, 2008 10:25 AM

Ditto on post 1 and 2

Please we have a short fall in state aid and will be cutting programs and they want another one?? Let's get real!
They are trying to save face and get votes right now!! that is all this is....is words ... and when they can't get it they will blame the city.... Please I have way to much to say!! What you need to do is review all the programs that are out there right now CUT the ones that are NOT working to raise your money this way so the budget is not increase..... BECAUSE GUESS WHAT... There is no money for anything right now even school programs that are payed out of the general funds will need to be cut!! Harp should know this!

All though I do stand by our Out reach program and will stand with them if need be. That is one program that has made a world of difference in a short time!

Posted by: GINA | March 31, 2008 10:31 AM

Thank you to the Ward 2 leadership team, members of the New Haven state delegation (including Rep. Toni Walker who had the flu and had to leave at 2pm), Lt. Ray Hassett and our other district officers, and especially community members and activists (including fellow Yale students) who made this event a success. The most significant piece of this event, which unfortunately was not fully captured here, was that as a community, we decided on three areas to target for short- and long-term planning. We committed as a community to work together and to continue to work with government officials and agencies, Yale, and other private and philanthropic partners to meet our goals of increasing and maintaining high voter turnout, participating in the development of our Office of Prison Reentry, and establishing a sustainable community center in Dwight. However, understanding the necessity of bringing something to the table with which to leverage additional support, we also decided to rely on the resources and assets we as a community possess and be persistent in achieving our goals. As a result, we closed the day writing up a clear plan of action that we will finalize over the next month and implement. The best part is that this is only the beginning and we will continue to work together as a community to identity areas for change, articulate the roles of community members and our partners, and engage in action to achieve that change. Looking forward to it!!!!

Gina Calder
Ward 2 Alderwoman
203-782-0832
ginaforward2@gmail.com

Posted by: Your Tax Dollars at Work | March 31, 2008 11:24 AM

As usual, Toni Harp has it right!

B of E has tons of resources, administrators and assistant administrators up the wazoo, basically an unlimited budget supported primarily with State funds and the very best in new buildings (some say the best in the country).

With all of that, (of which, on a child-for-child basis, Amistad has only a fraction) B of E cannot teach the same kids who make it through Amistad and into colleges how to read? Give us all a break!

Posted by: FIX THE SCHOOLS | March 31, 2008 11:59 AM

How many "summits", youth programs ideas, etc. has this city had in the last twenty years? And what impact has there been? Not much besides having created a cottage industry of not-for-profits which at best attend to the symptoms of poverty. When we start to measure things like the REAL high school graduation rate, or home ownership, or family income, or crime rates, you start to see that all roads lead back to the dismal results in public education. And Harp is right..if Amistad, Jumoke, and KIPP can do it, why shouldn't our public schools do it?

Maybe this is why Toni Harp has started to speak out. Maybe she has finally lost her patience for excuses for 14 years.

Posted by: robn | March 31, 2008 1:25 PM

Is Toni Harp planning a run for mayor?

Posted by: what | March 31, 2008 1:45 PM

Harp doesn't have the heart

Posted by: facChek | March 31, 2008 2:00 PM

"We committed as a community to work together and to continue to work with government officials and agencies, Yale, and other private and philanthropic partners to meet our goals."

Gina Calder:

Nice plan, however,

In order to achieve all those good things you mentioned above, you first must become more proficient at attending your committee, as well as, your Board of Alderman meetings.
It is here that you must forge partnerships with your peers in order to get political support for your ideas.
So shore that up.

Secondly,

Yale is not the solution to many of the community Ill's you have mentioned, you need to get Yale OFF the MIND.

We cannot expect the city to fill all the gaps that exist in funding for community programs, you must begin to seek out what current programs are under performing and redirect the funds to new promising ideas. This can only be achieved if you become active earlier in the CDBG funding cycle and work through the youth and human services committees, for starters.

Other wise you are just spitting to the wind, as many before you have successfully done.

Posted by: Wiseman45 | March 31, 2008 2:23 PM

Its a shame that too much of the money that the public schools get is used to employee lot of people that think their entitled to the job by virtue of being born and raised in New Haven. Ultimately, they are the ones that fuss the most when asked to step-up and give a little extra effort.

