New Queens Rep to PEP

Dear Friends:

Hope this email finds you well. I have some great and exciting news to share with all you. On April 15th, I was appointed by Helen Marshall to serve as a member of the Panel for Educational Policy, as the Queens representative that will serve 7 school districts throughout the borough.

The appointment comes as a great surprise, but unfortunately I will have to resign from the local level of school governance (CEC) for District 24 while I begin my new journey. My last official day (as a CEC member) will be April 29th and hope to see you during my last CEC meeting, which will be held at P.S. 49 in Middle Village.

In closing, I am honored to be appointed by Helen Marshall, our Queens Borough President and look forward to the challenges put before me while I serve and represent Queens on the Central School Board known as the Panel for Educational Policy for New York City's Department of Education. I am confident that my membership to this board combined with my prior four year local level experience as a Community Education Council Member will benefit the students of Queens as well as other children throughout the city.

Thank you for your time and if anybody should need to contact me in the future, please email my new contact - PEPofQueens@yahoo.com.

Dmytro Fedkowskyj

Panel for Educational Policy

Queens Member

TAG statement at PEP Nov meeting

Comparing like-to-like is nothing new – George W. Bush made his reputation as the “education governor” while Governor of Texas by doing this exact thing. And we all know how long ago that was…

We at TAGNYC question the validity of Regents scores when tests are scored by teachers ALONG WITH PRINCIPAL INPUT. I personally observed the principal of my school sitting in on Regents scoring last June. To be truly valid Regents would have to be scored outside the school. Oh, and my school received a “B”.

There is zero transparency regarding special education and ELL students. I spend much of my time dealing with persistent disruptive behaviors with no real support of any kind – just the usual “talk but no walk” - which has left the more motivated students demoralized, disenchanted and at this point in the term, completely disgusted. I cannot blame them. I come prepared to teach and I fight to maintain order – fighting apathy, disrespect, hostility, verbal and physical abuse. Real, constructive, and effective discipline consequences are non-existent. Yet my school got a “B”. The review team never spoke to ME, and I was THE sole, the only Dean last year.

We also question the concept of students being assessed on relative progress rather than true and critical command of subject material. This is not the same as teaching to the test. Real teaching has gone the way of the dodo bird. And by the way I am also an art teacher teaching music. My principal decided he did not have to give art this term even though we have students who need the art credit. And I do actually teach music. Good thing I have an early musical background. Our students are taught how and have bought into a culture of “playing the game” from the very first day of kindergarten to the day of their much-vaunted 70% rate of graduation.