I suspect these 72 schools in the class-size pilot program are some of the lowest performing with some of the biggest obstacles. One obstacle may or may not be class size. The city Department of Education will pilot this program, most of the 72 schools will NOT show a major improvement (because class size is NOT their biggest challenge) and then the DOE will turn and say “See, we tried, but class size doesn’t really matter.” And then they will ignore our overcrowded classes for the next 20 years.

We must reduce class sizes. If we won’t do it during a pandemic, it’s never going to be done. The DOE, the chancellor and the mayor must stop pretending they give a darn about students’ mental health and academic well-being if they’re not going to do anything about it.

Jennifer Rosenthal Forgash,
Young Women’s Leadership School, Manhattan
(via Facebook)