This piece makes some sharp critiques, but the argument that more school spending pushes families to leave NYC is puzzling, + discounts the ways NYC's school budget already serves as social safety net, incl: ~$2B for free 3-K/Pre-K, >$600m for free meals, free dental/vision at 100s of schls, etc.

Students across New York couldn’t log into state math exams Wednesday morning, raising fresh questions about the transition to computer-based testing.

Scoop! NYC Chancellor Kamar Samuels is pulling four controversial proposals from Wednesday's PEP vote: - Opening of 'Next Gen,' the city's first AI-focused HS - Closing middle schools at P.S. 191 and Manhattan School for Children - Relocating Center School www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2026...

Among the popular "industry credentials" in Philly schools: a 2-hour online ladder safety course that most employers who ask people to climb ladders would be required to offer anyway. Good work by @rebeccaredelmeier.bsky.social on what's going wrong in high school. www.chalkbeat.org/philadelphia...

Mayor Mamdani announcing at a press conference today that the "default model" for the new free 2-K program will subsidize child care 8am-6pm, year-round, in contrast to the default of 8am-2:20 pm, September-June for the 3-K and Pre-K programs.

Last week, Dylan Lopez Contreras returned to his Bronx high school after 10 months in ICE detention. It was a day full of joy, and also inescapable reminders of the threat of immigration enforcement still facing Dylan and his classmates: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2026...

NYC is about to release a long-await AI policy for schools. But over the past 2+ years, as AI use has grown, schools have had to figure out their own approach to confronting AI. Here's what some are doing + what the city might learn from them: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2026...

After 10 months, Dylan, the first NYC high school student detained by ICE in Trump's 2nd term, has been released. www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2026... Here's what Norma Vega, the principal of Dylan's school ELLIS Prep, which has played a key role in the efforts to rally behind him, said:

NYC is proposing a new, selective-admissions, AI-focused high school in Manhattan's D2, w/ support from Google + Open AI. Hundreds of parents have already sent letters expressing concern. PEP votes next month on the proposal. Via Lizzie Walsh: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2026...

Great read from @alexzimmerman.bsky.social on NYC’s new chancellor, his vision for the system, and what happens when Mamdani visits an elementary school: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2026...

Come join us Thursday at the Brooklyn Heights library for a conversation on what it means to educate immigrant students in this moment - with educators doing amazing work on the ground + great orgs with resources to share.

Important reality check from @mattbarnum.bsky.social on the oft-heard refrain that loosening admissions at selective schools will harm the lower-scoring students who get in by setting them up for failure. Research shows precisely the opposite: those students see real benefits.

One sign of how bad NYC’s child care crisis has gotten: there are *10,000* kids sitting on a waitlist for low-income child care vouchers b/c the program is out of $. Some observers say that’s a logical place for Mamdani to start his push for universal child care: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

New: the arrival of ~50K migrant students from 2022-24 buoyed NYC schools after years of enrollment decline. But over the past year, as the city closed shelters + Trump took office, that pattern reversed - posing long-term challenges for many schls + the system: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

Rly important work by economist Lauren Melodia finds the median income for NYC’s family child care providers, many of whom rely largely on public funding + will be a critical part of any push for universal child care, is $6 an hour: www.centernyc.org/reports-brie...

VIDEO: Federal Agents Bust Into Queens Apartment, Pointing Guns at Mother and Her Four Kids www.thecity.nyc/2025/11/19/q...

New w/ @alexzimmerman.bsky.social: NYC declared victory on a major class size deadline: >60% of classes under the caps. What they didn’t mention: they only got there by quietly declaring 10,500 classes exempt. W/o those, DOE would’ve been at 59.5% compliance: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

Mamdani’s visit to a BK child care center yesterday illustrated one of the problems in the system he’ll have to confront: 2 of the center’s classrooms, meant for 3K/PreK, have sat empty for 5 yrs. Citywide, ~27,000 free child care seats, 1 in 5, were empty last yr: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

Most of the conversation about whether Mamdani can deliver universal child care has focused - rightfully - on cost. But I've been curious (as a reporter and parent of an infant + toddler) what it would take operationally. So I talked to lots of knowledgable ppl: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

Plot twist in NYC's chancellor search! Meisha Ross Porter, a former schools chief under de Blasio who's considered a top contender for the job under Mamdani, is a finalist for CEO of Chicago schools. www.chalkbeat.org/chicago/2025...

