The New York City Public Education system is ranked among the best in the country. Despite this, there are ongoing issues in the city’s public school system, especially regarding school funding,  segregated schools and/or districts, teachers,  the Pre-K for All program, and testing.

Funding

The fight for increases in the education funding within New York City has been an uphill battle that is still in process of unfolding. New York City public school’s are known to be one of the most segregated out of all of the states (Fessenden),  but this is only further complicated by the inherent inequality that the city itself is needing to deal with. Find out more about this issue in the Funding section of our website!

Teachers

Teachers are crucial to the NYC education system. Without teachers, there would be no education. As such an important part of the system, there are still many areas in which it is being improved. In this website, we will discuss how teacher evaluations, certifications, and salaries are being reformed. There have been multiple controversial issues regarding how teachers have been evaluated and what is done to those evaluations. In regard to teacher certifications, the certification requirements for student teachers have been changed as well. Moreover, teacher salaries are now more focused on rewarding teachers for their effectiveness instead of longevity or seniority. You can find out more about this issue in the Teachers section.

Segregated Schools

While one would expect New York City to have one of the most diverse schooling systems in the country, the truth is far from it. While the city’s schooling population is very diverse, the schools themselves are not. in fact, the city has one of the most segregated schooling systems in the nation. How is segregation like this caused, and how does it affect the city’s students (spoiler: negatively on almost every aspect of their lives), and what is being done to remedy the situation? You can find out in the Segregated Schools section of our website!

Common Core and Standardized Testing

Common core, Regents, ACTs/SATs these are all important aspects of our education system. However with each of these parts of our system there are flaws that negatively affect the way it functions. Common core was meant to fill gaps that it did not fill. The regents have a lot of weight. The ACTs and SATs may cause more stress then success. To find out more these issues, head to over to Common Core and Standardized testing on our site!

Pre-K For All

Pre-K for all, New York City’s version of Universal Pre-K was one of Mayor De Blasio’s largest platforms when running for Mayor in 2013. When elected, he set the program in motion. While it has been celebrated for its success at allowing thousands of young children to have access to age appropriate and fundamental education, Pre-K for All has run into its fair share of issues. In our Pre-K for All section, we focused on two main issues. The first is segregation, and namely a lack of opportunity for and representation of certain groups within the program. Our second issue is that many people believe Pre-K is just too much too soon. Many have questioned, ‘are the children too young to be in a formal school environment?’ Curious about what we said? Curious about the results of our interviews? Head over to our Pre-K for all section where we address all this and much more!