JULY 2015
What’s Wrong with Math and
Science in NYC High Schools
(And What to Do About It)
by
C lara H emphill , N icole M ader
and
B ruce C ory
And at one level, the school is a success; more
than two-thirds of its students graduate within four years, making Marie Curie a sturdy
exemplar of the small school movement that
has fueled a sharp increase in New York City’s
high school graduation rate since 2002.
But here’s the rub: Only a small proportion
of Marie Curie graduates go on to four-year
college programs in nursing. Marie Curie’s
graduates are more likely to become certified nursing assistants—a job which doesn’t
require a college education—than registered
nurses, according to teachers at the school.
The median pay for certified nurse assistants
is about $24,000 a year. For registered nurses,
the median pay is about $65,000, according to
the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The sad irony is that at a school named for
the only person ever to receive Nobel Prizes
in both physics and chemistry, few students
pass Regents exams in either of those subjects, and as a result, few are prepared for careers in science. Just 4 percent of Marie Curie
students graduated in 2014 with an Advanced
Regents diploma—awarded to students who
pass three college-prep math exams and two
college-prep science exams (along with two
history exams and one English exam). And just
20 percent of the school’s 2014 graduates had
test scores on basic algebra and English exams that were high enough to avoid remediation at CUNY. That means most Marie Curie
graduates must pay to take remedial classes if
they go to college—classes they should have
received for free in high school.
The Common Core State Standards are supposed to ensure that every student graduates
from high school prepared for college or a career. But an analysis of high school math and
science performance by the Center for New
York City Affairs shows just how far the city is
Graduation Trends Over Time, 2005−2014
Diploma
type:
Dropped
Out
Still
Enrolled
Local
Diploma
100%
Regents
Diploma
Advanced
Regents
Diploma
75%
Percent of students
W H AT ’ S W R O N G W I T H M AT H A N D S C I E N C E I N N YC H I G H S C H O O L S ( A N D W H AT T O D O A B O U T I T )
2
Founded in 2004, the Marie Curie
School for Medicine, Nursing and
Health Professions is a small Bronx
high school that attracts students
eager to become registered nurses. The atmosphere of the school
encourages those dreams; students
wear scrubs to class and teachers
wear lab coats.
50%
25%
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
Expected Graduation Year
2011
2012
2013
2014
from reaching that goal. While the graduation
rate has steadily increased over the past decade, the proportion of students receiving an
Advanced Regents diploma—one commonly
used measure of college readiness—has stagnated. In 2014, just 18 percent of students
starting New York City high schools four years
earlier earned Advanced Regents diplomas.
Number of High Schools Offering a College Prep
Curriculum (Algebra 2, Chemistry and Physics)
in the 2013−14 School Year
3
16
136
Number of collegeprep courses offered
None
One
Two
All three
W H AT ’ S W R O N G W I T H M AT H A N D S C I E N C E I N N YC H I G H S C H O O L S ( A N D W H AT T O D O A B O U T I T )
241
3
As new, more difficult exams aligned to the
Common Core are phased in, Advanced Regents diplomas may be even further out of
reach.1
Another finding of the Center’s analysis shows
just how daunting that challenge could be. Today, 39 percent of the city’s high schools do
not offer a standard college-prep curriculum
in math and science, that is, algebra 2, physics
and chemistry. More than half the schools do
not offer a single Advanced Placement course
in math and about half do not offer a single
Advanced Placement course in science. 2 For a
complete list of schools click here.
Roughly 21 percent of New York City high
school students attend schools that don’t
offer courses in both chemistry and physics.
Many of these are the new small high schools
that proliferated during the administration of
Mayor Michael Bloomberg. And even at Marie Curie and other small schools where both
chemistry and physics are taught, too many
students lack the grounding in math needed
to take or pass them.
Number of High Schools Offering an AP Math Curriculum
(Calculus AB or BC, Statistics and Computer Science)
in the 2013−14 School Year
16
36
Number of AP Math
courses offered
None
One
Two
112
All three
232
Number of High Schools Offering an AP Science Curriculum
(Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Environmental Science
and Psychology) in the 2013−14 School Year
20
11 4
36
Number of AP Science
courses offered
None
One
Two
215
Three
Four
110
Five
1. The Advanced Regents diploma is only one measure of college readiness. Notably, the NYC public high schools in
the New York Performance Standards Consortium, which are exempt from Regents exams, use portfolios and performance-based assessments to measure student achievement and some boast high graduation rates as well as college
readiness, attendance and retention.