Posted by: Esbe | March 31, 2008 4:07 PM

I have been very critical of Harp on economic development issues, where I think she is AWOL. But her critique of the schools is correct. Too many excuses come out of the BOE and not enough results. The point of Amistad/Achievement First is to show what can be done. Since it can be done, let's do it.

Posted by: Your Tax Dollars at Work | March 31, 2008 5:59 PM

The meaningful civil rights problems are still:
Equal education;
Equal access to health care;
Nutrition.

Ironically, just as important and unsolved as they were in the fifties.

Rich folks can afford a $35,000 per annum Hopkins education and other private schools. The rest of us in the City who are not lucky enough to get our kids in to Amistad or the like, are relegated to a highly politicized education system. Its objective is not necessarily to provide a good education, but to give jobs, minimized work rules, and security to the thousands of workers/voters/well-connected/lucky folks (perhaps with mail-order doctorates) involved in the system.

Only a few politicians are willing to talk about the true solution to equal access to health care. Surprise: it's a one provider system!

Why is it not clear that the food we eat & the way we eat it transforms our destinies?

Posted by: Your Tax Dollars at Work | March 31, 2008 6:11 PM

"Office of Prison Reentry, and establishing a sustainable community center in Dwight" (Gina)

Prison reentry -- what a curious name? What does it mean -- are we trying to get folks back into prison so they won't bother us?

You already have a community center called "Q-House." It went broke, I think more tnan once. Was it because we didn't need it or because it was poorly managed?

Give me a break!

Answers: real education focused on getting kids to learn with the cooperation of their families.

Adequate health care available to all.

Good nutrition. Is there a better menu than that served at Colonel Sanders, Popeye, pizza palaces, Subways? Of course there is, but it's much easier to kick the kid out the door with ten bucks and let her fend for herself.

Posted by: Common Sense | March 31, 2008 8:27 PM

"We have 36 percent of our third-graders not reading at proficiency," Harp told the Dwight crowd Saturday. "And do you know that's how they plan prison beds for the future, by that statistic?! Something is deeply wrong in the city, when down the street at Amistad, they are doing the job."

The good news is that 64 percent of our third-graders are doing ok. Why not track the children not doing well. Perhaps they have no books at home. Perhaps they grew up with no one reading them stories to create an interest in learning to read. Perhaps the problem in learning to read might be at home. Perhaps the television is a factor. Ask the 64 percent reading at proficiency what motivates them to succeed! Let's not point the finger at our teachers. They are the backbone of the school system. They put in a hard day dealing with numerous issues besides teaching and monitoring discipline in the classroom.

Posted by: Gary Doyens | April 1, 2008 7:24 AM

Nobody blamed the teachers. 64% is a D-. That's good news?

Posted by: FIX THE SCHOOLS | April 1, 2008 8:55 AM

Common Sense,

There certainly are good teachers in New Haven. But as long as the the teachers in New Haven collectively continue to elect union leaders who fight to maintain a 6 1/2 hour school day, a shorter school year, and advocate for the kind of work rules that are incongruous to a student-centered school, then the teachers as a group have as much culpability as anyone.

Not only that, but the teacher unions in CT. continue to lobby vigorously up in Hartford to CUT funding for Amistad and to outlaw the board structure that allows the AF program to run great schools in New Haven, Bridgeport, and Hartford. If the teachers weren't fighting tooth and nail against successful public charter schools, maybe more people might agree that the teachers aren't to blame.

Is there an AFT teacher out there who can explain why they would suppport a union which invests their union dues into trying to kill the expansion of a great education option for kids and families in New Haven?

Posted by: William Doriss | April 1, 2008 9:45 AM

Office of Prison Reentry is official Newspeak for Office of Post-Prison Reentry. Just like War is Peace and Love is Hate in Orwell's writings. Perhaps Office of Post-Prison Integration, or Re-Integration would work.

Actually YTDAW, I believe the State IS trying to get folks back into prison. Let's call it an institutional Freudian slip of Olympic proportions, as we proceed unremittingly toward that Police State which we were warned about so many years ago. The Prison-Industrial-Complex is the last remaining growth industry in Ct., after gambling. The Founding Fathers are truly rolling over. "What hath we wrought?"

Read my comments under "Take Cruelty Seriously," in yesterday's Courant.

Posted by: Elm City Resident | April 1, 2008 10:09 AM

Pat Dillon and Toni Harp would do better focusing on actually getting money from Hartford for New Haven--a task they seem to delight in failing at--than launching tired criticisms of the current administration. It's so easy to criticize, but so much harder to get the job done!

