Out of Place

In NYC 70% of students are Black or Hispanic. The Citywide Council on High Schools, just elected, has no Black or Hispanic parents. There’s a story. Short version.

There are parent elections in New York City, this is the second time, they are scheduled every two years to the Community Education Councils (CECs), and the Citywide Council on High Schools, Citywide Council on Special Education, Citywide Council for District 75, and Citywide Council for English Language Learners.

An organization called “PLACE” – devoted to maintaining the SHSAT and screens – decided to contest almost every seat – and won about 40% of the seats. PLACE won all 10 seats on the Citywide Council on High Schools (CCHS).

PLACE

Who wants to keep the screens and the tests? PLACE is unsurprisingly whiter than New York City as a whole, and much whiter than the New York City public schools. Not surprisingly, their school politics (use tests and screens to hold seats for their kids) spill over – PLACE is anti-progressive in general. In the last elections PLACE endorsed Lee Zeldin and his racist campaign for governor. PLACE endorsed George Santos for congress.

It’s hard to hold an organization responsible for its members’ tweets – but focusing on white Manhattan and Queens PLACE supporters, there’s a lot of ugly anti-Black message. I am not trying to convince you, the reader that PLACE is racist. I am telling you, the reader, that I am fully convinced that PLACE is racist.

The Endorsements

PLACE endorsed candidates for the CCHS. None of those endorsements were for Black or Hispanic candidates.

When PLACE made endorsements, they may have violated DoE election rules. Maybe not. But in any case – the DoE did not see fit to warn them.

When progressive groups made endorsements, the DoE threatened them.

The Results

Results can be reviewed by clicking through each CEC here.

PLACE did better on some CECs than on others. Unsurprisingly, they scored lots of seats in District 2 and District 3, including some of the wealthiest white neighborhoods in the city. Sadly, they swept all 10 high school seats – leaving no Black or Hispanic parents representing high schools in New York City.

40% of CCHS members will now be white – while less than 15% of NYC public school high school students are white. 60% of CCHS members will represent specialized high schools. Only 2% of NYC public high schools are specialized.

Of the 4 white PLACE members on the 10 person CCHS, one represents a borough that they do not live in, and where their children attend schools that do not enroll a majority from that borough, and two will have children who are about to graduate – that is they claim to be qualified to represent high school parents, while their children will be attending a NYC public high school for only ONE MONTH of their TWENTY-FOUR MONTH term. These are usurped seats.

The Election System

School Board elections were historically low-turnout affairs in NYC – and that hasn’t changed. Most of the high school winners got around 200 votes… there are over 300,000 high school students… I can see something between 3 and 5% turnout… (although it does not appear that the NYC Department of Education reported on turnout)

Voting was through an on-line school account – and that form of voting favors those with easy access to on-line accounts, and with regular experience managing multiple accounts with different platforms and passwords. White gentrifiers could not have created a system that favored themselves more, unless they directly borrowed from pre-Voting Rights Act Mississippi. Voting was NOT allowed in person – which would have favored traditional active parents in their communitites.

Next?

Obviously this is completely unacceptable. I am not part of deciding how to change things, but a few ideas:

• Treat the specialized high schools as a block, and entitle them to one seat (6/10, crazy)
• Require CCHS members to reside in the borough they represent
• Require CCHS members to resign if they no longer have a child in high school for part of their term (again, these two will have no child in a NYC public high school for 23/24 months that they are on the council) – maybe this rule can be made effective immediately
• Allow multiple modes of voting – not just those that favor the gentrifiers
• Work on increasing turnout. Set minimum turnout levels for a valid election

Honestly, it should also be possible to outmobilize PLACE. Their racist core is just not that big.

Today

Literally today. There is an event at Gracie Mansion at 4PM. If you are available, I urge you to attend.