2. Advanced Placement classes are only one indicator of academic rigor. Schools that follow an early college model—
such as Bard High School Early College and Queens School of Inquiry, as well as schools that have robust College Now
programs—may not offer official AP courses but do provide high-level courses for college credit.
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W H AT ’ S W R O N G W I T H M AT H A N D S C I E N C E I N N YC H I G H S C H O O L S ( A N D W H AT T O D O A B O U T I T )
50%
The result is an intense bifurcation of the city’s
public high school system–one that parents
frantic to get their children into top high schools
are acutely attuned to. Looking at statistics
from August 2014, the Center for New York
City Affairs found that 48 percent of the New
York City public high school students receiving
Advanced Regents diplomas are clustered in
just 25 schools. At 100 other schools, on the
other hand, not a single student received an
Advanced Regents diploma.
Like so much else in the city’s public schools,
this dramatic split reflects an equally sharp
racial divide. While white and Asian students
make up less than one-quarter of citywide
public high school enrollment, they constitute
roughly 70 percent of the students at the top
Diploma
type:
Dropped
Out
75%
8,691 students, 71% white or Asian
6,384 Advanced Regents diplomas (48% of city total)
Still
Enrolled
Local
Diploma
Regents
Diploma
100 schools
25 schools
(Three years of science is a graduation requirement in all city high schools. Students
at schools that don’t offer the full complement of college-prep sciences meet that requirement by taking one of these sciences,
usually biology—or as it’s known in New York
schools, “living environment”—and supplementing that with courses such as forensics
or general science.)
city high schools awarding Advanced Regents
degrees. At the 100 schools where no Advanced Regents diplomas were awarded, the
student body was 92 percent black and Hispanic. Many of these schools are among the
hundreds of small secondary schools the city
has opened in recent years.
How have the city’s public high schools painted themselves into such an unenviable corner?
Part of the explanation is the inadequate foundation laid in elementary and middle school for
taking college-prep science and math courses
in high school—a shortfall that the Common
Core curriculum is specifically designed to
overcome. And grappling with that shortfall
has been a key factor in both the undeniable
successes and the unintended shortcomings
of the Bloomberg administration’s school reform program.
Ending dysfunction, entrenching division:
What high school reform hath wrought
That Bloomberg and his first schools chancellor Joel Klein inherited a deeply dysfunctional
system of public high schools is beyond de-
Graduation Attainment at Each High School, August 2014
Advanced
Regents
Diploma
Click to enlarge
100%
25%
0%
8,571 students, 92% black or Hispanic 0 Advanced Regents diplomas
W H AT ’ S W R O N G W I T H M AT H A N D S C I E N C E I N N YC H I G H S C H O O L S ( A N D W H AT T O D O A B O U T I T )
5
bate. When they assumed office in 2002, by the
city’s calculations only about 51 percent of high
school students graduated within four years—a
graduation rate that had remained more or less
constant for at least a decade.3 There were, to
be sure, shining exceptions of excellent city
high schools, and there was also a nascent “under-the-radar” movement of small progressive
schools designed to help students at risk of failure. But many other high schools were mired in
cultures of long-term mediocrity.
high school, became mandatory; all 8th-graders were required to fill out applications listing
their preferences for high school.
In response, Bloomberg and Klein undertook a
wholesale overhaul of the city’s high schools.
It was a reform effort built on the assumption
that broader student choice and healthy competition among schools would weed out floundering schools, reward successful ones and improve the system overall.
