| Releases & Statements
Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum sent to following letter to school’s chancellor Joel Klein following months of complaints from parents and advocate’s over the Department of Education’s pattern of secrecy.
April 9, 2003
Joel I. Klein
Chancellor
Department of Education
52 Chambers Street, Room # 320, B4
New York, NY 10007
Dear Chancellor Klein,
I am disappointed to see today that the City Council is forced to override Mayor Bloomberg’s veto of a bill to have the Department of Education submit quarterly reports updating the status and cost of capital projects to the Council. However, more disturbing is the appearance of a pattern of secrecy by the Department of Education.
I have read news reports of the Department’s refusal to release information on a variety of issues. In November, the Daily News reported that your staff balked at requests for crime statistics, the names of schools you had visited, and those schools that had dangerous water fountains.
In January, the New York Times reported that “Mr. Klein and his aides offered few details of how the Leadership Academy would work and the roles of Mr. Welch and Mr. [Robert E.] Knowling.”
Just last month, the New York Post wrote that “buried way at the end of Klein’s two-page, tiny-type letter” was the right to transfer a child out of a failing school… “No wonder Klein & Co. are viewed suspiciously on their commitment to informing parents about policy.”
And just last week, your Department refused to release the list of 88 schools that have been given one-year exemptions from the new standard curriculum.
Secrecy and silence serve only to exclude the oversight of experienced educators, concerned elected officials, and most important, the parents of the very children the Department of Education exists to serve. The information parents seek on their children’s education should be available. I urge you to rethink this approach and allow the release of information that allows for critical public involvement and discussion of your admirable efforts to reform our public schools. I will be calling you shortly to discuss this issue.
Sincerely,
Betsy Gotbaum
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