TESTIMONY
Khalek Kirkland, Superintendent of District 23, on Managing Class Size Regulations in Brownsville
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7 min
Khalek Kirkland discusses the impact of class size regulations in Brownsville, emphasizing the district's high compliance rate and the associated challenges.
- Kirkland highlights that 73% of District 23's classes already meet the new class size caps, showcasing high compliance.
- He expresses concerns about the potential decrease in resources for District 23 as resources may be redirected to less compliant districts.
- Kirkland points out the difficulties in maintaining smaller class sizes due to budget constraints, space limitations, and the challenge of recruiting high-quality teachers to the district.
- He underscores the importance of ensuring that changes in class size regulations do not negatively affect the educational resources and achievements of students in District 23.
- Kirkland calls for creative solutions and equitable, thoughtful approaches to comply with class size laws while maintaining academic excellence.
Khalek Kirkland
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Councilwoman Joseph, in Brownsville, we have this thing called the Triple p.
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Positive public praise because we're dealing with a lot of emails and phone calls.
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I wanna publicly tell you how much respect that I have for you.
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I've grown to know you, and you are definitely the woman for the job.
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Good afternoon.
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Cheah Joseph and all the members of the city council committee on education here today.
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My name is Colleen Kirkland, and I'm the proud superintendent for district 23 located in Brownsville.
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The section of Brooklyn.
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I wanna thank chair Joseph and the council for your continued advocacy for the scholars of New York City.
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I wanna first start by telling you a little bit about myself and the path that led me to stand before you today.
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I saw that as a middle school math teacher at middle school 113 district 13.
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I still consider myself a math teacher.
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Before becoming an assistant principal and ultimately a principal at the same school, I served as the in the as a principal in the Bronx before coming to serve the community of District 23.
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I strongly believe in the benefits of smaller class sizes.
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When scholars are in smaller classes, they can receive personalized instruction unique to that scholar and approach not always conducive in larger classrooms.
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That attention to detail for scholars is key to academic success for our young scholars.
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Well, I believe that the law has some worthy goals.
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There will be some implementation challenges for schools.
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I say this as a superintendent whose district is not only complying with the law, But as you heard, our deputy chancellor mentioned in her testimony, we have 73% of our classes already under the newly mandated caps.
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However, in the coming years, as we continue to comply with these caps, our principles will be forced to make some difficult decisions when it comes to how they will utilize their budgets.
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I work extensively with our district budget director reviewing spending regularly.
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I understand why our principles make the choices they make in our district to ultimately provide an enriching experience for our scholars and school community.
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Many of the decisions that our proud principals make today as they look at their respective budgets will need to take a back seat to ensure a 100% compliance with the law.
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Our principles will have a tough choice.
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How do we continue to comply with the law while ensuring robust coursework for our scholars?
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If building expansion is not a current option, principals will have to rethink space and how they schedule classes based on room availability.
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Ultimately, causing an impact on how classrooms are utilized.
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In our schools, we create a welcoming environment, the moment our young scholars step foot into the buildings.
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Our teachers are creating spaces that are literacy rich utilizing visual aids, progress trackers, and classroom libraries.
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And you've helped us a lot with the classroom libraries.
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As we continue to meet the class size law, my schools will need to develop alternatives to maintain these vital tools across multiple classrooms.
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Students moving through different rooms during the school day will introduce new challenges for our young scholars who would lose out on the welcoming spaces that their teachers have created.
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Movement between classrooms will also result in a loss of instructional time, particularly for collocated schools vying to use additional space.
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Very few buildings in my district, hosts solely one school, meaning many of our scholars will be impacted and lose vital time in the classroom.
0:37:03
We have talented teachers in our district, and I'm deeply proud of the work that they do every day.
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However, the current reality is we still face challenges with hiring teachers to come to teach at our schools and down the line This law may exacerbate the issue.
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Our district is the most compliant in the city.
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That means as the New York City public schools work to direct resources to reduce this class sizes in place that have higher class sizes those resources will not be coming to Brownsville.
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Instead, they will be going to places with much lower compliance rates than ours.
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We already face challenges and recruiting teachers to teach in our district.
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I like to jokingly say that Brownsville is not closer to 2 to 3 to 4 to 5 the J and the injury.
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As schools in lower poverty districts open up more teaching positions, we anticipate that teachers will be more likely to move to those districts and potentially away from Brownsville.
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New York City public school data shows that teachers tend to move from higher poverty schools to lower poverty schools as they move within the schools in the system.
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This law and the need to hire more teachers in our less compliant districts, while well intentioned only hurts Oscars even more.
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There will be no small class sizes if we do not have high quality teachers in front of the class.
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I look forward to engaging with you and the council on developing pathways to incentivize teachers to teach in communities like mine, in Brownsville.
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Under the current way that the city fund schools, fair student funding, schools in my community get additional dollars for serving high need scholars.
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With these changes that may come as we comply with the class size law, with the requirements which will drive resources are the same across the city.
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I'm concerned about how my district may lose out.
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With resources instead of going to other districts which have many fewer classes under the newly mandated caps.
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I hope that the scholars of District 23 who have already begun to see positive impact of this funding model.
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I'm sure by now you've seen the Brownsville has had the highest gains in mathematics and the 3rd highest gains in ELA.
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I'm hoping that they do not lose the money, the teachers, and the investments that they deserve.
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The city and the state must ensure schools and communities like mine continue to keep and in fact grow their resources in the face of this law.
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The scholars in my district require this support.
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Finally, we are committed to ensuring that New York City students have access to high quality education while complying with the state's class size law.
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We will continue to prepare for the upcoming challenges, facing our schools in the coming years, and we'll actively look towards creative ways to lessen the impact with student academic excellence in an approach that is equitable and thoughtful.
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When we lift all small boats, all students can achieve.
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We greatly appreciate our partnership with the city council, and I wanna give a special shout out to my city councilwoman Darlene Mealy.
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And look forward to continued collaboration to enhance the education experience of our scholars.
0:40:46
Thank you so much for your time.