The positive results were impressive. In December 2013, during his final weeks at City Hall,
Bloomberg released numbers showing that
since 2005 the four-year graduation rate had
climbed to 66 percent—an all-time high. (The
base year used for comparison was 2005, not
2002, because in 2005 the State Department
of Education changed the way that on-time
graduation rates are calculated. City officials
also used August rather than June graduation
numbers to define on-time graduation.) The
graduation rate of the city’s black public high
school students had jumped 52 percent during
those years; Hispanic students posted a 58
percent gain.4
During the Bloomberg years, large traditional
neighborhood schools, which in some cases
had enrollments of more than 3,000 students
and which were widely seen as poster children
of failure, were closed. Many were replaced
with six to eight smaller schools of roughly
400 students occupying the old school campuses, often one to each floor. By the end of
the Bloomberg years, the city, with support
from the Carnegie Corporation, Open Society
Institute, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
and other philanthropies, had opened more
than 650 new small schools, most of them high
schools. At the same time, school choice, once
an option for New York City students entering
Bloomberg and then-chancellor Dennis Walcott
presented evidence that the city’s new small
high schools were a key factor in this impressive
progress—and most outside experts agreed
that the new schools had significantly outperformed the neighborhood schools they had
replaced. Reporting by MDRC, the respected
education and social policy research organization, began in 2010 and found in August 2013,
for example, that new small schools continued
to “significantly raise graduation rates” in New
York City, demonstrating that “large-scale transformation is possible in an urban public school
system.”5 And the city’s on-time high school
graduation rate continued to inch up in 2014, to
3. “New York City Graduation Rates 2011 (2007 Cohort),” New York City Department of Education presentation, http://
www.nyc.gov/html/om/pdf/2012/2011_grad_deck_presentation.pdf.
4. “Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Walcott Announce New York City Students Achieved All-Time Record High School
Graduation Rates in 2012–2013 School Year,” City of New York press release, December 4, 2013, http://www1.nyc.gov/
office-of-the-mayor/news/387-13/mayor-bloomberg-chancellor-walcott-new-york-city-students-achieved-all-time-record#/0.
5. Howard S. Bloom, Saskia Levy Thompson and Rebecca Unterman, “Transforming the High School Experience: How
New York City’s New Small Schools Are Boosting Student Achievement and Graduation Rates,” MRDC, June 2010.
W H AT ’ S W R O N G W I T H M AT H A N D S C I E N C E I N N YC H I G H S C H O O L S ( A N D W H AT T O D O A B O U T I T )
68.4 percent (using the city’s methodology) or
4.2 percent (using the state’s).
6
For many black and Hispanic students, smaller
high schools have indeed been lifeboats rescuing them from the sinking Titanics of neighborhood high schools. With their smaller student
bodies and 28-student class size limits (down
from 34-student classes in their predecessor
neighborhood schools), greater individual attention was virtually guaranteed for struggling
students who might otherwise have become
lost in larger schools. The small schools also
tended to be safer and more student-friendly
than the behemoths they replaced. The result:
Literally tens of thousands of young people
who attended these schools and who otherwise might well have dropped out now have
high school diplomas.
Nevertheless, their lagging record in granting
Advanced Regents diplomas shows that the
new small schools also operate under severe
constraints. Many of their students, for example, arrive in 9th grade two, three or even four
years behind grade level. In these schools, remediation is the order of the day. In the arena
of science and math, the schools’ response has
been to focus resources on helping kids meet
the minimum required for earning a Regents
diploma: passing one Regents exam for math
(usually algebra), one for science (usually living
environment), as well as Regents tests in English
language arts, U.S. history and world history.
Some struggling high school students, of
course, are late-bloomers. They hit their stride
as freshmen, bring themselves up to grade level
and then are ready for more advanced coursework in their upper-class years. But while small
schools may help such students catch up, with
notable exceptions they’re also generally not
helping them advance to higher-level coursework—or even offering such classes.
The irony of unintended consequences
So while the city’s effort to replace large neighborhood schools with small high schools has
had many benefits, it has also had at least two
unforeseen downsides that deepen the divide
between schools that make students college
ready and those that don’t.
Today, 39 percent of the city’s
high schools do not offer a
standard college-prep curriculum
in math and science, that is,
algebra 2, chemistry and physics.
First, school choice, while designed to be liberating, has perversely instead tended to replace
one trap with another. In the bad old days when
neighborhood high schools were the norm,
where students lived largely determined the
quality of their education. Students were, as
Chancellor Klein and others pointed out, unfairly imprisoned by their zip codes. Now, however,
the city’s new high school system instead makes
most students captives of their 7th-grade transcripts and test scores, the measures used to
admit them to high school. There are exceptions—the schools that require students to
take an exam or audition for admission. But it’s
far more common for schools to use 7th-grade
transcripts. Some require students to have a 90
average in 7th grade—some 85, some 80, some
75—and some are open to all regardless of
their test scores. This creates a stratification of
schools based on student performance in middle school. The result is that lagging students
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W H AT ’ S W R O N G W I T H M AT H A N D S C I E N C E I N N YC H I G H S C H O O L S ( A N D W H AT T O D O A B O U T I T )
are tracked into schools where even spectacular academic improvement in the 9th or 10th
grades is nevertheless unlikely to lead to their
earning Advanced Regents diplomas.
