New York City's reading initiative

Will NYC schools chose effective reading curricula?

In May 2023, I posted a note about New York City’s plan to change reading instruction (see https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/09/nyregion/reading-nyc-schools.html). Why were the curricula approved by the local education agency so…chancy? Not supported by evidence?

Well, Natalie Wexler also has had concerns. In “Most New York City Schools Are Choosing A Literacy Curriculum That Falls Short,” she discusses the choice being made by the LEAs. She pretty plainly explains why that ”the most popular choice so far is also the least effective.”

Now, why were the three choices that NYC provided selected? That’s something I’d like to know. Why were the two or three curricula that have the best evidentiary records omitted? That’s something I’d like to know.

If you are a New Yorker and you know that your child is going to be submitted to instruction that is substandard (i.e., less effective than other instrution), why wouldn’t you ask questions about it. If you’re am American, why would you want your child to get less effective instruction? If your an Australian, a Brit…Martin….

This is yet another example of what people like Engelmann and Maynard have called “academic child abuse.” When it is disproportionally visited on “children of color,” it sounds to me like discrimination.

I don’t like it. I think we know better, and as educators, we should do better.