Submitted by Sandi -- NYC Schools employee, Mar 10, 2007 09:08

There is an old saying "Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater". When the mayor took control of the NYC schools not only did he throw out the bathwater and the baby he threw out the bath tub as well, with not a clue as to what to do in its place. All of the educators who held top positions at the Department of Ed are now gone and in their place we have MBA's and lawyers, making educational decisions for our children without any educational background or experience. This last re-organization will effectively make each elementary school its own mini-corporation with the principal as CEO. The Chancellor routinely refers to the principals this way in his weekly newsletter. Many parents have complained about all of the assessments that their children take throughout the year. Where is there time to teach anything that isn't on the test? The fact is there will be even more assessments added to the testing calendar in the future. This is the Chancellor's form of quality control--the children of NYC are looked as data numbers on a page. At the end of the day, this is all that truly matters to the folks at the top at the DOE. The children that we teach are our future. They are the people we will depend upon as our future leaders to make sane and rational decisions for neighborhoods, cities and country. The message sent to our students every day is "it's all about the test!" Is that the message we want our children to hear or do we want to raise well-rounded, well-educated future leaders for America. It's about time we open our eyes and raise our voices in saying "enough is enough" --Let our teachers and administrators do what they were trained to do--educate the WHOLE child, physically, intellectually, emotionally and socially.

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