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“Mayor de Blasio could have fixed the Absent Teacher Reserve back in 2014, but he kicked the can down the road, squandering hundreds of millions of dollars that should have been put back into classrooms. The real cost of the ATR pool is paid by the kids who are stuck with teachers that no principal wants to hire,” said StudentsFirstNY Executive Director Jenny Sedlis.

(New York, NY) – Hundreds of public school parents joined education reform organization StudentsFirstNY and other advocates on the steps of City Hall today to urge new Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza to hit the reset button on Mayor Bill de Blasio’s failing education agenda. The parents want Carranza to deviate from the path laid out by former Chancellor Farina and Mayor de Blasio because it didn't produce results for their children. Taking Carranza at his word, the parents called on the Chancellor to “look under the hood,” saying they will support a bold new vision.

“We welcome Richard Carranza as NYC Schools Chancellor and hope he will show himself to be an independent leader who critically reviews Mayor de Blasio’s education policies and charts a new course. Carranza said he will ‘look under the hood’ and when he does, he’ll see that Mayor de Blasio’s inattention to K-12 school improvement and the achievement gap, his hostility to school choice and his failed turnaround programs mean that a change is needed,” said StudentsFirstNY Executive Director Jenny Sedlis.

"On behalf of our more than 13,000 parent members, we welcome the new Chancellor and hope that Alberto Carvalho will be the independent leader that public school children desperately need. We extend our best wishes for his success and we look forward to working together to expand school choice and improve teacher effectiveness. After four years and half a billion dollars on a failed school turnaround program, NYC students need a leader who will work with urgency to give them the quality of schools they deserve," said StudentsFirstNY Executive Director Jenny Sedlis.

“Chancellor Carmen Farina has dedicated her career to public service, and no one can question that she has fought tirelessly for what she believes in. However, after four years of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s control of public schools, far too many low-income students remain trapped in struggling schools. We hope that the next Chancellor will push the Mayor to embrace evidence-based policies and parental choice," said StudentsFirstNY Executive Director Jenny Sedlis.

Leading education reform organization StudentsFirstNY issued a new report called Burying the Evidence that analyzes previously unreported findings from the 2015-2016 teacher evaluation ratings. In past years this data was widely released to the public, but this year, the State Education Department (SED) posted the ratings with little to no public engagement. 

More than 200 public school parents joined with StudentsFirstNY and prominent clergy leaders today to demand that Mayor Bill de Blasio rethink his decision to force unwanted teachers into New York City schools. The call to action comes just days before de Blasio’s self-declared October 15deadline to place 400 teachers from the Absent Teacher Reserve into permanent positions.