Hundreds of educators, parents and students from Oyster Bay-East Norwich schools and all over Long Island gathered at Westbury High School March 12 to defend public education.
The crowd, which spilled from the Westbury High School auditorium into the gymnasium, rallied against what they called Governor Andrew Cuomo’s “anti-public education propaganda.”
Much of the crowd was made up of teachers who were members of New York State United Teachers (NYSUT). The union has decried Cuomo for his proposed budget, which, among other components, gives the state the ability to appoint a third party agency to take over school districts deemed as failing, uses state testing to evaluate teacher effectiveness and puts more money toward charter schools. Cuomo has not released the school state aid numbers to districts until the state legislature approves his demands.
Board members are currently working off projections to put together their school budgets. If the governor’s educational amendments are passed into law, he is expected to release as much as $1.2 billion to school districts, if not, it could be as low as $300 million.
Teachers groups, educators and community activists all over the state have been regularly holding rallies to call out Cuomo and voice their displeasure with his reforms.
“Tonight we are here to celebrate public education,” said Westbury Board of Education president Dr. Pless Dickerson at last week’s rally. “Although everyone’s challenges may be different, I’m sure everyone can attest to and identify the road blocks public education is facing today. Let each and every one of us make certain our voices are heard on behalf of public education.”
Numerous Westbury students shared the effect their education and teachers had had on their lives. They all emphasized that the extracurriculars, electives and support from educators was what stood out to them the most, not the tests they took.
“The Westbury School District has been instrumental in shaping me to be the empathetic, worldly person I am today,” said Westbury High School senior Danielle McDougall. McDougall credited the school’s dual language program for her near fluency in Spanish, which has led her to being a two-year Spanish honor society member and recent first-place winner of the Optimum Community’s Hispanic Heritage Month essay contest. “My teacher’s continued efforts has taught me…to acknowledge and embrace diversity and use it to propel myself and others toward success and a better condition of living.”
Marie Festa and her family moved to Massapequa in the 1970s, looking for a school district with a strong special education department for her daughter.
“She graduated from public high school with a diploma,” Festa said. “She is a very successful woman in her chosen career because of her public school education.”
Festa spoke against charter schools, which she said did not seem to be very successful in educating “the whole person to live in a diverse world.”
“Nowhere can you get a better education than in public school,” said Festa. “Today’s public schools educate the whole child, every child, not just the elite or select few. This world has all kinds of people. It is very important that our children attend public schools with diverse people. This is the real world.”
Parents joined the fight as well, saying they would stand united with educators.
“When you reduce teachers to a single test score, you’re taking away their ability to teach. And when you do that, our children lose,” said Marianne Adrian, a parent of three young children in the Levittown School District. “Governor Cuomo’s proposal is not only hurting our teachers and schools, but it’s hurting our children. But together we will fight and give our children what they deserve.”
In response to Cuomo’s proposal for more testing, the opt-out movement has grown stronger.
Hundreds of parents across Long Island have chosen to have their children not take state tests, which have no academic bearing, but are only used for teacher evaluations.
While Oyster Bay-East Norwich Central School District has no written policy in place for opting out of standardized testing, school administrators said they accommodate requests made by parents.
“We ask that the parent/guardian of students who will not participate in state tests to indicate this in writing to the building principal,” said Superintendent of Schools Dr. Laura Seinfeld. “Students will not be placed in a separate location during test administration, but will be permitted to read silently while their peers take the exams.”
