Coalition for Public Education/Coalición por la Educación Pública

Friday, January 15, 2010

Human Rights and Public Education: A Local and International Concern!

The Foundation of the Coalition for Public Education/Coalición por la Educación Pública is that Education is a Human Right!

What does "Education is a Human Right" mean?

Local school systems and state and federal governments are responsible for guaranteeing the human right to education for every child. There are many human rights standards and principles that must be guaranteed in order to fulfill the right to education.

1. Equal access to education, Article 13, ICESCR

2. Education must adapt to meet the needs of diverse children, Article 13, ICESCR

3. Good quality curricula and teaching methods, Article 13, ICESCR

4. Relevant and culturally appropriate curricula, Article 13, ICESCR

5. Adequately trained teachers, Article 13, ICESCR

6. Equity in resources, Article 13, ICESCR

7. Education must be aimed at the full development of the child's potential and abilities, Article 29, CRC

8. Education must develop respect for the child's cultural identity, language and values, Article 29, CRC

9. Right to special services for children with disabilities, Article 23, CRC

10. Education must promote self-esteem and self-confidence, Article 29, CRC

11. Right to rest, leisure and play, Article 31, CRC

12. Right to dignity, Preamble, Articles 28 and 29, CRC

13. Freedom from degrading treatment, Article 37, CRC

14. Right to health, Article 24

15. Right to an adequate standard of living, Article 27, CRC

16. Right to family, Article 9, CRC

17. Freedom from violence, abuse and maltreatment, Article 19, CRC

18. Freedom from arbitrary arrest or detention, Article 19, CRC

19. Right to security of person, Article 3, UDHR

20. Right to freedom of opinion and expression, Article 19, UDHR

21. Right to participate in government (including public education), Article 21, UDHR

22. Right to remedy when your rights have been violated, Article 8, UDHR

23. Right to monitoring of the school system, Article 2 and 13, ICESCR

24. Right to information and transparency, Article 2 and 13, ICESCR

Abbreviations: CRC—Convention on the rights of the child; ICESCR-International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; UDHR-Universal Declaration of Human Rights

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

The Coalition for
Public Education

Coalición por la
Educación
Pública

Who We Are
What We
Want

The Coalition for Public Education/Coalición por la Educación Pública is an independent, non-sectarian, and non-governmental organization with short, middle and long-term educational and social goals. We believe that education is a human right and we want to ensure that New York City public schools are places of learning in which all stakeholders (parents, students, educators, non-pedagogical staff, administrators and the community) are engaged in a democratic process to provide a free and quality education to all its students, from Pre-school to College.

Our coalition is based on antiracist/antisexist democratic grassroots organizing concepts and not based on the idea that any one individual, politician, union leader, or political messiah will save us.

Our coalition will participate in election campaigns but will focus on mass action as a primary vehicle for social change.

Therefore, we will organize the distribution of leaflets, mass rallies, forums, civil disobedience, petitions, referendums, web-based actions, economic boycotts, and other grassroots tactics. We also understand that we are not alone in struggle and that we must unite with other groups and individuals who support democracy, self-determination and the empowerment of our communities.

What We Want:

I. A Peoples' Board of Education

II. Local control of our Public Schools not Mayoral Dictatorship!

III. Better Public Schools not Charter Schools!

IV. Power to Parents, Students and Educators!

V. Implementation of a mandatory Antiracist Curriculum!

VI. Recruiting educators from our neighborhoods to achieve racial parity!

VII.Money for Education Not War!

VIII. OUR Schools = Neighborhood School Control!

NYC EDSTATS You Can Use

New York City Schools by the Numbers

By John Tarleton
www.indypendent.org

$12.5 billion: Annual New York City Department of Education (DOE) budget (2002)

$21 billion: Annual New York City DOE budget (2009)

1,719: Number officials employed by the DOE central administration in June 2002

2,442: Number of officials employed by the central administration as of November 2008

2: Number of DOE officials earning more than $180,000 per year in 2004.

22: Number of DOE officials earning more than $180,000 per year in 2007.

5: Number of DOE public relations staffers in 2003.

23: Number of DOE public relations staffers in 2008.

944: Number of contracts approved by DOE in 2008, at a total cost of $1.9 billion.

20: Percentage of contracts that exceeded estimated cost by at least 25 percent.

$67.5 million: Annual budget of Project Arts, a decade-old program that was the sole source of dedicated funding for arts education. It was eliminated in 2007.

86: Percentage of principals who said in a 2008 poll that they were unable to provide a quality education because of excessive class sizes in their schools.

100,000: Number of seats DOE plans to provide for charter school students by 2012.

25,000: Number of seats DOE plans to build under 2010 to 2014 capital plan.

66,895: Number of K-3 school-children in classes of 25 or more during the 2008-09 school year.

15,440: Average number of seats per year built during the last six years of the Rudolph Giuliani administration.

10,895: Average number of seats per year built during the first six years of the Bloomberg administration.

27.2: Percentage of newly hired teachers in 2001-02 who were Black.

14.1: Percentage of newly hired teachers in 2006-07 who were Black.

53.3: Percentage of newly hired teachers in 2001-02 who were white.

65.5: Percentage of newly hired teachers in 2006-07 who were white.

76: Percentage of white and Asian students who performed better than the average Black and Latino students in 8th grade English Language Arts (ELA) in 2003.

75: Percentage of white and Asian students who performed better than the average Black and Hispanic students in 8th grade ELA in 2008.

77: Percentage of white and Asian students who performed better than the average Black and Hispanic 8th graders in math in 2003.

81: Percentage of white and Asian students who performed better than the average Black and Hispanic 8th graders in math in 2008.

54: Percentage of New York City public school parents who disapproved of Mayor Bloomberg’s handling of education, according to a March 2009 Quinnipiac poll.

Sources: New York City Council, New York City Comptroller’s Office, New York Daily News, New York Post, Eduwonkette, Quinnipiac Institute, Black Educator, Class Size Matters, New York City Schools Under Bloomberg and Klein.