<p>I would like to add that our teachers are very appreciative/grateful (sorry, I don’t really understand the distinction) for donations received from the parents. They write thank you letters and emails to the parent community. I have never, ever heard that our schools did not want our money (and my kids have attended 7 different schools).</p>
<p>Of course they are thankful, but it’s still a bizarre situation when teachers are going begging for funds to do their job well and parents expect them to be “grateful” for being given the funds to do so. I mean, the paradigm is, as the kids say, just whack.</p>
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That is not how it works everywhere.</p>
<p>I would still like to know about your public schools which have no economic diversity.</p>
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<p>In my experience, public school teachers do not feel that they have been provided the necessary funds to do the job they want to do for the students (hence, the necessity for some of them to buy their own supplies, as you pointed out). They are not content to just “do their job,” they want to do a good job, and we parents want them to, too. </p>
<p>If you think that teachers have no cause to feel grateful for the generosity of parents in their community, then ok. I would feel grateful.</p>
<p>It i show it works in many areas where there is a vote on the schooll budget ot tax levy. And in many strapped state-funded systems today.</p>
<p>The NYC public schools are very well funded, yet parents are expected to donate approximately $100 in supplies every year for their kids’ classes because things like tissues, toilet paper, ink, wipes and paper are not supplied by the school system.
Those who can, do, and those who can’t donate use those supplies. If you added up THAT money it would end up being quite a chunk that would look very different on a ledger, and I don’t think the schools here could function at all without it. So care must be taken not to cause unintended consequences.</p>
<p>Yes and NYC has teachers sitting around for years doing nothing at full pay too. NYC is hardly an example for anyone to follow in any way.</p>
<p>“Public schools are desperate for more funds”
-Even though they have the highest cost per student in a world. Very funny, while one more penny or one more billion will make no diff. whatsoever except for pockets of the most loud people who work for public schools. They need this additional money so desparetely though. They are working so hard and retire so late at the ancient age of 55 and getting so little, just in mere 6 digits. We need to get more out of our pockets and put into theirs. This should recognized as the best fix for our public k -12 despite the fact that it went the other way, the more money were poured into system, the worse it was getting. But what is new in promoting failing strategies? The main idea is to choose what has failed and implement it again and again just to make sure that it has failed 100%.</p>
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<p>From someone who is a product of the NYC public school system…albeit one of its gems at the HS level, a large part of that is because NYC has to serve the needs of students who span the spectrum not only in socio-economic background, but also linguistic capabilities, abled/disabled, academic ability, level of safety in their neighborhood/home environments, level of parental involvement/concern for education, etc. The need to serve a student population with such a wide variability on that spectrum in a variety of areas is a major factor in the high levels of funding. </p>
<p>Incidentally…contrary to popular belief…the NYC Specialized Public High schools received some of the lowest…if not the lowest levels of funding per student compared with the comprehensive/other high schools in NYC when I attended in the early-mid-'90s. Moreover…not all of our teachers are great at their jobs either. In fact…one of the worst teachers I’ve ever had was during my time at one of the top NYC Specialized High schools.</p>
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<p>I don’t see how that is any more “whack” than expecting parents to be grateful for teachers who are paid to do their jobs.</p>
<p>I’d like to see both teachers and parents appreciate each other more and be grateful for anything that goes above and beyond the minimum that is expected of them; which is for teachers to do nothing but show up everyday and for parents to do nothing but pay their taxes.</p>
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That is very true, which is why the generosity of the “haves” is so critical. If all donations were banned, that would include things like toilet paper, printer paper, etc. which add up to a lot of cash in a particular classroom or school. It is because of the diversity of population in the individual schools in NYC that the donations are important and actually serve far more than just the kids of the wealthy. As I said earlier, there are almost no NYC public schools without economic diversity and in no schools are poor children prevented from utilizing the resources donated by their wealthier classmates. Not to mention, the parents who can donate this year might not be able to do so next year, and vice versa. I don’t know about anywhere else, but our kids would be in trouble without donations, both large and small.</p>
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<p>The funds you are referring to in the above statement would be private $$, obtained through an effort of those who now hold the dollars and subsequently have the option of where to spend them. The difference between these $$ and the ones referred to in the article is that $$ spent by government entities were neither ‘earned’ by them nor are they as carefully tended as one would tend the fruits of ones on labor. And, as is often the case…$$ given by one entity (who obtained them through no effort on their part) and given to another entity (who now obtains them without any input of effort on their part) tend to be looked as as ‘free and easy to come by’ by both parties…and…as I stated before, not tended carefully.</p>
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<p>That wasn’t the case…at least in my old neighborhood’s public schools back when I was doing K-12 in the 1980’s and early-mid '90s. </p>
<p>The changes which brought about what you’re describing include greater gentrification of many NYC neighborhoods…including the old neighborhood of my childhood and changes in how they allocate public school places…both of which took place sometime in the late '90s or the early '00s.</p>
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Everything has changed so much in the intervening period that you really can’t have a perspective on the current situation.</p>
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<p>I’m not so sure about that. I regularly counsel the kids of neighbors who attend NYC public schools…especially those attending high school and I am well-acquainted with several friends/neighbors who work as teachers/admins in the NYC public school system.</p>
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I’m sure you are familiar with their experiences, but it is a very big city. I wonder how familiar you are with the demographics, finances and practices in other boroughs.</p>
<p>With the exception of Staten Island, I’ve known neighborhood kids and friends who attend/teach in public schools in every other borough.</p>
<p>^kids do not go to public schools in their boroughs. I am aware at least about Brooklyn, kids are going to public schools in Manhattan. It is different system, some public schools in NYC are very selective, kids go thru interviews…</p>
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Guess where I live?</p>
<p>But I stand by my position. The money donated in various ways by individuals is crucial to the schools, and there are very few NYC public schools that lack economic diversity.</p>
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<p>Actually, most NYC kids I know of…even today attend public schools in their boroughs…with the exceptions who gained admission to one of the NYC Specialized High Schools/niche programs like La Guardia or who were assigned out of the borough due to the current lottery system which most parents perceive as chaotic and messy…especially if you are shut out of your neighborhood school and the only options left are remote and underperforming/lacking in resources. </p>
<p>Speaking of selective NYC public schools…the NYC Specialized High Schools…the gems of the system base their admission off of the results of a single standardized test and what is your first, second, and so on choices.*</p>
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<li>Different from my day when the criteria was only based on the results of the test and whether it matched/exceeded the minimum cutoff score for each school…a student’s listing of his/her own prioritization of choices had no bearing whatsoever. Hence, if one’s applying to go into the 9th grade…Stuy had the highest cutoff score, Bronx Science, and then Brooklyn Tech. If one was entering the 10th grade…reverse the top two schools.</li>
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<p>Incidentally, from my visits there and from what I heard from classmates/colleagues from Staten Island, it is the least diversified of the 5 boroughs in terms of demographics. </p>
<p>In many ways and from the cracked jokes from HS classmates and longtime current neighbors…Staten Island is much closer to suburban New Jersey or Long Island than the other 4 boroughs.</p>