EdVANTAGE Blog

New York Post Albany Bureau Chief Fred Dicker writes today,

Tomorrow’s special legislative session will be an all but certain flop because nervous Democrats, eyeing last Tuesday’s suburban voter revolt, are refusing to back Gov. Paterson’s plan to slash school and health-care spending.

He continues,

“If Paterson had a chance of getting the cuts he wanted, that chance ended last Tuesday,” said a prominent Senate Democrat, adding that there is now “widespread fear of defeat next year” among many Democrats in the wake of the stunning election results.

And adds,

“If any of our ‘marginals’ voted for those school cuts they would be dead next November,” said the Senate Democrat, referring to a half-dozen “marginal” Democrats, including two on Long Island, who have been targeted for defeat by Republicans.

Mr. Dicker also reports that support for the cuts in State Assembly may not be as solid as previously suggested:

While Assembly Democrats, unlike their Senate counterparts, have been publicly supportive of Paterson’s efforts, they privately tell a different story.

Insiders said Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) is “unwilling” to go along with the size, scope and distribution of Paterson’s proposed school-aid and health-care cuts because he considers them to be too sweeping and out of fear of their impact on suburban Democrats.

For more on the implications of the election see my weekend post, “Election tea leaves.”

Tuesday’s election results are being interpreted as evidence of a “tax revolt” and possible Republican resurgence in New York State.

But an under-analyzed aspect of the election is that Democratic losses in many regions resulted from a steep fall-off in their voter turnout, not a surge in GOP votes. Read the rest of this entry »

Governor Paterson today issued the formal proclamation for the Legislature to return to Albany next week to consider his plan to close the state’s $3.2 billion current year budget deficit.  But it is far from certain that any action will be taken.

The session has been ordered for Tuesday, November 11.  The Governor can require the Legislature to convene, but cannot force either house to vote on his proposals.

This morning’s Albany Times-Union reported, “‘We’re not close to a deal [on mid-year budget cuts],’ said one person with knowledge of the situation.”

The New York Daily News reported that the Governor has reached out to Dean Skelos, leader of the Senate Republican minority, for help on budget cutting.

The News quoted a Republican source, “He [Governor Paterson] is feeling very frustrated with the Senate Democrats and he made that clear. He’s getting nowhere with them; they’re divided and he has no problem going through us if need be. He’s going to work with us as long as our interests are in sync.”

A year ago, while still in the majority, Senate Republicans steadfastly resisted any mid-year School Aid cuts.

The Governor has also requested an opportunity to address the Assembly and Senate in joint session on Monday.  At this point in the calendar a joint session can only be called by resolutions approved by both houses. Read the rest of this entry »

New State Education Commissioner David Steiner’s “listening tour” around the state continues and he is getting positive reviews from most media.

He was in Rochester on Wedenesday where he reiterated his concern that state assessment tests are taking over the place of curriculum at too many schools. “We’ve reached a point in some cases where the test has become the curriculum,” he said.

The Buffalo News followed up on its reporting of the Commissioner’s Western New York visit with an editorial concluding, “Overall, that visit was encouraging.”

The paper added,

Perhaps the take-away lesson that resonated loudest is Steiner’s interest in lessening dependency on assessment testing and backing a more in-depth analysis of what students actually are learning.

An Elmira Star-Gazette columnist wrote of her paper’s editorial board meeting with the Commissioner, “The conversation with Steiner was far-reaching and left me energized, just as Steiner was energized by the Odessa-Montour classroom he visited earlier in the day.”

She explained,

One thing Steiner said stuck with me:  “it’s not an option to say ‘one at a time.”

In other words, there’s far too much to do in education to only focus on one area, fix that problem and move on to the next.

Like we’ve seen with the Obama administration’s attempt to fix the nation’s economic woes, lots of parts are moving at once on the state education level. For Steiner, those parts include dropout rates, teacher preparation, state and national assessment standards, curriculum sequencing (when to teach what), low-performing schools, college matriculation and more.

Saturday’s New York Times ran an article titled, “Schools Are Where Stimulus Saved Jobs, New Data Show.”

The Times reported,

On Friday, the Obama administration released the most detailed information yet on the jobs created by the stimulus. Of the 640,239 jobs recipients claimed to have created or saved so far, officials said, more than half — 325,000 — were in education. Most were teachers’ jobs that states said were saved when stimulus money averted a need for layoffs.

Of the 40,620 jobs reported to have been created or saved by the stimulus in New York State, 29,212 were credited to funds channeled through the U.S. Education Department, chiefly jobs in school districts.

But many of those jobs could disappear, with the threat of new state budget cuts, to close either an estimated $3.2 billion deficit this year, or projected gaps in future years. Read the rest of this entry »