Posted by: Rep. Pat Dillon | April 1, 2008 1:29 PM

I'm posting live from the Appropriations Committee meeting so do not have all of our calculations here, but do want to respond.
PILOT is driven by a formula, and New Haven's share is less than the past because more towns are eligible. Since FY 2004, state aid to New Haven in education accounts has increased by about $35.2 million. Increased. In the same 2004-2008 period, PILOT aid increased about $6.6 million.
So it isn't clear how the city could justify assuming a $10 million increase in one year. In accounting terms, it wasn't realizable.
If income tax receipts - due after April 15 - are stronger than expected, some of the dollars cut from the requests may be increased. But we don't know that now.

The amount of new dollars needed in PILOT to yield a new $10 million for our town would be, I am told by the OFA staff here, $30 - $40 million.

Elm City Resident,
Saturday's meeting was attended by Sen Martin Looney, Sen. Toni Harp, Rep. Toni Walker, and myself. It isn't clear why you singled me out, but in my view it isn't justified by any comments I made that day, nor by my effective advocacy for the city.

Hope that helps.

Posted by: Imma Canelli | April 1, 2008 2:06 PM

I found State Sen. Toni Harp's comments that the school system is failing its children to be off the mark.

Her continual remarks that the school system is failing its children and that Amistad Academy can get the job done ignores the many improvements we have made. Certainly Amistad and Elm City, charter schools which currently serve about 600 children, deserve support. But a public school district that serves 20,000 students from all walks of life also deserves a real champion who will fight to help us continue to improve.

And improve, we have. This has been amply confirmed by Cambridge Education, an international school improvement organization retained by the state Department of Education to work with 12 urban districts across the State. While Sen. Harp charges we are failing children, the Cambridge team spent several weeks in New Haven this fall, visiting schools, interviewing teachers, staff, students and the NHPS Community Engagement Team. Their final report, which is public and which has been made available to Sen. Harp repeatedly, concludes that New Haven is steadily improving. In fact, the school system was found to meet minimum requirements in five major categories, and to exceed them in three, one of the best urban reviews that Cambridge has done to date.

"Within New Haven, there is a strong sense that things are improving," the Cambridge team writes. "There are encouraging signs that initiatives are beginning to have an impact, with grade 3 students closing the gap in reading, writing and math" and Grade 7 students making good gains while high school test scores have also improved.

Those gains can only be continued if the State continues to do its share to support us. And that job falls to the legislators who represent us in Hartford. These kinds of comments by Sen. Harp are not productive, particularly in light of the challenges we face and the improvements we have made.

Last year, with Sen. Harp co-chairing Appropriations, the school system suffered a devastating cut of $2.3 million from the Early Reading Success program. Many priority school districts were devastated by the cuts, which impacted literacy instruction and intervention efforts in grades K-3 - the very grades that need the intervention to improve the test scores for which we are held accountable. Through the efforts of many communities, the Appropriations Committee this month did restore the funding for the program - even though last year the cuts were made without providing any school districts the opportunity to show just how strong a program it is. This year, we provided Sen. Harp with information about the program's strengths and impact on New Haven students - information she may have used to restore the funding but apparently chose not to use in the forum at Dwight, just as she did not use any information in the Cambridge report. We understand about being held accountable, but when we make improvements, as we are doing, we expect that to be part of the public discussion by our elected officials.

Last year, when in-school suspension changes were under consideration, we agreed that keeping students in school made sense. We also pointed out that such an endeavor was expensive, in terms of providing in-school suspension workers at many of our schools, in providing intervention services for students, and in locating space for the programs. In correspondence with Senator Harp, we proposed an expansion to 36 in-school suspension workers, to cover all high schools, middle schools and K-8 schools. This expansion alone would cost over $1 million to be done right. We also proposed additional psychological services for suspended and at-risk students, additional reading and math intervention services, classroom libraries for in-school suspension activities, and occupational exposures for understanding potential jobs and careers. We noted the potential for community service activities, and possible links to the Yale Child Study Center, to increase the social work support from there. We believe these efforts will go hand-in-hand with our expanded efforts on reducing truancy. We also noted that our efforts to reduce expulsions and reach students have many facets. We asked for resources to develop a program called 2nd Chance for students expelled from our public schools for extremely serious offenses.

