ARCHIVES OF THE MAYOR'S WEEKLY COLUMN Archives of Rudolph W. Giuliani

Accountability Will Fix Our Schools

In my State of the City speech earlier this month, I reviewed the progress we've made together in improving education, and outlined our agenda for the future.

We've made tremendous strides towards bringing accountability to the Board of Education. The Chancellor now has the authority to remove and select superintendents; we've ended principal tenure; and we are the first city in New York State to implement school-based budgeting, which allows us to gauge how taxpayer dollars are spent.

With increased accountability in place, we've been able to bring New York City's funding of its public schools to a historic high, totaling $11 billion. We've invested this money wisely through specific initiatives such as Project Read, Project Arts, and Project Smart Schools, which have been huge successes.

However, we could do even more if the City received its fair share of state education funding. Although New York City schoolchildren make up 38 percent of the population of students in New York, the State has traditionally given the City only 36 percent of education aid. New York City gets 43 percent of its budget from the State, while the other big cities (Syracuse, Buffalo, Rochester and Yonkers) get 63 percent. That's a difference of approximately $400 million.

This historic inequity was recognized by the State Supreme Court earlier this month, which declared the State's current educational funding system invalid and unconstitutional. In my testimony on Monday before the State Legislature regarding the Governor's proposed executive budget, I said that it is critical that the State allocates to the City its fair share of education aid in order for us to continue to turn around the school system in New York City.

New York City is devoting more of the percentage of its budget to the public schools than it ever has before. The share has risen from 26.6 percent in Fiscal Year 1995 to 30.6 percent in FY 2001. Since FY 1995, City funding for education has increased $1.6 billion, while state funding has increased by $1.5 billion.

In addition to the expense budget for schools, the Board of Education's capital plan has also been the largest ever in recent years. In fact, the Board's most recent five-year capital plan reached $7 billion. Additionally, between 1988-1994, only 17 schools were built in New York City. Since I have taken office, there have been 41 additional schools built in the city.

But more important than increased funding for schools is accountability. Ideally, all new money should be tied to accountability reforms and performance standards, so that we can know exactly how it is spent, and exactly what it is doing for our children.

That is why I continue to advocate for the abolition of the unaccountable and inefficient Board of Education. Governor Pataki, City Council Speaker Vallone, and the mayors of cities throughout the state understand that the boards are obstacles to reform. The sooner we pass legislation to abolish the boards in large city school districts, the sooner we can get to work fixing our schools and educating our children.

The money that I have provided for the Board of Education in the past years has been targeted so that it could directly reach the students in the classrooms. Project Arts has restored arts education to every school in the city. Project Read is improving literacy, while Project Smart Schools has given every student in a fourth-grade classroom access to a computer.

In my State of the City speech, I proposed additional programs of this nature. Project Science will offer 40 weeks of special weekend science instruction to 45,000 specially-identified eighth-grade students and high school students in the five boroughs. Project English will help 45,000 students receive extra English language instruction.

Every year that we delay in meaningful, strong school reform, a number of children are left behind. We must all work together to create a system that focuses first and foremost on improving the education of our children. In the 21st Century, they deserve no less.