NYC NOW - May 17, 2024: Midday News

Episode Date: May 17, 2024

Child poverty rates in New York have reached their highest level since 2016, according to a new report from state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli. Meanwhile, about 26,000 runners are expected to participate in a half marathon in Brooklyn on Saturday. In other news, school districts nationwide are seeking ways to address COVID-related learning loss. However, the Union City, New Jersey, School District, which serves some of the state's lowest-income students, is meeting academic goals with little state assistance. WNYC’s Michael Hill speaks with district Superintendent Silvia Abbato and Bergen Record education reporter Mary Ann Koruth to learn why.

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. It's Friday, May 17th. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. Child poverty rates in New York have reached their highest level since 2016. That's according to a new report. WNIC's Charles Lane has more. Child poverty rates more than doubled since the expiration of federal pandemic aid in 2021, according to a new report from state controller Tom DiNapley. This reverses

years of improvement for the state's children. Elsewhere in the U.S., kids' fortunes have continued to improve, widening the gap between New York's children and the rest of the country. DeNapley estimates that New York would have 100,000 fewer children in poverty if the state kept pace with the country. During the pandemic, Congress approved more than $3 trillion worth of financial assistance for families in poverty. He called on lawmakers to again pass expanded tax credits aimed at children. A half marathon will take over a stretch of Brooklyn tomorrow, stretching from Palsby Park down to the beach. Ted Mattelis is one of the organizers with New York Roadrunners. We're expecting over 26,000 runners to navigate 13.1 miles of Brooklyn,

starting by the Brooklyn Museum and finishing the beautiful Coney Island. Mattela says this race is unusual and that many of the racers are local Brooklyn running clubs took off during the pandemic. And Mattela says that some 10% of the registered runners are from new clubs that formed in the past five years. 68 in cloudy now, mostly cloudy in 74 for a high today. Tomorrow those runners will face a slim chance of showers, mostly cloudy skies in a high of 70. 68 and cloudy now. Stay close. There's more after the break. School districts across our region and the country continue to look for strategies to address learning laws from the COVID pandemic.

One New Jersey school district may have some advice to offer. The Union City School District is home to some of the state's lowest income students. It's meeting academic goals without a lot of state assistance. With us now to talk about how they're doing it. is Sylvia Abado, Superintendent of Union City District Schools, and Mary Ann Carruth, staff writer for the Bergen Record covering education. Superintendent Abato, would you briefly tell us about the students you serve in the district? We are approximately 95% Hispanic, Latinos.

Out of that, we have 35% who are bilingual students, another 12 to 15% special needs, so 50% of our population is at risk, and we have 97% of our students that receive approximately free and reduced lunch. And in spite of those figures, we are a high-achieving urban district. Marian, your article gives some historical context. In 1989, for instance, what was happening then? The school district was struggling so much that the state threatened to take it over, and they got a one-year reprieve.

and over several years, they really went in and made big changes in how they were running the schools, and that sort of playbook has stayed in place. Superintendent Abano, that's about the time that you came in, as I understand it. What changed after you started, and what do you credit to the success of Union City since then? We had different curriculums at the time at each school. Students would move from school to school to start out with new curriculum, So we actually had everything there as far as standardized. Also, what we did was we would concentrate on grade levels.

We started the preschool program. Now we have a nationally recognized preschool program. And the cohort, the first cohort that went through the preschool program actually doubled their score in the assessments. Our students went from 45% to 86% passing. And we provide for our teachers certification in ESL or bilingual education at a cost to the district. Besides our bilingual ESL programs, we have what's called an advanced bilingual program where once students test out, they still have a certified teacher to provide that little extra support that might need for an extra year.

In addition, we work with local universities to have interns work for us. So as a result of that, once they graduate, they've been trained by us and we signed them up as teachers. So that helps tremendously with teacher retention. What about during the pandemic, Superintendent Abano? What was the district strategy then? Please call me Sylvia. Something that we did that a lot of districts did not do, if you recall, there was delays in materials being shipped and delivered. So we decided to empty our computer labs and our classrooms and get as much technology in the students' hands as possible

because they did not have the technology at home. I'm curious if you have numbers on the number of homes that actually had or did not have access to the Internet. As far as Internet services, we have maybe 40 to 50 percent, and we worked with the local providers to provide either Internet access or hotspots because we had a lot of the students that lived in the high-rises. and they were not able to get the computer connectivity. And we had that as soon as the schools closed. Marian, how does Union City compare to other school districts in the Garden State in terms of learning loss?

There was a study that was conducted by Harvard and Stanford to look at learning loss and recovery in school districts across 30 states. And in New Jersey, Union City was a... an outlier. Basically, at Union City, the numbers showed that the school district almost improved in its reading scores between 2019 and 2022 compared to most other districts which actually lost ground in reading. There was learning loss in math too, but it was much lesser in Union City than it was in other districts. And this is even in comparison to many of the wealthier suburban districts. Wow. Sylvie, I'm curious, what advice would you share with leaders at other school districts who may still be struggling to catch their students up? You need to have a buy-in from the

community. Obviously, from our mayor and state senator, our board members, who are appointed board members, by the way, because they have a buy-in in long-term projects that we have in the district. Also, the fact that parental input is very important. Also to teach with a heart. I think if education is the great equalizer, and again, when you're representing, underrepresented communities, you want the students to succeed. Because I always say when you have a student that succeeds,

it's not only the success of that student, but it's the success of that family, and that will impact the community. Marian, what assistance is available through the state for struggling districts? There's no formal department or office as of now that literally looks only at learning loss and how to remediate it. Advocates I spoke to such as people at the Ed Law Center, Daniel Farie, I was talking to her about why she thinks it isn't that easy for districts similar to Union City

to simply just copy it and achieve everything that it has. And I think one of the reasons is that districts don't just need the money. they need support to look at the data and come up with policies and action plans as to how to use this money to actually make the very targeted changes that I think Union City is able to do. Marianne Carruth is a staff writer for the Bergen Record and Sylvia Abado is the superintendent of Union City District Schools. Thank you both for this enlightening conversation. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks for listening.

from WMYC. Be sure to catch us every weekday, three times a day, for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. See you this evening.