Educators Talk About
The Future Of Southeast Queens Schools

By Shams Tarek

As former School District 29 superintendent Celestine Miller and four of her associates were sentenced last week to pay back $4.85 million the city lost in a computer equipment contract-rigging scheme, two of the borough’s top educators were focused on putting education back on the front burner.

The shift in focus comes at a time of great change in District 29 and the entire city’s public educational system, with new schools chancellor Joel Klein leading the charge to replace community school boards with something he thinks will be more efficient and effective for governing schools on a local level.

The PRESS got a chance to talk to the two education leaders—Superintendent Michael Johnson and Department of Education (DOE) Queens community representative Evita Belmonte—on several occasions recently.

Johnson, whose recent installation ceremony was seen by many in District 29 as the closing ceremony for the district’s recent corruption woes, is focusing mostly on students and their curricula, as far as his statements in public and to the press suggest.

Belmonte, a member of the DOE’s Panel for Educational Policy, a 13-member panel including one community representative from each borough of the city, is focusing on getting feedback from parents, residents and students about the schools they attend and live near.

The two officials, both longtime players in the city’s public education but new in their recent appointments at the recently restructured DOE—formerly the Board of Education—talk a lot these days about “governance.”

The word is DOE lingo for how administrators in the Downtown Manhattan Tweed building will manage the city’s schools after the expected June 2003 elimination of community school boards.

“In terms of governance,” Johnson said recently, “it’s a major issue, and the chancellor still has it on the table.  There will be a significant change.  What that will evolve into, I don’t know yet.

“We’re in a period of tremendous reflection, review.  It won’t look like the old system, but it will let associations and parents know what is going on.”

Belmonte also urged the community to reach out to her, as their representative, with their input on school governance.

“Good or bad,” Belmonte said, “the school boards have a presence.  We want to look at a model that would allow you a voice that will make a difference.  [We] want to take it to another level.”

Belmonte invited the community, at a recent meeting of the Wayanda Civic Association of Queens Village, to attend several upcoming meetings that would allow people to give their input.

The first was the DOE’s Dec. 5—rescheduled for Jan. 11 because of snowfall—“Children First” meeting at Thomas Edison High School, in which Klein, Johnson and Belmonte are scheduled to discuss where local schools are today, and where they should go in the future.

“If you’ve never seen how the Panel operates and what’s going on,” Belmonte said, “it would behoove you to come.  Please participate in the system as fully as you can, whether you have children in it or not.”

Members of the community are being asked to come to the meeting, according to the DOE, with answers to the following questions in mind:

• What works best in your school?  Why?

• What are your local school’s most pressing problem?

• What is the area(s) that you would like to see addressed in your local school?

• Can you think of any possible partnerships between parents, the school and the local community in your area that would strengthen your school?

• What can we do together to create genuine reform?

Belmonte’s panel also solicits responses to these and other questions about schools through forms at the DOE website, at www.nycenet.edu.

Belmonte also asked parents to participate in meetings held by the State legislature’s “Task Force on Community School District Governance Reform,” which is co-chaired by State Senator Steve Sanders and former Board of Education representative Terri Thompson.

“It was developed by the State legislature in order to examine the burning question of the possibility to replace the community school boards,” Belmonte said.  A meeting of the task force in Queens was scheduled for Dec. 12 at Borough Hall.

“It’ll be like a council hearing,” Belmonte said before the meeting.  “Basically they’re there to hear different suggestions on what kind of direction the school boards are going into.”

Belmonte said that while she doesn’t have a formal working space at the Department of Education yet, she does have a space at Borough Hall given to her by President Helen Marshall, who assigned Belmonte to her “Task Force for Parent Involvement.”

Department of Education Queens Community representative Evita Belmonte. PRESS Photo By Ira Cohen

“What the borough president has done to help me with this monumental task [of representing the entire borough] is set up a space for me at Borough Hall with a desk and a phone,” Belmonte said.  “We have committees and members submit proposals for whatever they want to do research on.”

Belmonte said that she holds monthly meetings that are open to members of the community, and that anyone who wants to attend can call her at 286-2625.

Belmonte added that parents and members of the community should take an active role in their local schools, whether they’re talking about governance or not, and that parents shouldn’t be afraid to be close to their kids in their academic lives.

“They want us to be in their lives,” Belmonte said.  “They’re comfortable with us.  They need to know who we are.  And we need to know who they are.”

“With the chancellor’s initiative of Children First,” Belmonte added, “I’m asking… community members to keep that heart alive.”  

Belmonte talked about her own involvement in schools as an example, telling the story of when her daughter was accosted as a student at I.S. 231. 

Belmonte said she went to a PTA meeting and challenged the principal in front of everyone, after which other parents told her she should—and she eventually did—become PTA president.

“Please work with us as we work to charge this entire borough,” Belmonte said at a recent meeting with Queens Village residents.

Belmonte, much newer to the community than Johnson as a district-wide—and in her case borough-wide—school official, is using her increasingly public schedule to introduce herself and explain what her role is at the DOE.

“What I’m trying to do is be on top of the different things that are going on in the community,” Belmonte said about a job that asks her to represent two million people with a staff of zero.  “As I go through the borough, there are different kinds of needs I’m finding.

“I can’t be everywhere at once, but I’m making some headway.  It’s overwhelming.  I’m honored and I’m humbled, and because of the nature of the task, I try to maintain that.”

Johnson, who succeeded Miller as an interim superintendent two years ago and was formally appointed by Klein in August, talks as much about governance as he does about the need for the community and the media to stop focusing on “politics” and start talking about education.

“We have not been able to have a real discussion about the education in our schools,” Johnson said. “We really need to.”

“I know there are ways in which we can do better,” Johnson added, noting technology and discipline as areas that need improvement.  “We’re not there.  We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

Johnson also said he’s looking for “direct communication from the people in the community,” since “as soon as we get feedback, we can move very quickly.”  He also said that he’s looking for adult mentors, particularly those who can come in to the schools and help the districts’ middle school students.

“Many parents in our community are working long hours and don’t have the time to spend with their children,” Johnson said.

Johnson said that one of the bigger problems in the district is how hard it can be to get records for its many students with counselors acting as surrogate parents, and that he was surprised to find out how many there are.

“I’m from Brooklyn and I was stunned to come out to Queens and see the number,” Johnson said.

“Of course you know,” Johnson added, “we’re obligated by law to take every child who comes through the door.  “Often times, many kids who come into the system with problems at home and other difficulties require a lot of resources in the system.”

Useful School Numbers
Community School District 29
One Cross Island Plaza
Rosedale, NY 11422
Phone: 718-978-5900  
Fax: 718-276-2066
On the web: http://www.nycenet.edu/dist_sch/dist/default.asp?Dist=29  

The Department of Education’s (DOE) Queens community representative is Evita Belmonte.

Her office is located at:
Queens Borough Hall
120-55 Queens Boulevard
Kew Gardens, NY 11424.
For more information, call 286-2625.