The second irony of this new stratification is
that it is, in one respect, even more rigid than
the status quo ante that it replaced. Consider
the now virtually extinct large neighborhood
high schools of New York City. Perhaps only 1
percent of the 3,000-plus students at one of
them might have been prepared for advanced
math, chemistry or physics. Those 30 or so students, however, represented a critical mass
large enough to warrant offering such courses. So a late-blooming learner might well have
been able to land a seat in such a classroom. In
a high school of 400 kids, however, the comparable critical mass for creating advanced classes has to be much larger than just 1 percent of
the students before it makes sense to commit
the necessary time and effort. Sometimes, that
critical mass simply doesn’t exist.
The Department of Education policy limiting
transfers exacerbates the problem. Students
Average 8th-grade
math proficiency:
4.0 (well above
state standards)
may not transfer from one school to another
unless they can prove their health and safety
is in danger—usually with a police report documenting an assault. This means a late bloomer may not, for example, transfer from a small
school with a limited curriculum to a larger
school with a broad curriculum except in extraordinary circumstances.
The achievements of the small high schools
created in the city over the past 10 years are
incontestable. They have, as New York University researcher Leslie Siskin has written, done an
enormously useful job of “bringing the bottom
up.”6 But now the limitations and contradictions
of this reform effort have become increasingly
evident too. As the new Common Core Standards require ever-higher levels of achievement, high schools cannot bear the burden
alone of preparing students for college.
Indeed, an analysis by the Center for New York
City Affairs shows that for many students, the
die is cast before they arrive in 9th grade. At
high schools in which most students arrive
well-prepared, most graduate with skills that
Math College Readiness at Each High School, August 2014
3.5 (above
state standards)
3.0 (meets
state standards)
2.5 (below
state standards)
Click to enlarge
100%
75%
50%
25%
6. Leslie Santee Siskin, “Changing Contexts and the Challenge of High School Reform in New York City,” in Education
Reform in New York City, ed. Jennifer A. O’Day, Catherine S. Bitter and Louis M. Gomez (Cambridge: Harvard University
Press, 2011), 193.
W H AT ’ S W R O N G W I T H M AT H A N D S C I E N C E I N N YC H I G H S C H O O L S ( A N D W H AT T O D O A B O U T I T )
CUNY considers “college ready”—that is, scoring at least 480 on math SATs or at least 80 on
the Algebra 1 Regents. But the reverse is also
true: It’s very difficult for students to overcome
poor preparation in elementary and middle
schools. Most students who enter 9th grade
with weak math skills don’t catch up: If they go
to college, they must take remedial classes.
8
earlier than in most middle schools that begin
in 6th grade. Fifth-graders get two hours of
math instruction from a certified math teacher
every day; by the end of 8th grade, nearly all
are well-prepared for high school and many
take the algebra Regents exam that year.
Recommendations:
Building on what already works
On the positive side, some schools have developed strategies to beat the odds. The staff
of Insideschools, a project of the Center for
New York City Affairs, visited 180 elementary, middle and high schools from 2013 to 2015
and discovered many that were successful in
meeting the Common Core State Standards
for math while offering challenging courses
for science. (New York State has not yet adopted the Common Core for science). The
Department of Education should use these
schools as models and encourage others to
emulate their success.
Help teachers overcome their own math
phobia. Many elementary school teachers are
anxious about their own ability in math—and
pass on their anxiety to their pupils, particularly to girls. A number of elementary schools,
including PS 63-STAR Academy on the Lower
East Side, have helped teachers conquer their
fears by giving them time to re-learn math,
framed in a different way so they understand
the underlying concepts (See: Overcoming
Teachers’ Math Anxiety).
Hire math specialists in 5th grade. The original KIPP Academy Charter School in the Bronx
serves children in grades 5–8. Because this
middle school begins in 5th grade, children
get the benefit of having specialized teachers
Fewer than half of the city’s high schools offer Advanced
Placement science classes.
Invest in schools that serve grades 6–12.
The continuity of instruction at the Urban Assembly School for Applied Math and Science
in the Bronx helps students succeed through
seven years of middle school and high school.
