Whatever gains the city has made in education under mayoral control and its emphasis on smaller schools and charters are nullified by its callous disregard for those students still stuck in schools the Department of Education has deemed beyond repair.
Take Jamaica High School, the storied institution the city has decided to eliminate and replace with four awkwardly named boutique schools. Small classes, new computers, Smart boards — students lucky enough to be attending the new schools are getting all these and more, while others under the same roof are getting the shaft.
No honors classes. No advanced placement classes. One guidance counselor for 600 students. Outdated computers always on the fritz. That’s what the students who are stuck in Jamaica High School are coping with as the city phases it out over the next few years. The DOE claims they’re getting the resources they need to succeed, but to be blunt, that’s a lie. No more or less. A lie. Great lesson for the kids.
What do you think a college admissions officer will think when he reviews an application from a student who took two years of honors courses and then ... stopped. Drugs, maybe? Problems at home? Prob-ably not that such classes simply disappeared overnight. But they did.
Imagine your kid trying to explain the situation to the powers that be at, say, Georgetown or Howard university. They’ll probably just say no and look to the next applicant whose record appears consistent.
And all that talk about trying to get more girls interested in math and science? You know, the kind of road-to-gender-equality stuff you read about in The Times’ op-ed pages every other week? Not at JHS.
“I feel like I should be given the opportunity to take classes in chemistry and physics; I love science,” female student Jahan Ferdous told Chronicle Senior Editor Anna Gustafson on Monday. We agree. And we note that Jahan is an immigrant who said her family came to the United States largely so she could get a good education. How often do you hear Mayor Bloomberg touting New York as the city of opportunity for immigrants? All the time. Here’s another case of hypocrisy.
What’s going on at Jamaica High School is simply a travesty. These children are being denied the state constitution’s guarantee of a quality education. They’re being denied equal protection under the law. Since the majority are minorities, the city’s neglect even carries the appearance of racial discrimination. That’s almost certainly not what’s driving its approach, but you know some people will think it is.
It’s been a year of debacles for the DOE, with the scheduling disasters at Long Island City and Metropolitan high schools, the insistence on replacing yellow buses with MetroCards for some kids as young as 10 and the revelation that the city that pushes healthy food to fight obesity is building elementary schools without gyms. All absurd, but none tops the reckless destruction of futures at Jamaica High School.
Concerned teacher librarian posted at 10:56 pm on Thu, Dec 8, 2011.
I work at Jamaica and am very upset that our students are not getting the new library books they are entitled to. Our book orders and magazine subscriptions are not being ordered. There is no paper for teachers to make copies with. Our computers were last replaced in 2003. Now that the school is closing I am being told that we are going to be getting a grant to renovate the library. but, construction will not begin until all the JHS students have left. And yet, everyday, I see new computers being delivered to students upstairs in other schools. Smartboards and apple computers are given to each teacher in the new schools but not to the teachers in Jamaica.
JEterno posted at 7:12 pm on Thu, Dec 8, 2011.
Great story. It is puzzling that the DOE insists they gave us a $50,000 technology grant. Where did that money go? We would like to know as it certainly did not go to new equipment.