New York Times, July 25, 2007

2 New Jersey School Districts Regain Some Local Control  By WINNIE HU

After more than a decade under state control, the Newark and Jersey City public schools have improved enough to be allowed to take back some of their fiscal and management operations as a first step toward regaining local control, state education officials said yesterday.

The state education commissioner, Lucille E. Davy, said she would immediately recommend that Newark be given control over such day-to-day operations as maintaining its buildings and addressing student conduct, health and safety issues, areas in which it showed the most improvement.

She said she would also recommend that Jersey City get control over its budget and that its elected school board, which currently serves in an advisory role, be allowed to take on more responsibilities.

Ms. Davy said that state control in those areas was no longer necessary because the districts had made steady improvements, and that the transition could take from a few weeks to a few months. The state will continue, however, to oversee academic instruction in both districts.

“The idea is not for the State of New Jersey to be operating or controlling school districts,” Ms. Davy said. “The idea is for us to get in when necessary, assist where necessary and then get back out of the district.”

The move to return some local control requires the approval of the New Jersey State Board of Education, whose 13 members are appointed by the governor and set the state’s education policies.

The Jersey City school system, which was taken over by the state in 1989, has 30,000 students and is currently run by a superintendent appointed by the state commissioner. The elected nine-member Board of Education serves in an advisory role.

The superintendent, Charles T. Epps Jr., said that the district had strengthened its financial controls, in part by using automated systems to reduce human error, expanding the accounting staff and working closely with auditors. In addition, he said, student test scores have steadily improved in recent years amid curriculum changes that include adding more reading time in classes.

“This is a historical event for us here in Jersey City,” Dr. Epps said. “You want to have control over your own district and your own destiny, so we’re very excited because we’ve worked hard to get where we are.”

The Newark Public Schools, the state’s largest school system with 43,000 students, has been under state control since 1995.

Joseph Del Grosso, president of the Newark Teachers Union, said that state control of the Newark schools had created an additional layer of bureaucracy that needlessly complicates decisions on teacher contracts and academic policies. But he said he supported a gradual transition back to local control to allow time to decide how the schools should be run.

“If you come out of a coma, you wouldn’t expect the person to get up and run a marathon,” he said. “The logical thing as we come out of the state takeover is to see if we can walk on our own first.”

David G. Sciarra, executive director of the Education Law Center, an advocacy group for poor students in New Jersey, said that the state takeovers of troubled school districts had not worked, and he questioned whether the state could provide enough assistance to improve academic performance.

“There are no surprises here,” he said. “We know there’s been progress in these districts, but it’s clearly a start and there’s a long way to go, and it’s taken a long time for the state to get to this point.”

In addition to Newark and Jersey City, the state also controls the Paterson district, which it took over in 1991. Ms. Davy said that her office was still evaluating progress there.

Shelley Skinner, a Jersey City parent who in the spring started an advocacy group for better schools, said she was disappointed by the news because she had not seen any improvement in the Jersey City schools. She said the district had squandered taxpayer money on administrative expenses without showing enough academic gains. “I think it’s incredibly irresponsible for the state to give fiscal management back to the district,” she said.