Though many students start off with weak
skills in 6th grade, by the end of 8th grade
roughly half pass the Algebra Regents exam,
setting them up to take calculus before they
graduate from high school. The school sends
some graduates to highly selective colleges
like Cornell and Brown—a particularly impressive accomplishment given that the school
doesn’t screen students for ability and most
come from one of the poorest neighborhoods
in the country.
W H AT ’ S W R O N G W I T H M AT H A N D S C I E N C E I N N YC H I G H S C H O O L S ( A N D W H AT T O D O A B O U T I T )
9
Offer “conceptual” chemistry and physics
for high school students with weaker math
skills. Many students miss out on chemistry
and physics in high school because they don’t
have the math skills necessary to be successful
in courses that lead to Regents exams. Some
schools have developed courses, stripped of
higher-level math, that at least give students
an introduction to these subjects. At Quest to
Learn in Manhattan, for example, 10th-graders may take a conceptual chemistry class. If
they are successful and their math skills develop over the year, they may take Regents-level
chemistry the following year. If not, at least
they have had some exposure to chemistry.
minutes a day of math instruction—less time
than most elementary schools offer. Many of
the successful schools allowed significantly more time for teaching math. For example, at Park East High School in East Harlem,
9th-graders take two math classes, one in algebra and one called “math applications.”
Encourage small schools to share teachers
and resources. Small schools have many benefits, but they often don’t have the resources
to offer higher-level math and science classes
because just a few students would take them.
The Tortora-Sillcox Family Foundation is working with NMSI (National Math and Science Institute) on a program to create a number of
high-level STEM courses on the Erasmus Hall
Educational Campus in Brooklyn. All of the
building’s five schools will participate when
the program is launched in fall 2015, with
teachers from the various schools teaching
courses open to all. Putting Common Core to the test
A “conceptual” chemistry class offers students with weak
math skills an introduction to the subject.
Devote more time to math in middle and
high school. One big problem the Insideschools staff discovered is that the traditional
structure of the school day allows for just 42
The ultimate goal of the Common Core Standards is to “ensure that all students are ready
for success after high school.”7 Today, judging by the number of Advanced Regents diplomas awarded in New York City public high
schools, about 80 percent of students fail to
clear that bar, as measured by their preparation for college or for well-paying careers.
Many occupations are closed to students who
don’t take physics, chemistry and advanced
mathematics in high school. Dental hygienists need chemistry and people who install air
conditioning systems need physics, according
to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The woeful
lack of advanced math and science instruction
7. “What Parents Should Know,” Common Core State Standards Initiative, www.corestandards.org/what-parents-shouldknow/.
W H AT ’ S W R O N G W I T H M AT H A N D S C I E N C E I N N YC H I G H S C H O O L S ( A N D W H AT T O D O A B O U T I T )
10
in our city’s high schools is a loud and clear
warning that if the high expectations embodied in the Common Core are going to be met
in New York City, the limitations as well as the
strengths of the city’s current array of high
schools have to be acknowledged. The good
news is that research by the Center for New
York City Affairs has identified hopeful existing models for ameliorating those shortcomings. Such efforts must now be encouraged
and, where possible, replicated. Otherwise,
students with high hopes enrolling in Marie
Curie and similar schools will only continue to
be disappointed—and the disturbing racial divide in high school instruction and outcomes
in our city will only deepen.
What Courses Do Students Need?
Many occupations are closed to students
who don’t take physics, chemistry and advanced math in high school. Listed here are
required courses for various occupations.
Accountant: pre-calculus
Architect: pre-calculus, physics
Dental hygienist: biology and chemistry
Electrician: algebra 1
Emergency medical technician:
biology, chemistry
HVAC mechanic: physics
Lab technician: chemistry and biology
MRI technician: biology, chemistry, physics
Registered nurse: biology, chemistry
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
This report is published jointly by the Center for New York
City Affairs and Insideschools.
CNYCA Executive Director: Kristin Morse
The Center for New York City Affairs at The New School is
an applied policy research institute that drives innovation
in social policy.
Editor, Insideschools: Clara Hemphill
Insideschools, a project of the Center, helps parents find
good public schools in New York City.
This report was made possible with a grant from the
Donors’ Education Collaborative and the Alfred P. Sloan
Foundation.
CNYCA Education Project Director: Kim Nauer
Reporter: Laura Zingmond
Data Analyst: Nicole Mader
Editorial Consultant: Bruce Cory
Reporter and Copy Editor: Aimee Sabo
Layout and Design: Mick Wieland