Only the mandate was adopted, but not the concomitant resources. We asked again for pilot funding this year, reducing the amount but utilizing roving teams of additional intervention services to work with students. To our knowledge, those pilot programs are not included in the budget revisions adopted by the Appropriations Committee this year.

Posted by: Webblog 1 | April 1, 2008 3:14 PM

Ms. Imma Canelli,

Thank you for the dissertation, your argument with Sen.Harp May or may not be factual, or have merit, since Sen. Harp likely will not respond to your post, it seems to me that you and many others, of the Board of Education, still do not get it...

The State is sending a clear message that it is unlikely the district will receive more money, it is also a certainty that the tax payers in New Haven are not willing to folk over more cash for your cow.

Yet you continue to write more programs and seek more and more $$$$ for societal ills, which no program in the country has shown to cure.

Take it from me, button up and get to some serious teaching, and while your at it, do more with less!!!

Leave the tooting of your horn to us.

Posted by: cedarhillresident | April 1, 2008 3:22 PM

Elm City Resident Ditto
But I agree with Pat she is truly not alone in this and she stated the others.

as for schools
Is the school system at fault totally! No I was a low income single mother who came back to New Haven for the schools! Why because they do have some of the best programs going. The problems from where I sit is parents not getting involved! That simple..that is the key to Amistad success they parents have to care. Most of the parents that go through the trouble to get there kids in to that school do care.... your question should be how do you get the parents of the kids in public school to care?
Not sure if that made sense but I am posting it :)

Posted by: FIX THE SCHOOLS | April 1, 2008 4:13 PM

Ima Canelli,

Got to give you some credit for not reading from the usual district script.

I believe if you checked though, Amistad schools now have over 1,000 kids in New Haven now - almost 5% of the district population.

Amistad serves kids from "all walks of life" - except for wealthy and white.

You want a champion who will help you improve? Look no further than Hartford's Supt. Adamowski or New York's Chancellor, Joel Klein. Just once, I would like one district administrator to explain why Klein and Adamowksi have it all wrong, and why the Mayo/Destefano 30 year plan is better for us. Please learn about what Adamowski and Klein have done to improve performance in their districts, and then compare that to the actions taken by New Haven's "champions".

Cambridge study? Before you claim vistory, how about posting some results? Break down the results from last year and you find as many disappointments in individual schools performance as there are gains. This leadership has been in control something like 14 years. What has it produced? A study that shows that there are improvements in some of the inputs? Where are the consistent outcome gains? Where are the dramatic gains that are possible, and that families are waiting for? People shouldn't have to wait thirty more years for the district to get to average.

Before you parse the appropriations budget and call a $2.3 million cut devastating, why don't you first ask your BOE to produce a transparent budget so that the public can actually understand where the expenditures are going. After you put the entire budget into context, then ask for your programs. At a total of over $300 million, the program funding you called for is a rounding error. Help NHCAN and the public to understand how you spend your money.

Posted by: Sally Joughin | April 1, 2008 9:41 PM

For those readers who understand, or want to understand, why it is important to assist individuals who return to New Haven from prison, you may be interested in attending a community meeting on the topic of Re-entry that is taking place on Saturday, April 19. It will be from 2:30-4:30 at the Cortland Wilson branch library in the Hill. People Against Injustice is sponsoring the event and inviting service providers, officials from DOC and the city, and former prisoners to share information about what is needed and what is available. Successful re-entry is in everyone's interest. I was glad this topic was part of the discussion at the ward 2 meeting last Saturday. The alderwoman and ward committee chairs organized a very worthwhile event, at which individuals who care about our city's problems and people's needs shared their views on a number of important issues and made plans to work for improvements.

Posted by: Wiseman45 | April 1, 2008 10:14 PM

Imma,
I found the Cambridge report to be a whitewash of problems in the leadership at Meadow Street. Frankly, the results of this past year illustrated a fraction of the improvement that Amistad gets out of the kids that leave your school district. The also do it in half the time. Your comments suggest a self preservational instinct.

Posted by: Gary Holder-Winfield | April 1, 2008 10:36 PM

Just to add some context here is what the report says when not chopped:

There are some encouraging signs that initiatives are beginning to have an impact, with grade 3 students
closing the gap in reading, writing and mathematics. Grade 7 students also made gains in both reading
and mathematics and there were also improvements in approximately 20 percent of schools, particularly
in mathematics. However, these gains have been inconsistent from year to year and between grades and
overall, the proportion of students who are not at proficiency in basic skills is too high.

