District 15 Parents for Middle School Equity
External Resources
John Kucsera, "New York State’s Extreme School Segregation: Inequality, Inaction and a Damaged Future," The Civil Rights Project (March 2014).
"561: The Problem We All Live With," This American Life, July 2015.
Right now, all sorts of people are trying to rethink and reinvent education, to get poor minority kids performing as well as white kids. But there's one thing nobody tries anymore, despite lots of evidence that it works: desegregation. Nikole Hannah-Jones looks at a district that, not long ago, accidentally launched a desegregation program. First of a two-part series.
University of Connecticut, "Schoolwide Enrichment Model (SEM)," Neag Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development.
Research on SEM suggests that the model is effective at serving high-ability students in a variety of educational settings and in schools serving diverse ethnic and socioeconomic populations. These studies also suggest that the pedagogy of the SEM can be applied to various content areas resulting in higher achievement when implemented in a wide variety of settings, and when used with diverse populations of students including high ability students with learning disabilities and underachievers.
RESOURCES
D15 Parents for Middle School Equity Presentations:
Presentation to the District 15 Community Education Council, November 10, 2015
Statement to the NYC Panel for Education Policy, October 27, 2015
Statement to the NYC Panel for Education Policy, August 26, 2015
Overview of our 2014 District 15 survey, May 27, 2015
Testimony at the NYC Council Hearing on School Diversity, December 11, 2014
D15 Parents for Middle School Equity in the News:
Educators on front line of desegregation debate say city must take the lead
Chalkbeat, March 9, 2016
“The DOE needs to be the one to take responsibility for this,” said Miriam Nunberg, a Park Slope Collegiate parent who co-founded a group that is trying to reform the District 15 middle school admissions process.“
How to stop the middle school 'Hunger Games'
AM New York, December 7, 2015
"I've written in this space about NYC's ... middle school process because it's needlessly stressful for 10-year-olds to compete for spots in decent schools. Are the preteen years the best time to learn to "interview well"? Worse, it produces staggering levels of segregation and inequality. A group of parents in District 15 ... calling itself Parents for Middle School Equity, is working to change that."
The Democratic Promise of Our Public Schools
Brad Lander, May 30, 2015
"Miriam Nunberg spoke on behalf of “Parents for Middle School Equity,” and shared a survey of 400 parents about the frustrations of and desired changes for the middle school admissions process. The survey highlighted the deep disparity between district demographics and our largely segregated middle schools. Their findings spoke to parents’ interest in schools that are: safe, a good fit for a student, diverse, and a quality neighborhood school."
Middle School Seats as Hard to Get as Rolling Stones Tickets, Parents Say
DNA, May 27, 2015
". . .the "choice" system in District 15 favors those parents who can take time off work to attend middle school fairs, tours and auditions, according to a grassroots group, Parents for Middle School Equity.
The group surveyed more than 400 families and found that 91 percent of them want the Department of Education to explore how to reform the current system, according to co-founder Amelia Costigan, a mom of twin sixth-graders.
Parents are tired of the "competitive sorting" of 10 year olds, the segregation of middle schools and the general stress on families the process causes, Costigan said."
Chasing Middle-School Admissions Is Test for Parents
Wall Street Journal, October 2014
Some parents are rebelling against a system they say sends the top students to coveted middle schools, leaving struggling children behind in lower-performing schools.
Amelia Costigan, a mother in Windsor Terrace, is co-leader of about 30 Brooklyn parents asking the Department of Education to find ways to make the selection process more transparent, equitable and geared toward socio-economic diversity.
Disgruntled Brooklyn Parents Want to Know: Do You Hate the Middle School Search as Much as They Do?
WNYC SchoolBook, October 2014
"A group of parents from School District 15 — want to hear from you. They are not happy about the process of applying to middle schools, not in their district"
