NYC Parents' Group Sides With NAACP in Charter School Fight, Plans Own Lawsuit

Hundreds of parents, students and education activists gathered yesterday afternoon to voice their discontent with the school closings and charter school co-locations running rampant throughout the city.

At a rally in front of the Department of Education (DOE) headquarters, the NYC Parents Union not only voiced their support for the NAACP lawsuit against the DOE, but also announced plans to file a separate lawsuit, claiming the DOE's policy of closing low-performing and co-locating charter schools in district space is illegal. 

According to Arthur Schwartz of Advocates for Justice, who spoke at the event and will be spearheading the legal efforts, the lawsuit would effectively stop all school closure and co-locations from moving forward, although it is not clear when the lawsuit will be filed.

"These are real lives, real children and real education that is being disrupted," said Schwartz. "We will be collecting affidavits and parents will be in the courtroom so that they may have an opportunity to have their voices heard."

The lawsuit will also take opposition against charter school locations not being charged market rent for space in district school buildings, and seek to reverse the charter school co-locations. 

This comes on the heels of the recent lawsuit filed by the NAACP against the DOE to hold them responsible for noncompliance with a previous court order, which included developing and executing improvement plans for low-performance schools, as well as engaging with parents prior to any schools being shut down.

According to Muba Yarofulani, Vice-President of the NYC Parents Union, the DOE has co-located more than 75 charter schools in public school locations.

"There is no greater inditement of the enduring failures of this administration than the extensive waiting lists at these charter schools," said Yarofulani. "It is a damning failure. High school graduation rates have not improved, and only 25 percent of our students will graduate college ready."

The rally also included testimonies from students at schools directly affected by the co-locations and budget cuts from the DOE.

"Morale is low amongst students because student-teacher relationships are broken when teachers are phased out due to budget cuts," said Nigel Hills, a senior at Paul Robeson High School. "If the DOE sees their current approach is not working, why not try a different one?"