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PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Dale Kelly, Executive Vice President of the Council of School Supervising Administrators
6:39:54
ยท
6 min
Dale Kelly, representing the Council of School Supervising Administrators, addressed the City Council on various education issues, focusing primarily on school safety concerns and budget priorities. Kelly emphasized the need for more school safety agents, improved safety infrastructure, and investment in restorative practices and mental health support.
- Highlighted the critical shortage of school safety agents and the need for a systematic framework to address this issue
- Stressed the importance of maintaining funding for early childhood education, community schools, and arts programs despite fiscal challenges
- Raised concerns about the class size mandate implementation and the need for updated fair student funding formula to support it
Dale Kelly
6:39:54
Good afternoon, Chia Joseph and members of the city council.
6:39:58
I am Dale Kelly, executive vice president of the council of school supervising administrators speaking on behalf of president Henry Rubio and representing over 17,000 in service and retired school leaders.
6:40:10
Thank you for your opportunity to speak today.
6:40:13
School safety is our top concern.
6:40:15
Principals, APs, and administrators across the city are raising the alarm.
6:40:20
Our schools are less safe than they've been in decades.
6:40:23
Number of school safety agents has steadily decreased, leaving many schools without the coverage they need.
6:40:29
Recruitment has stalled, and without a citywide plan to address the shortage, our concerns grow.
6:40:35
Pre pandemic safety agents numbered approximately 5,000 plus.
6:40:40
As of today, they hover around 3,000.
6:40:43
We must develop a systematic framework to ensure more agents are placed where they are needed most.
6:40:49
We must continue investing in school safety infrastructure, particularly cameras and buzzer systems.
6:40:55
We must repair and replace metal detectors and scanners and provide this technology to any school that asks for it.
6:41:02
We need to invest in restorative practice and mental health support.
6:41:06
Every teaching administrator should be trained in restorative practice, restorative justice, and we need funding for counselors to engage students directly in their classrooms.
6:41:16
Bullying, harassment, and gang violence are real issues, and early interventions can prevent conflicts from escalating.
6:41:25
Beyond safety, we must talk about funding because every priority in education depends on it.
6:41:31
We commend the city for their continued funding for summer rising and career readiness programs, but we cannot afford to lose investments in the early childhood education, community schools, and arts programs.
6:41:43
We understand the fiscal challenges, but cutting direct services in schools harms New York City families, particularly when there is uncertainty regarding the future of the federal Department of Education.
6:41:55
I was happy this afternoon when I heard chancellor Ramos speak about the summarizing impact analysis.
6:42:03
I think part of that success was attributed to the fact that the chancellor and the department engaged school leaders and engaged the principal advisory group to speak about the what went well during summer, what did go didn't go well, what needed to be retweaked, and I think that bear fruit.
6:42:20
So I commend the the chancellor and department on those efforts.
6:42:24
One of the biggest concern is the class size mandate.
6:42:29
Every educator knows that smaller classes benefit students, but the city must provide students schools with the funding to make it work.
6:42:37
Schools need more teachers, more space, and more supervisors to handle the additional workload.
6:42:43
The fair student funding formula must be updated to align with the new class size limits.
6:42:48
Without an adjustment, we risk leaving our most vulnerable students, students with disabilities, those in temporary housing, and English language learners without the resources they need.
6:43:01
Professional development for school leaders remains a top priority, and we hope you will continue to support the executive leadership institute, Eli, which provides our members with peer driven workshops, mentoring, and other critical supports that has a tremendous impact on New York City families.
6:43:19
There is there is no entity that has done more to recruit, train, and retain our principals than Eli and its flagship principal preparation program.
6:43:30
Earlier, council member Brewer spoke about an issue that I didn't anticipate speaking about, but I want to address.
6:43:38
She spoke about the investigator headcount at SCI.
6:43:42
Please note, chair Joseph, that apart from the SCI headcount issue, Department of Education also has two investigative arms, OSI and OEO.
6:43:52
Both of those agencies too face head count issues with the investigator.
6:43:57
The number 11,000 cases was cited by council member Brewer earlier for SCI is actually a smaller number than the number of cases that are referred to OSI, And the unfortunate reality is that approximately half of those cases that are referred to OCI get kicked back to schools to handle as school based investigations.
6:44:18
Simply put, our principals, our assistant principals are not investigators.
6:44:22
They're educators and shouldn't be pulled away from their duties to do these investigations.
6:44:27
So we ask that that be looked at, and I also wanna take an opportunity, chair Joseph, because you hit the nail on the head when you asked that question about the technology infrastructure in our schools, specifically the devices that are gonna be needed for online testing.
6:44:46
The department shared the the burden has now been shifted to schools to repair laptops and other devices.
6:44:55
As we know, since pandemic, those machines sometimes go home, and unfortunately, they sometimes come back, and they're in disrepair.
6:45:02
And it's not right that schools are now being expected to foot the bill to repair machines that our children desperately need.
6:45:10
The department needs to own hold the onus of repair, upkeep, maintenance of those machines, which was always part of their fiscal responsibility.
6:45:21
That cannot be put on to schools because as you fairly put, many schools don't have the fiscal resources to keep those all of those laptops and other devices in good repair.
6:45:32
Lastly Lastly.
6:45:34
I apologize to you, Joseph.
6:45:35
I just wanna take the opportunity because you said something earlier also that really struck a chord.
6:45:40
We too believe that there needs to be proactive measures put in place to address the potential short coming of the $2,000,000,000 that are brought from federal funding.
6:45:50
To that end, we've already begun began addressing state legislators and during our Albany Day lobby day visit in Albany to really stress the importance of some of the unintended and or intended consequences of any shortcoming in federal one on title one funding from the federal government.
6:46:08
Our children deserves safe schools, smaller classes, and fully funded programs.
6:46:14
We look forward to working with you to ensure that this budget meets the needs of all of our school communities.
6:46:20
Thank you.