A little more election-eve news for NYC schools: Enrollment is down 2.4%, the largest drop in 4 yrs. Seems likely immigration played a role - the influx of 50K migrants propped up NYC’s enrollment the last 3 yrs, but that’s ground to a halt under Trump. www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

A bit of news for NYC schools: schools w/ lower-than-projected enrollment won't have to give back $ midyear. That could be especially beneficial to schools that have enrolled large immigrant populations + have seen big drops under Trump. W/ @amyzimmer.bsky.social: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

Hundreds of thousands of NYC students + families are about to lose SNAP. Their schools are scrambling to set up ad hoc food pantries, raise $, + collect donations to keep them fed. Another way schools are trying to hold up a crumbling social safety net: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

As momentum builds for universal child care in NYC, the city is for the first time piloting free, non-means-tested seats for kids 2 and under. Here's the list of neighborhoods getting priority: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

As more NYC public school parents are detained by ICE, schools are often the first places the family members left behind turn for help picking up the pieces. Here’s how some schools are supporting those students: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

After Mamdani announced plans to phase out gifted programs, Cuomo + Sliwa said they would expand them instead Eric Adams tried to do that — and roughly 1 in 3 of the city's gifted programs are underenrolled. Heres why w/ @michaelelsenroo.bsky.social www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

They wandered back to the hotel shortly after to their terrified children who had already seen video of both of their parents being detained. "It was like something out of a movie,” they told me.

This has been updated with strange new details. I spoke to one person who was arrested but then released, who described being taken to a subterranean parking garage and questioned by agents who said they were with ICE and told them they were looking for Venezuelans.. www.thecity.nyc/2025/10/17/r...

Mamdani announcing a teacher recruitment plan where NYC will offer tuition assistance, mentorship, other support to prospective teachers in exchange for commitments to stay at least 3 years. Class size law requires thousands of addl teacher hires in coming years

Lost in the debate over NYC’s gifted and talented program rekindled by Mamdani’s proposal was the fact that the program underwent a big change in recent years: eliminating its admissions test. @alexzimmerman.bsky.social dug into how that change has played out: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

The rare feel-good gov't shutdown story: I talked to some Bronx 8th-graders on a field trip to DC whose tour of the Capitol was canceled bc of the shutdown - and who ended up getting a personal tour from @aoc.bsky.social instead: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

Eric Adams’ first schools Chancellor David Banks shares his thoughts on the last year of Adams’ tenure as news comes he won’t seek a second term. Via @alexzimmerman.bsky.social: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

“It’s truly more socializing than I’ve seen in my 10 years working in a high school.” Seyma Bayram w/ a great story on the early challenges + triumphs of school without phones in NYC. www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

More from @amyzimmer.bsky.social and @alexzimmerman.bsky.social on why Adams does not have legal authority to roll back the DOE's bathroom access policies for trans students in NYC despite these comments: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

Families of gender-nonconforming students in NYC have been worried about something like this for months given Mayor Adams’ stance towards Trump + his wide authority over schools (www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...). Now Adams is openly promising to review school bathroom policy.

Really excited for this talk next week at Lofty Pigeon about two important books. NYC education folks - would love to see you there!

Always a pretty wild reminder of the scale of NYC’s school system to see the class of new teachers assembled in the same place

The stellar @rebeccaredelmeier.bsky.social got up at the crack of dawn to ride SEPTA to school with two Philly students. The whole trip took over an hour and they missed a bus and had to walk the last mile to Palumbo. These cuts are already having a real impact on Philly's young people:

"Normally, in the final month of school, students were worried about moving to the next grade or graduating. This year, he said they wondered: 'Is a masked person going to grab me off the street?'" via @chalkbeat.org / @michaelelsenroo.bsky.social

@michaelelsenroo.bsky.social’s eye for detail is impressive

Thank you @bgrueskin.bsky.social for highlighting my reporting on a Bronx HS and undocumented teen navigating the Trump administration. Here’s Part 1: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025... And Part 2: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

"Her unexpected removal...will likely have a deep emotional impact on her classmates and our entire school community. She belongs with her family and her classmates." Message from principal of P.S. 89 in Queens, whose 7 y/o student was detained by ICE + sent to Texas, via @gwynnefitz.bsky.social

Part 2 is out today. It’s about what happens after the deportation campaign arrives at ELLIS’ doorstep and the difficult choices facing Bridget and the school as they try to make it through the Trump administration. www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

“It’s not going to be my fault that her dream dies." @MichaelElsenRoo spent months with an undocumented NYC student and the school fighting to keep her education hopes alive www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

If you read one thing today, read this 👇

Here is your must edu-read of the day; terrific embedded reporting on the fear and stress our immigrant neighbors and their children are experiencing and the heroes trying to steer them through it

For 6 months, I’ve followed ELLIS, a Bronx HS for newcomers, to understand what it means to educate immigrant students in Trump’s second term. Proud to share the 1st of 2 stories about ELLIS, Bridget, an undocumented teen, & the fight to keep her education alive. www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...

@alexzimmerman.bsky.social flexes a deep knowledge of the complicated dynamics of the SHSAT, but in particular his answer at the very end of the show is probably the clearest thing I’ve ever seen in the media about the limits of test prep on a 100% norm referenced test 1/

NEW: Mayor Eric Adams’ re-election campaign submitted faked and fraudulently obtained petition signatures in his effort to secure a spot on the November ballot as an independent candidate, a Gothamist investigation has found. gothamist.com/news/forged-...

Enraging story from @alexzimmerman.bsky.social. NYC hasn’t paid its ~1,000 Teaching Fellows the entire 7 weeks they’ve been working this summer, forcing some to go into debt to cover rent and food. This at a time the city is trying to hire in historic numbers: www.chalkbeat.org/newyork/2025...