Former Congressman Anthony Weiner accused Mayor Michael Bloomberg of using school closures to skirt union rules and fudging test scores ahead of his 2005 re-election bid during a conversation on education policy this morning that represented a rare reprieve from relentless questions about his latest sexing scandal.
Still trying to shift the conversation away from revelations that have engulfed his fledgling mayoral campaign in recent weeks, Mr. Weiner spent nearly an hour discussing everything from test scores to classroom diversity during a CUNY Institute of Education Policy Breakfast at Hunter College.
Asked about the Bloomberg administration’s controversial school closure policy, Mr. Weiner made the case that schools are being closed, not to improve them, but because it allows the city to skirt union rules that would otherwise bar the changes.
“It is simply a way to use their tools to be able to do what they want to ultimately do, which is to move teachers. And I think that–frankly–it’s not a particularly productive way to solve what is basically a labor–a contract–negotiation,” he said, describing the process as deeply disruptive to students.
“We’re basically saying to kids, ‘Don’t worry this school is a failure,’” he charged.
The allegations continued as Mr. Weiner accused Mr. Bloomberg of messing with test scores ahead of his 2005 re-election bid in order to make it seem as though more progress was being made.
“The mayor himself, I think, fudged the scores wildly leading up to his re-election in 2005,” said Mr. Weiner, who at the time was also running in the race. “A lot of those early numbers turned out to be discredited.”
In a scrum with mostly education reporters after the forum, Mr. Weiner doubled down on the accusation, pointing to news reports from the time questioning the scores.
“There was a spate of press conferences about how amazing the schools were doing that were later on discredited when those numbers came crashing back to earth,” he said. “These numbers are getting fudged in hundreds of ways,” he said.
Why would the press challenge Weiner on Bloomberg's playing funky with the test score data?
Bloomberg used to scream to holy heaven about how great the test scores were, how his reforms had closed the achievement gap.
But after the state acknowledged that state test scores were inflated, the city scores dropped precipitously and Bloomberg could no longer brag about either high test scores or closing the achievement gap.
Seriously, political journalists can actually look that stuff up if they want and see it for themselves.
Or they can call a journalist like Juan Gonzalez and ask him.
It's a fact - and not even a "Weiner" fact, but a real, honest-to-God true fact:
For years, Mayor Bloomberg, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein and top education officials in Albany touted big jumps in math and reading scores statewide - and skyrocketing results among New York City's pupils.
The scores, they said, were proof that mayoral control and Klein's data-driven version of school reform had succeeded.
Schools were winning the "civil rights battle of our time," the chancellor claimed, by closing the racial "achievement gap."
To promote his reforms nationwide, Klein even founded a nonprofit group last year with the Rev. Al Sharpton. They called it the Education Equality Project.
Now, state officials have revealed a startling nosedive in test scores. Admitting that results from previous years had been inflated, the state announced tougher standards this year - resulting in the lower scores. Thousands of parents who had been told their children were at grade level are suddenly learning they aren't.
Even worse, the new scores show the racial "achievement gap" has increased.
Back in 2003, 73.3% of white fourth-grade students met state standards, compared with only 46.3% of black pupils. The gap between the two groups was 26.9 points. This year, the gap between black and white fourth-graders increased to 31.7 points.
For Hispanic fourth-graders, there was a smaller rise, from 29.7 points in 2003 to 30.3 this year - but a rise nonetheless.
Comparisons aren't possible for all grades because the state only tested fourth- and eighth-graders until 2006.
More than 15% of the 400,000 students who took this year's reading test registered at Level 1 - the lowest possible level - while only 2.8% did last year. An astonishing 85% of those lowest achievers were African-American and Hispanic.
The new scores are so bad Sharpton has begun to distance himself from Klein. "I'm very disturbed and concerned by these scores," Sharpton said.
"We were told students were improving, but it seems our kids were victims of dumbed-down tests to make the administration look good."
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