QUESTION
What are the real numbers regarding the cost for more school seats, and what challenges hinder obtaining them?
2:50:06
·
57 sec
The United Federation of Teachers represents challenges in verifying the reported cost for additional school seats due to a lack of transparency and the absence of a detailed capital plan.
- Assistant Secretary Michael Sill questions the reported cost figures for school seat expansion.
- Acknowledges the need for more seats in certain neighborhoods.
- Emphasizes the importance of having a transparent capital plan to track progress and costs.
- Criticizes the School Construction Authority's lack of transparency, hindering accurate cost assessment.
Rita C. Joseph
2:50:06
If we disagree with the numbers we're hearing, what are the real numbers?
Michael Sill
2:50:11
I don't know.
2:50:13
You know, when they said 30 to 35,000,000,000, that's when we started to dig into that.
2:50:19
And so that is a crazy number.
2:50:21
We know that there are neighborhoods that need more seats.
2:50:25
I think what we really need in order to be able to know if we're on track to meet the number of seats and have a cost associated with that is a capital plan that has the same kind of transparency that it's had in the past.
2:50:37
If not more,
Rita C. Joseph
2:50:38
we can have it this time.
2:50:40
We ask that question.
Michael Sill
2:50:41
Exactly right.
2:50:42
And so I I don't I don't know why that decision was made at this time, but I know that a a further lack of transparency on the part of SCA while we're trying to implement this law is detrimental.
2:50:56
And I would love to be able to say what the number actually is, but it's impossible with the way that they're doing business at the moment.
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Fernando Alvarez, 4th Grade Teacher in East Harlem, on the Challenges of Increased Class Sizes and Maintaining Student-Teacher Relationships
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Dale Kelly, First Vice President of the Council of School Supervisors and Administrators on School Space and Class Size Data Concerns