In 2007, the district data for reading show that overall, 43 percent of its students in grades 3 through 8 are
at "below basic" based on the Connecticut Mastery Test (CMT) scores. This figure has been changed
only marginally from five year ago, when it was 44.3 percent. The improvements from years prior to that
when the figure was 49.4 percent, have not been fully sustained. For the proportions of students who are
at or below basic, there has been some small improvements in the last five years from 59.9 percent to
57.1 percent, with corresponding increases in the proportions of students at proficient or goal levels in
reading. Although there is some improvement, particularly in the last two years, more than half the
students do not reach proficiency in reading.

In mathematics, the picture is only a little better. The district has reduced the proportion of students who
do not reach proficiency in grades 3 through 8, from 44 percent to 40.9 percent. Most of this improvement
consistently across grades has been in the last two years. As with reading, the improvements made prior
to five years ago, have not been sustained.

Posted by: Hit At Hillhouse | April 1, 2008 11:12 PM

"Ninety-two percent of suspensions are out of school, with some 6,000 a year, while only 142 by recent count were in school. What end does that serve to have these kids on the street? Especially, especially when so many of the suspensions are for silly things like wearing a hat wrong!"

Dear Sen. Harp.

I take umbrage with your commonets regarding out of school suspensions. These little angels are certainly not being suspended for simple infractions. Let us take for example Hillhouse High School...

You say that stsuents at are suspended for little things like wearing a hat. Well, lets use that example. As a former part time teacher at Hillhouse, the hat example is a good one becasue It's one that I have experience with.

The typical opening salvo between teacher and student usualy follows this pattern,:

Teacher: Dave, wanna take that hat off for me please.
Student: Pff, what ever.
Teacher: Dave, hat off please!
Student: Why, is it bothering you?
Teacher: Yeah its bothering me, hat off!
Student, Mothaer Effer, you want it off come take off, f you, why you getting on my case.....etc etc

In this case, I would refere "dave" to the office and ask for an out of school suspension. Not for wearing that hat, but for dusrupting my class and being grossly insubordinate.

Which is is the issue. Kids are suspended not for the initial infraction in most casees, but rather are suspended becasue that have absolutly no respect for adult authrity and always want to challenge the adult figure in front of their freinds.

I wuld also bet that if you compared out of school suspention figures from Hillhouse and the other main high school in New Haven, Wilbur Cross, that the numbers of out of school suspensions from Wilbur Cross would be lower. Why, becasue Bob ran a tight ship at Cross, and had a Zero Tolerance policy about bad behavior.

In fact, I would venture to say that I am sure that Hillhouse without a doubt has the highest rate of out of school suspensions of all the high schools in the city. Why is that you might ask. Becasue no one wants to admit this becasue its not politicaly correct, but out of all the high school students in New Haven, Hillhouse has the highest population of ... disrespectful. "i will do what I want when I want" students in the city.

Hillhouse is a school where students do what they want, when they want, walk out of class when they want, leave the school grounds mid-day if they want, tell adults to go "F" themselfs when ever they want, assault teachers for insisting on no violence, and sexualy assault special education stdents just becasue they think its fun.

Heres a concept, how about parents letting their children know when they act out at school, there are consequences. How about putting the blame for bad behavior where it belongs, at the feet of the student involved.

However, to say these poor students are being picked on for minor infractons is a falsehood. What starts out as a simple hat infraction, ends up being a suspention becasue kids these days dont know when to shut the "f" up, accept adult authority, and realize they they are in school to learn...

Posted by: DingDong | April 2, 2008 11:34 AM

Facchek,

Do you have any information about Ms. Calder not attending B of A or committee meetings? I'd be curious to hear it.

Posted by: facChek | April 2, 2008 1:49 PM

Dingdong:

Per your request:

you can call or email Shirley Dixon in Legislative services, Board of Alderman, City of New Haven.

(203) 946-8371. sdixon@newhavenct.net

Posted by: DingDong | April 2, 2008 9:06 PM

Facchek,

Thanks for the phone number. I take it that YOU know something about this, however? I will take you on your word.

I do not mean to ask in an accusing way, but you implied above that there is a problem with her "proficiency" in attending meetings and I'm curious.