New York

There are 56 posts filed in New York (this is page 1 of 6).

Same Credentials, Different Outcomes: Race and Homeownership in New York State

As a child in the 1950s, I lived in the New Jersey suburbs near New York City. Although the metropolitan area was racially diverse, the suburbs were not. I first lived in Wood-Ridge, a small town where none of my schoolmates were Black or Hispanic. In 1958, my family moved to Maplewood, adjacent to Newark, which had a large Black population. Yet only six of the 550 students in my high school graduating class were Black. The deed to the house my parents bought included a racial covenant, unenforceable by then but still present in the legal paperwork of suburban homeownership. Sixty-five years later, I pulled Census microdata for New York State and calculated homeownership rates by race, education, income, and metropolitan area. The results were striking: in New York State, a Black college-educated householder is still less likely to own a home than a White householder who never finished high school. Equal credentials do not produce equal outcomes.

The Rockefeller Institute’s Disability Services Economic Impact Analysis: What it Measures and What it Doesn’t

The Rockefeller Institute of SUNY released a report on March 2nd, “The Economic Impact of Disability Services Providers in New York and NYSID: New Developments.” The report was funded by two disability services-related organizations: the New York Alliance for Innovation and Inclusion and New York State Industries for the Disabled (NYSID). The report claims that “Providers have an economic impact of $15.6billion and employ over 98,000 people while supporting almost 200,000 jobs. In addition to that impact, NYSID member agencies and corporate partners generated an economic impact of $470 million, employing 4,794 workers with disabilities. Together, the economic impact is over $16 billion.” Does the report accurately reflect the program’s impact?

Students Outside New York City Underperform on State Tests

The poor academic performance of students in city schools has been a long-standing concern. When students struggle to acquire essential skills, it can significantly hinder their ability to compete successfully in the job market as adults. Large city schools tend to have high concentrations of economically disadvantaged students. In fact, over three-quarters of students in […]

Student Performance in Upstate Cities in 2022-2023: Combined Data

The academic performance of disadvantaged students has long been of concern. In district-operated schools outside New York City, only 31% of disadvantaged students passed the state’s grades 3-8 student evaluations in mathematics and English language arts in 2022-2023. Sixty-one percent of students who were not disadvantaged passed. In schools with high percentages of disadvantaged students, […]

The Poor Performance of Disadvantaged Students on New York’s English Language Exam at District-Operated and Charter Schools in Upstate Cities

The poor performance of economically disadvantaged students, particularly those in schools with high percentages of needy students, has long been a concern. In my first post, I examined the performance of disadvantaged students on the state’s grades three through eight mathematics exam at district-operated and charter schools in large upstate New York cities. In these […]

Students in Large Upstate Cities Performed Poorly on the Most Recent State Assessments

Historically, economically disadvantaged students have performed poorly on the State’s annual Student Assessments. That pattern continued in the 2022-2023 school year. On the State’s Grades 3-8 mathematics examination, only 30% of students in districts where 80% of students were economically disadvantaged were rated proficient, on average, compared with 70% of students in districts where 20% […]

COVID-19’s Impact on School Performance in New York State

The COVID-19 Pandemic disrupted teaching and learning at schools nationally and in New York State. School closures and remote learning removed the opportunity for students to interact directly with teachers. National testing shows that this led to significant learning losses. New York State students lost six points on the fourth-grade English (220 to 214) and […]

Have Charter Schools in Upstate Cities Achieved their Promise?

According to a recent article by Albany Times-Union columnist Chris Churchill, the sponsors of a new Charter school in Schenectady faced a chilly reception from area elected representatives. Churchill wrote, “Before it even opened, the new Destine Preparatory Charter School was denounced by two area politicians, Phil Steck and Angelo Santabarbara. In a joint statement issued when […]