Episode Details

The public schools are the largest expense in NYC's budget ($17 billions in 2008) and have been the object of several “Great School Wars.” Most recently, in July 2002, Mayor Michael Bloomberg was given control of the NYC public schools by Albany. Joining Doug this week to discuss the positives, the problems, and the prospects of mayoral control of the public schools, Department of Education accountability, testing, parent involvement and more is Betsy Gotbaum, who as NYC Public Advocate has been exactly that - an advocate, who has questioned and evaluated DoE's efforts - from excessive testing to ineffective curricula to finance to evaluation.