New Paradigm

This page is a work in progress and outlines my understanding and personal remarks on the re-organization of the New York City school system.

New York City Schools are now organized into 10 Instructional Divisions (click here for map).  Each division encompasses 2 or more of the former Community School Districts.  For example, Division 10 includes the former districts 3, 5, & 6.  At this stage reorganization will not affect zoning for schools.  However, District Six is an extremely large (some 28,000 students) and over-crowded district.  The only choices to alleviate the problem are to create more space in district six or to shift some boundaries and move some district six students into the less crowded district 3 & 5 schools.  I'm not optimistic that either option will happen anytime soon.

Each division is headed by a Regional Superintendent (click here for list).  Why the confusing terminology is another question.  If they are regional superintendents, why not call them regions instead of divisions?  With all the talk about streamlining the "bureaucracy," they are so far doing a great job of recreating all the obtuse bureaucratic terminology and acronyms.  The regional superintendent is not housed in a regional office or a divisional office but rather a "Learning Support Center" (click here for a list of sites).

Each Regional Superintendent supervises about 10 Local Instructional Supervisors (click here to access lists), or LIS's. Additionally, each region has employed a number of Regional Instructional Specialists (RIS's), mostly in literacy & math.  The central department of education is also much different from the former board of education, in ways that I won't attempt to summarize.  For more detailed information consult the DOE's official FAQ.

To be continued...

 

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