Yet another unconvincing report on the results of Bloomberg's school closure policies
Yesterday, another dubious report was released by the Research Alliance, claiming better outcomes for students as a result of Bloomberg's draconian school closure policy. A major problem with the study is that it doesn't examine the well-documented destabilizing impact of closing these schools on other large high schools nearby, as discussed in this New School report.
Nor does the report mention the issue of soaring discharge rates at the closing schools. In fact, the word "discharge" is never used in either the report or the technical appendix.
In the report Jennifer Jennings and I wrote on the DOE's rising discharge rate between 2000 and 2007, we found this problem especially evident at the closing schools, with rates as high as 50% for the last two graduating classes at closing schools. See this graph :
Theoretically, these students were supposed to have transferred into another high school or GED program program outside the NYC public school system, and thus were not counted as dropouts -- but probably should have been. Indeed, a subsequent audit from the NYS Comptroller's office revealed that 15% of general ed students reported by the DOE as discharges should have been categorized as dropouts, and 20% of special ed students. Probably an even larger percentage from the closing schools were really dropouts.
The Research Alliance was founded with $3 million in Gates Foundation funds and is maintained with Carnegie Corporation funding, which help pay for this report. These two foundations promoted and helped subsidize the closing of large schools and their replacement with small schools; although the Gates Foundation has now renounced the efficacy of this policy. Michele Cahill, for many years the Vice President of the Carnegie Corporation, led this effort when she worked at DOE.
The Research Alliance has also been staffed with an abundance of former DOE employees from the Bloomberg era. In the acknowledgements, the author of this new study, Jim Kemple, effusively thanks one such individual, Saskia Levy Thompson:
The author is especially grateful for the innumerable discussions with Saskia Levy Thompson about the broader context of high school reform in NYC Public School Parents: Yet another unconvincing report on the results of Bloomberg's school closure policies: