Last week, in a striking decision, a five-judge panel of the Appellate Division, Third Department, ruled unanimously that the plaintiffs in each of eight small-city New York school districts (Jamestown, Kingston, Mount Vernon, Newburgh, Niagara Falls, Port Jervis, Poughkeepsie and Utica) had proved they were being denied the opportunity for a sound basic education guaranteed by Article XI of the New York State Constitution.

This decision in the case of Maisto v. State of New York again criticized the trial court judge, Albany County Supreme Court Judge Kimberley O’Connor, for misreading the applicable legal requirements.

This was the third time the case, originally filed in 2009, had been appealed to the Appellate Division. Rather than sending it back to the trial court once again, the court decided this time to undertake a rare “de novo” review and study the 5,000-page trial transcripts and 30 boxes of exhibits themselves and issue a final ruling, without any further input from the trial judge.

In its 52-page decision, the Appeals Court emphasized the needs of the “at-risk” student populations in these districts. The plaintiffs had presented extensive evidence that many of the districts lacked adequate academic intervention services (AIS) for students struggling academically, language services for students learning English, as well as social workers and guidance counselors. Emphasizing the importance of these resources, the court wrote:

Although we agree with [the trial court] that the educational system cannot be charged with resolving all of society’s problems, we believe that the services and programming in question are foundational, and the level provided was insufficient to meet student need.

In addition, the court criticized Justice O’Connor for her wholesale rejection of the testimony of plaintiffs’ expert witnesses and for failing to accept one of the experts’ findings regarding the importance of small class sizes, especially considering the Court of Appeals’ precedent on this point in the Campaign for Fiscal Equity (CFE) v. State case.

The court also expounded upon, and applied to this case, legal principles established by the Court of Appeals, New York’s highest court, in its three major decisions issued more than 15 years ago in the CFE litigation:

The Education Article requires defendant to offer “all children” the opportunity for a sound basic education … including those who “present with socioeconomic deficits” (Campaign for Fiscal Equity v. State of New York, 100 NY 2d at 915). … As explained by multiple qualified witnesses, providing at-risk students with a meaningful high school education … necessarily requires two general categories of resources: (1) a student and family support team comprised of adequate numbers of social workers, guidance counselors and parent and community liaisons; and (2) early, intensive academic interventions and extended learning opportunities. As noted by the Court of Appeals in CFE II, “all children can learn given appropriate instructional, social, and health services” …. [A]dequate AIS programming, language services and support personnel are relevant factors to consider when assessing the inputs portion of such a claim.

The panel of judges also noted, “Proof that a school district or its board of education has mismanaged its district is not defense to an otherwise established Education Article claim, as school districts are agents of [the State] (see [CFE II] at 922).”

After reviewing all the facts concerning services provided to students in each of the eight small-city school districts, the court held that the State had violated the constitutional rights of students in every one of these districts. The Appellate Division did not determine a remedy for these extensive constitutional violations; instead, it remitted the case to the trial court for further proceedings to determine an appropriate remedy.

The State has not yet indicated whether it will appeal this decision to the Court of Appeals. Nor is it clear what impact the state legislature’s recent commitment to fully fund foundation aid over the next few years will have on the remedy.

History of the Maisto Litigation

In 2009, a number of small-city New York school districts filed an adequacy challenge to the state’s education funding system. After seven years of procedural wrangling, a trial was held in the spring of 2016. In September 2016, the trial judge, Kimberley O’Connor, issued a decision that rejected plaintiffs’ claims and dismissed the case.

The judge essentially ignored all the evidence of inadequate educational inputs and below-par educational outcomes presented by the plaintiffs during the months-long trial; instead, she ruled that as a matter of law the State need not provide the level of aid its own foundation aid formula had determined to be necessary to provide students the opportunity for a sound basic education.

Although she agreed the performance of the students in the plaintiffs’ districts was “not acceptable,” Justice O’Connor determined that the remedial action required is “not in the form of a specific dollar amount, but is instead a blend of funding, oversight, and proper allocation of resources by the districts.” She also held that detailed analysis of the causal link between insufficient resource inputs and unacceptable student performance outputs, of the type the Court of Appeals had undertaken in 2003 in CFE v. State of New York when it upheld the plaintiffs’ claims of inadequate funding for students in New York City, was no longer necessary because we are now “in the post-CFE environment.”

Plaintiffs appealed Justice O’Connor’s decision to the Appellate Division, Third Department. The appeals court unanimously decided in October 2017 to reverse the decision and send the case back to the trial court to issue specific findings on whether the plaintiffs had presented sufficient evidence that inadequate resources are a direct cause of the poor educational outcomes of students in those districts.

The Appellate Division strongly rejected the notion that there is a “post-CFE environment,” and the indication the Court of Appeals’ approach to analyzing constitutional deficiencies in CFE applied only to that case. Noting that the Court of Appeals had recently reaffirmed the continued relevance of the CFE precedent for current litigations in its 2017 decision in Aristy-Farer/NYSER v. State, the court held that Justice O’Connor must review all the evidence the parties had presented and provide specific findings of fact for each of the eight school districts regarding the needs of their respective students.

In January 2019, Justice O’Connor issued a 113-page opinion that again concluded plaintiffs had failed to meet their burden of proof and the case should be dismissed.

In this decision, the court acknowledged that the educational outputs in all eight districts are “undeniably inadequate” and concentrated on the question of whether resource inputs were inadequate and, therefore, caused the unacceptable outcomes. It systematically examined issues of class size, teacher qualifications, facilities, instrumentalities of learning, and supplemental services for “at-risk” students in each of the districts.

Despite the fact that the plaintiffs established that, in every one of the eight districts, many “at-risk” students were not receiving the full extent of supplemental academic intervention services required by state law, Justice O’Connor held that full compliance was “aspirational” and not a constitutional requirement.

She then concluded that resources were adequate in all of these areas in all of the districts and that the basic cause of the inadequate outcomes was “ineffective leadership” and failures to “reevaluate … operations and allocation of resources.”

The plaintiffs again appealed this decision to the Appellate Division, which, in May 2021, issued its decision reversing Justice O’Connor’s findings.

Note: The Center for Educational Equity, Teachers College, Columbia University, submitted an amicus brief in support of the plaintiff’s decision.

By: Michael A. Rebell

The New York State Legislature did something extraordinary for schoolchildren last week: It committed to increasing state education aid by $4.2 billion over the next three years to honor the pledge the state made in 2007 to fully fund the Foundation Aid formula enacted in response to the Campaign for Fiscal Equity (CFE) litigation, which I helped lead.

This is potentially historic. Together with billions in federal stimulus aid the schools will be receiving during this period, the new resources should put schools in a position to deal with the profound learning loss, emotional trauma and other setbacks students have suffered during the pandemic. These funds also should position New York City and other high-need school districts to allocate sufficient resources to offer the hundreds of thousands of students with special needs the counseling, bilingual education, special education, tutoring and other supports they are entitled to under state law but have been denied because of funding shortfalls. Moreover, these funds should allow the state to close resource gaps so students in lower-wealth school districts can benefit from class sizes, educator expertise, curricular offerings, enrichment activities and technology that approach what their peers in affluent districts receive.

As co-counsel for the plaintiffs in the CFE case, I am delighted that the state government has renewed the commitment it made so many years ago, and the long-overdue payoff has begun. But I am also plagued by a sense of déjà vu.

In 2007, the Legislature committed to phasing in, over a four-year period, the full $7 billion increase called for by the Foundation Aid formula. That formula was based on a needs-based calculation the state Education Department did in 2006 to determine the number of dollars required to provide all students the opportunity for a sound basic education — which is their right under the state Constitution as determined by the Court of Appeals, New York’s highest court, in CFE.

The state government kept its promise to its schoolchildren for only the first two years. Then the 2008 recession hit; in its wake, the state first postponed further increases, and then, when the federal stimulus aid of that era ran out, New York State cut school aid substantially. We’ve been playing catch-up to try to close resource gaps ever since. That’s why, at the present time, with inflation and other adjustments, approximately $4 billion is still owed to New York’s schoolchildren under the Foundation Aid formula.

I hope the state will keep its newly renewed commitment to fully fund Foundation Aid over the next three years. The first installment of the three-year commitment has now been appropriated, and it will be paid. But I worry about the installments due in years two and three. Actual budgetary appropriations are made on an annual basis. I believe the members of the Assembly and Senate made this three-year commitment in good faith and intend to honor it. But political winds can shift rapidly. As Yogi Berra said, “It ain’t over ‘til it’s over.”

As it happens, Attorney General Tish James can quickly end worries that students will be again shortchanged. The state’s past failure to fully fund Foundation Aid led students, parents and many city and state education and advocacy groups several years ago to initiate a new lawsuit for fair school funding, New Yorkers for Students’ Educational Rights (NYSER) vs. State of New York. That case is now awaiting trial in the state Supreme Court. The attorney general, as counsel for the defendants, should settle the case by agreeing to include the state’s three-year commitment to fully fund Foundation Aid in a court-ordered stipulation. That way, the funding will be guaranteed.

A court settlement should also include another key provision: mechanisms for permanently ensuring on a current basis the funding levels needed to provide all students their right to the opportunity for a sound basic education. The cost study the state Education Department undertook to develop the current Foundation Aid formula is now 15 years old. A lot has happened in the past 15 years: major demographic shifts, a reckoning with structural racism, new state mandates, new technologies and new concepts for promoting cost-effective use of educational funds. The state should now undertake a new cost study in a fair, objective and transparent manner to identify student needs and resource requirements in the post-pandemic era. A mechanism for assuring that such cost studies will be done periodically in the future should also be included in a court-ordered stipulation.

We’re on the cusp of education equity in New York. But we’re not there yet. To quote Yogi Berra one last time, we’re at a fork in the road; the attorney general needs to take it.

Rebell, a professor at Teachers College, Columbia University, is the Executive Director of The Center for Educational Equity, was co-counsel for plaintiffs in CFE and is currently co-counsel for plaintiffs in the NYSER case.

This op-ed was originally published by the Daily News on April 13, 2021.

Click here to be redirected to the original article.

We’ve compiled state and federal information to answer your questions about the New York education budget.

STATE FUNDING ISSUES

This year, New York State’s budget situation and budget negotiations have been complicated (but also made much easier) by the large infusion of federal aid that will be coming to the State as a result of the most recent relief bill. If you are unfamiliar with the budget process for New York State, here is a quick breakdown of how it typically goes:

1. The governor releases the proposed executive budget in January.
2. Shortly after that executive budget is released, the New York State Senate and Assembly hold joint public hearings throughout the end of January and the month of February. 
3. By mid-March, each house of the Legislature releases a response to the executive budget with a proposed counter-budget.  

How do the state senate and assembly education budget proposals compare?

Back in January, we criticized Gov. Cuomo’s executive budget proposal for its severe austerity measures and his plan to supplant state education funding with federal dollars – federal dollars that were intended for COVID-19 relief. With the passing of the fed’s American Rescue Plan Act (ARP Act), the Governor can no longer make a case for his previously proposed cuts to New York’s education sector. 

FEDERAL AID ISSUES

According to the U.S. Dept. of Education, the ARP Act provides the State of New York with $8.9 billion to help schools reopen. Allocations to states are in exact proportion to Title 1 funding that states receive under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. New York City, the State’s biggest school district, is expected to receive roughly half of the ARP Act funds coming to New York at $4.5 billion. 

Thanks to the influx of federal funds, there is no longer any reason to entertain the Governor’s proposed cuts to education funding. Indeed, the State Legislature has proposed deeper investment in the education system. Perhaps most notably, both the State Senate and the Assembly have proposed to fully phase in Foundation Aid over the next 3 years. Additionally, both houses have proposed restoring the $1.35 billion in cuts to state aid in the 2020-2021 budget and using federal relief funds to supplement (rather than supplant) state aid.

The main question now is what should we do with billions of dollars in supplementary funding? Reema Amin, of Chalkbeat, reported that several education advocates and stakeholders have big ideas for the relief dollars going to New York State and New York City. The United Federal of Teachers wants $1 billion to fund teams at each school that would provide academic intervention for students and assist with mental health needs. They also call for a pilot program that would reduce class size at 100 high-need schools and result in the hiring of 1,500 more teachers. The Alliance for Quality Education is calling for investment in socio-emotional learning and smaller class sizes. They also want a public-facing spending tracker that would provide clarity on how the state government is spending its funds. Education Trust-NY has called for investment in mental health through restorative summer programming that includes both academic and cultural enrichment for students. They have asked that NYC find out how many families want their children back in school buildings and proposed that the City offer Saturday enrichment programs. Class Size Matters and NYC Kids PAC want NYC to use funds to reduce class size and achieve a social worker to student ratio of 1:250. They ask that NYC hire 10,000 new teachers.

Based on the spending requirements established by the ARP Act, it does seem like any of these ideas are possible. Here’s a breakdown of the fed’s guidelines for using relief funds.

State Education Department Requirements:

• Subgrant at least 90% to school districts. 
• Allocate funds to local education agencies within 60 days of receiving funds.
• Set-aside at least 5% for addressing learning loss.
• Set-aside at least 1% for summer enrichment programs.
• Set aside at least 1% for afterschool programs.
• States may reserve, at most, 0.5% for administrative costs and the remainder for any emergency needs related to the pandemic.
• Return any unspent funds to the Secretary of Education within 1 year of receipt.

Local Education Agency (LEA) Requirements:

• Publish plan to reopen schools for in-person instruction within 30 days.
• Use at least 20% to address learning loss
• The remaining funds may be used for any activity that school districts would typically be able to fund with their budgets (a full list of activities are listed at the end of this post).

This is good news for LEAs. The requirements for spending relief funds are vague enough that school districts can take this opportunity to make great improvements to their schools so long as it addresses learning loss. This means that in addition to addressing mental health needs and academic disparities, districts can also invest in addressing the civic learning loss that has resulted from the pandemic. 

List of eligible activities that LEAs can use relief funds for: ^[2]

“(A) Any activity authorized by the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. 

(B) Any activity authorized by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. 

(C) Any activity authorized by the Adult Education and Family Literacy Act. 

(D) Any activity authorized by the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act of 2006. 

(E) Coordination of preparedness and response efforts of local educational agencies with State, local, Tribal, and territorial public health departments, and other relevant agencies, to improve coordinated responses among such entities to prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus. 

(F) Activities to address the unique needs of low-income children or students, children with disabilities, English learners, racial and ethnic minorities, students experiencing homelessness, and foster care youth, including how outreach and service delivery will meet the needs of each population. 

(G) Developing and implementing procedures and systems to improve the preparedness and response efforts of local educational agencies. 

(H) Training and professional development for staff of the local educational agency on sanitation and minimizing the spread of infectious diseases. 

(I) Purchasing supplies to sanitize and clean the facilities of a local educational agency, including buildings operated by such agency. 

(J) Planning for, coordinating, and implementing activities during long-term closures, including providing meals to eligible students, providing technology for online learning to all students, providing guidance for carrying out requirements under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and ensuring other educational services can continue to be provided consistent with all Federal, State, and local requirements. 

(K) Purchasing educational technology (including hardware, software, and connectivity) for students who are served by the local educational agency that aids in regular and substantive educational interaction between students and their classroom instructors, including low-income students and children with disabilities, which may include assistive technology or adaptive equipment. 

(L) Providing mental health services and supports, including through the implementation of evidence-based full-service community schools. 

(M) Planning and implementing activities related to summer learning and supplemental afterschool programs, including providing classroom instruction or online learning during the summer months and addressing the needs of low-income students, children with disabilities, English learners, migrant students, students experiencing homelessness, and children in foster care. 

(N) Addressing learning loss among students, including low-income students, children with disabilities, English learners, racial and ethnic minorities, students experiencing homelessness, and children and youth in foster care, of the local educational agency, including by—(i) administering and using high-quality assessments that are valid and reliable, to accurately assess students’ academic progress and assist educators in meeting students’ academic needs, including through differentiating instruction; (ii) implementing evidence-based activities to meet the comprehensive needs of students; (iii) providing information and assistance to parents and families on how they can effectively support students, including in a distance learning environment; and (iv) tracking student attendance and improving student engagement in distance education.

(O) School facility repairs and improvements to enable operation of schools to reduce risk of virus transmission and exposure to environmental health hazards, and to support student health needs. 

(P) Inspection, testing, maintenance, repair, replacement, and upgrade projects to improve the indoor air quality in school facilities, including mechanical and non-mechanical heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems, filtering, purification and other air cleaning, fans, control systems, and window and door repair and replacement. 

(Q) Developing strategies and implementing public health protocols including, to the greatest extent practicable, policies in line with guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for the reopening and operation of school facilities to effectively maintain the health and safety of students, educators, and other staff. 

(R) Other activities that are necessary to maintain the operation of and continuity of services in local educational agencies and continuing to employ existing staff of the local educational agency.”

^[1] LEAs may address learning loss through “implementation of evidence-based interventions, such as summer learning or summer enrichment, extended day, comprehensive afterschool programs, or extended school year programs, and ensure that such interventions respond to students’ academic, social, and emotional needs and address the disproportionate impact of the coronavirus on the student subgroups described in section 1111(b)(2)(B)(xi) of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 6311(b)(2)(B)(xi)), students experiencing homelessness, and children and youth in foster care…”

^[2] Extracted from ARP Act: https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/1319/text#toc-HC9CE46A721204EB081A88ACD8FB287D5

Last week, Governor Cuomo released his proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year. As expected, the governor’s budget promises austerity measures in response to the fiscal crisis that has resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic. It also details how the governor plans to use federal funds that New York State has received to provide school districts with financial relief. Based on the proposal, New York’s schools will not be receiving the full $4.3 billion in COVID-19 relief funds that Congress recently authorized; the governor’s budget siphons off a substantial portion of these funds, approximately $2 billion, to offset reductions in state aid to the educator sector.  

Rather than target the federal relief funds strictly to the unexpected COVID-19 expenses that schools incurred in 2020 (i.e., increased technology demands, teacher training, online platform purchases, etc.), the governor suggests that the state will only reimburse districts for the cost of transporting learning materials and food to students. While the proposal accounts for technology demands by acknowledging the continued allocation of funds from the Smart Schools Bond Act, this act was approved by voters in 2014, long before the global pandemic. Therefore, its appropriations are not aligned with current district needs and technology expenditures.

The governor’s proposal touts that it will maintain funding levels for certain key elements of the state’s education budget, but it ignores that public school districts, and high-need districts in particular, have been historically underfunded and continue to suffer from inequitable funding practices. Since the pandemic hit New York, high-poverty districts saw a drop in their funding but affluent districts had roughly the same amount as they would expect without a fiscal crisis. Even with the $2 billion in federal aid to replace reductions in state aid, under the governor’s proposal, the amounts received by school districts will not be sufficient to meet inflationary cost increases and pressing student needs resulting from the COVID-19 crisis like major learning gaps and mental health supports. Moreover, the state has yet to make good on the $3.5 billion still owed to the state’s schools as a result of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit. Indeed, the failure to fully fund the state’s Foundation Aid Formula has led to another lawsuit. 

The governor also would reduce, by almost $400 million, the so-called “formula-based aids” such as transportation and BOCES aid. He would convert the funding for these services, which now are reimbursed on the basis of actual costs incurred each year by school districts, into a new block grant category that presumably will be based on annual budget allocations (and potential cuts) rather than actual annual costs.

Hidden in the governor’s proposed budget are additional cuts for the state’s, and the nation’s, largest school district, New York City. For example, the proposal would eliminate reimbursement to New York City for the cost of charter school rental assistance. This means that the city would be on the hook for the full amounts of the rental costs that charters pay to operate in private facilities. Since most charter schools (including those of large charter networks like KIPP, Achievement First, and Success Academy) are authorized at the state level by the SUNY Charter Institute, this move would be an imposition on the independence of NYC’s public system and its theory of public education. The city would be forced either to help charters move from private spaces to co-locate in public school buildings–an often controversial and contested move–or face greater fiscal demands on its budget than previously expected. In other words, the state, which has authorized the fifth most charters in the country in spite of opposition of many New York City parents to large charter networks, is forcing New York City taxpayers to foot the bill for its decisions.

These cuts and austerity measures needn’t be so severe. New York is often cited as one of the wealthiest places on earth because it houses so many millionaires and billionaires; this means a progressive tax system could greatly improve the economic welfare of the state. In recognition of this fact, Governor Cuomo has proposed short-term marginal tax increases on the richest New Yorkers in the form of a surcharge, but he could do so much more. The proposed budget calls for a 2% increase on taxable incomes over $5 million in order to raise $1.5 billion–below the budget reduction that the education sector would be facing and coming nowhere close to the total budget deficit faced by the state. This raises the question of why the governor would take such a small step toward balancing the books. It seems that the primary reason is the myth of millionaire tax flight.  

Cuomo and many fiscal conservatives have argued that wealthy people are highly mobile and would simply pack their bags and flee New York to a lower tax state if there were ever any tax hikes on their wealth. However, there is little evidence to support this notion. Data analysis from Dr. Cristobal Young of Cornell University suggests just the opposite. It turns out very few U.S. millionaires migrate to different states for lower tax rates. Indeed, millionaire taxes are actually taxes on what Dr. Young calls the “late career embedded elite.” Put simply, most of New York’s wealthy elite are people who benefit from and enjoy the business and cultural advantages that New York offers and therefore are highly unlikely to leave where they live and work as a result of tax increases.  

The governor’s proposal will now be considered by the state legislature, which must enact a final budget for the next fiscal year by April 1. 

An extensive study of collective impact, community schools, and other comprehensive educational opportunity initiatives in eight cities concludes they are a calming force and “show promise.”

For the past four years, CEE Executive Director Michael A. Rebell and Policy and Research Director Jessica R. Wolff, together with two faculty colleagues at Teachers College, Carolyn J. Riehl and Jeffery R. Henig, have been working on a major study of broad, multi-sector collaborations for education that can involve government, schools, business, universities, foundations and nonprofits. The final report of this important project, which was supported by The Wallace Foundation, has now been released.

• • • • • Read the Building Impact full report here.

In addition to the full report, the authors have prepared an executive summary and a longer overview of the study and discussion of key findings.

While collaborations of this kind have existed for more than 100 years, collective impact has in recent years attracted attention nationwide as communities try to tackle problems that are too complex for any one institution to solve on its own. Despite the growing interest, however, there has been little research on contemporary forms of cross-sector collaboration.

Although they face a number of challenges, “current collaborations show promise for creating a new kind of venue to bring local partners together who often have not cooperated in the past and have even been in conflict,” the authors say. “Importantly, most of the collaborations we studied seem to have helped calm often-contentious urban education politics and establish enough stability for partners to move forward.”

The report is the third and final in a series, presenting findings from comparative case studies of eight such initiatives across the country. Between 2015 and 2017, researchers took an in-depth look at three collaborations—All Hands Raised in Multnomah County, OR; Milwaukee Succeeds; and Say Yes Buffalo—and a more limited look at five others (Alignment Nashville, Chatham-Savannah Youth Futures Authority, Northside Achievement Zone in Minneapolis, Oakland Community Schools, and Providence Children and Youth Cabinet). They visited each city one or more times to observe meetings and other activities and interview participants and stakeholders.

The report takes a comprehensive look at the components of collective impact, from funding to data use to strategic relationships. Among the many findings are the following:

• Collaborations need a credible and compelling rationale, as well as committed advocates, to get started.
• Collaborations can serve as venues for advocating for and developing a “cradle-to-career” vision of education, even when the resources to carry out that vision aren’t fully in place.
• Most of the studied collaborations assigned leadership responsibilities to local elites and used a variety of venues to keep community members informed and engaged.
• Supporting a “backbone” organization to coordinate among the various players is a primary expense of collaboration.
• Collaborations seem to be helped, not hindered, by efforts to gather and use data, despite a range of obstacles, including privacy concerns and uncertainty about which metrics to use.
• Affiliation with national networks gives collaborations access to strategic ideas, program guidelines, technical support, and some funding opportunities.
• Some collaborations take a “colorblind” approach, directing resources to students who need them without explicitly focusing on specific groups; others directly take on racial inequality and class disparities.

The Center for Educational Equity was an early leader of work on cross-sector collaborations to provide comprehensive educational opportunity; our writing and teaching in this area began over ten years ago. Some of our contributions including history, theory, and legal research, can be found here.

There’s nothing funny about the violation of children’s educational rights, especially when those rights relate to students’ preparation to participate in and help shape our democracy as active and effective civic participants.

That said, we think you’ll both laugh at and learn from this brand-new The Daily Show with Trevor Noah episode featuring Cook v. Raimondo, the federal lawsuit filed by Center for Educational Equity executive director Michael Rebell last fall.

The Daily Show correspondent/comedian Jaboukie Young-White sat down with Michael Rebell as well as high school students Aleita Cook and Musah Mohammed Sesay, two of the lead plaintiffs who are standing up for all students whose civic-education rights have been violated.

CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE CLIP!

Summary of Cook v. Raimondo

In addition to this national legal effort, the Center for Educational Equity is leading a number of state-level initiatives focused on policy development, research, and public engagement to advance students’ educational rights.

Cook v. Raimondo was filed in the U.S. District Court in Providence, Rhode Island, to confirm the constitutional right of all public school students to a civic education that prepares them adequately to vote, exercise free speech, petition the government, actively engage in civic life, and exercise all of their constitutional rights under the 14th Amendment, and under Article 4, Section 4, of the U.S. Constitution. Oral argument on plaintiffs’ and defendants’ recent motions is expected to take place this summer, before the Honorable William E. Smith, Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for Rhode Island, and a decision is expected to be rendered in the fall.

CLICK HERE FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THE LAWSUIT

The legal history of educational equity in New York State, from the Campaign for Fiscal Equity (CFE) case to current legal efforts to compel the state government to honor students’ rights, has never been told–until now.

On June 12th, Center for Educational Equity (CEE) executive director Michael Rebell testified before the New York State Advisory Committee of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, which is preparing to issue a report on equity and funding in New York. As lead counsel in the CFE lawsuit and–in his independent, pro bono capacity–as co-counsel for the families and organizations who in 2014 filed the follow-up suit, New Yorkers for Students’ Educational Rights (NYSER), Rebell is exceptionally qualified to tell that story. And although CEE, as a part of Teachers College, is not participating in the NYSER lawsuit, the core aims of that endeavor align with our vision of educational equity and justice, and we believe that all education stakeholders should be aware of it.

The CFE case began in 1993, 26 years ago, and yet, today, as both research and the lived experiences of families affected by educational-rights violations show, students throughout our state, particularly those living in poverty and those who are Black or Brown, are still not receiving even the basic learning opportunities to which they are entitled.

Needless to say, that has major implications, not only for the young people themselves but for the kind of society we live in and whether we will one day live up to our stated values of liberty, equality, and justice for all. But, as they say, in order to get where we’re going, we have to know where we’ve been.

CLICK HERE to read “A History of New York State’s Failure to Meet Constitutional Requirements for Providing All Students the Opportunity for a Sound Basic Education.”