NYC Dept of Education -- Empowerment Schools, Sharrock Network #17

The New York City Department of Education runs 1350 schools with over 1.1 million students, 140,000 employees, and a $15 billion budget.

Through a comprehensive reform program called Children First, Chancellor Klein aims to transform the troubled system, ensuring that every child will graduate with the skills to become a fully engaged member of society. As part of this reform, the Chancellor established School Support Organizations (SSOs), including the Empowerment Schools Organization to assist schools in achieving school goals and performing well on accountability measures.

Empowerment Schools are premised on the fundamental belief that decisions about how to educate students should be made as close as possible to those who work with them – the principals in collaboration with the school community. Such key decisions include broader authority over educational programming and curriculum, greater discretion over budgets, a significant role in selecting and evaluating the dedicated administrative team that supports principals and the chance to decide what customized professional development principals want for themselves and their staff.

Today, principals in 500 New York City public schools have the freedom and flexibility that comes with being empowered and have been using it to improve the educational opportunities for their students.

To learn more about Empowerment Schools visit this website: http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/DD96235C-CA36-4554-8050-F49E82F5781B/32167/FactSheetESO2.pdf

To provide a high degree of personalized support for every school Empowerment Schools is organized into Networks. We are a Network of 27 schools, including middle and high schools that are located in all five boroughs of New York. To learn more about us please visit our website: www.innovativeschoolsnyc.org