Mayor Bill de Blasio: Good morning, everybody. We have a lot to go over today. Chancellor Carranza is here and we’re going to be making an important announcement related to education. But first, let me speak to the report that came out this morning from our Department of Investigation – a very, very important report, looking back on the protests in May and June. It is a clear, blunt, clear – objective report, an honest report. I want to state my full support for the conclusions and the recommendations in this report. I want to thank Commissioner Margaret Garnett and the whole team at the Department of Investigation. We needed objective, unsparing look at what happened in May and June. We needed to understand what went right, what went wrong, what needs to be different, what needs to be better. I certainly take full responsibility for the issues that are raised in the report and the changes that we have to make. So, I asked for an independent review, I’ve gotten an independent review, and I support that review and its findings.
We've got a lot of work to do. I am confident we can do that work. We will implement the recommendations in the Department of Investigation report, but we're going to go farther than that. The work of reforming the NYPD, of deepening neighborhood policing, of changing police culture – that work must intensify and it will in the year 2021. A lot is already being planned that will be unveiled in the coming weeks. But the bottom line is we can never accept a broken status quo. We can never go back to a past that didn't work. COVID – the COVID era has taught us that so clearly. And we need to do better and we will, and that means a commitment to fighting disparities and inequality in every part of the life of New York City. And that certainly takes us to education, where if you're talking about the problems of disparity, if you're talking about structural racism, certainly policing is not the only area to talk about. There are many areas to talk about and education must be front and center. There has been so much that needed to be addressed in education in New York City. And from the beginning, what I tried to focus on was a very simple concept, equity and excellence – that we needed to profoundly change the distribution of resources. I like to say very bluntly, our mission is to redistribute wealth. A lot of people bristle at that phrase – that is in fact the phrase we need to use. We have been doing this work for seven years to more equitably redistribute resources throughout our school system. That means Pre-K for All, 3-K for All, Advanced Placement courses in every high school, including those that never had a single one. It means changing school funding formulas. There are so many things that we've tried to do to profoundly rebalance the equation – community schools, focusing on schools that the help the most in communities that had not been invested in. That work will continue this year, for sure – this hardest of all school years. But starting in September, the Chancellor and I announced our 2021 Student Achievement Plan, which is going to focus on closing the COVID achievement gap and ensuring that there is fairness for our kids, support for them, but with a special focus on the 27 neighborhoods most deeply affected by COVID. And those are Black communities, Latino communities, Asian communities that bore the brunt. So, this work has been going on in a lot of different ways over the last seven years. It has to intensify now, given all the lessons we've learned during this most painful of years.
As we look beyond this year, we understand that there are many, many tools, many things we can do differently, and it's time to start using every tool at our disposal to address inequality and to improve the education of all children. And those two things go together, addressing inequality, stopping disparity, and improving education for all – that's one continuous mission. So, today, we're announcing changes to our high school and middle school admissions policies. And I think these changes will improve justice and fairness, but they'll also make the process simpler and fairer, particularly given what we're dealing with this year and all the results of the coronavirus that have changed the way we have to do things. So, beginning right away – and this will be for the 2021-22 school year, but the admissions process, obviously, will be starting now – for middle schools, there'll be a one-year pause for screens – for screened schools for those criteria used in “screened schools.” Those criteria will be put on pause for next academic year and for the admissions process happening now for high schools, we will eliminate geographic priorities over the next two years, thus giving a much bigger swath of the city, an opportunity to experience some of our great high schools.
We also be expanding diversity planning to all 32 school districts in New York City – that will happen over the next four years. Right away, we're going to get five more districts going in that effort. The districts that have done that work have seen extraordinary results. District 3 and District 1 in Manhattan, District 15 in Brooklyn – my district, where I started out as a community school board member – have had tremendous success with diversity programs, with efforts to make schools, better for everyone and more inclusive of everyone. And they've shown it can work for everyone. So, you're going to see a lot more of that starting now and in the next year, and the years ahead. Here to give you a sense of how this will all come together, our Chancellor Richard Carranza.
Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This has been a year of new and difficult choices, testing our collective strength and endurance ss we faced the unknown together. We've had to re-invent the building blocks of public education in the nation's largest school system from how to go to class, to a grading policy, attendance and everything in between. As Chancellor, it's my responsibility to deliver the highest-quality education possible to each and every child in this city, so that they are prepared for successful, productive life and empowered with the skills that they need to chase their dreams. There are inequities in our city and in our school system that have been exacerbated this year by the COVID-19 health crisis and has had – and this COVID-19 health crisis has had a disproportionate impact on our communities of color, our immigrant families, the students whose parents never had the option to work from home, and so many more. The health crisis is also interrupted so many of our normal school year practices as we accommodated it's unprecedented wake, including a lack of State testing this year, a revised approach to grading and attendance policies to meet the moment in time. And we took the time to hear feedback and work through this complex and important issue to make sure that we got this right. So, I'm appreciative of all of the students and the families and schools that have engaged with us since last spring and over the summer, literally hundreds and hundreds of town halls and meetings. And I want to thank you for your patience as well as we've crafted this new policy.
Building on this administration's commitment to equity, we're so proud to announce a common-sense approach. Number one, directly – it will directly address the current circumstances attendant to the pandemic. And, number two, this will make it simpler and fairer as a process for our families to be admitted to schools that have already gone through so much during this pandemic. So, for middle schools with screens – all screens will be paused one year, because the screens included the use of State exams, which we don't have those exams anymore. And they were canceled due to COVID. We also don't have the grades or the attendance that we can compare to previous years. Using data from the year prior when rising sixth graders were seven or eight years old, and in their first experience of taking the State test, it's untenable and it's unfair to students. District priorities will still apply. These are young children and during the extensive admissions-focused community engagement that we conducted in the spring and the summer, we heard loud and clear that families requested that we keep the district priority to allow young children to go to a school closer to their home. Common sense – so we're keeping them in place.
For schools that have more applications than seats, admissions will be decided through a lottery-based system. For high schools with screens, we're eliminating geographic priorities for admissions over two years, as the Mayor – as you've announced. In the first year, we'll start with district priorities. And, in the second, we'll extend to all other geographic priorities, like borough residents. These geographic screens have kept too many students out of the high schools of their choice. And this is an important step to open back up so that access and opportunity to your high school options aren't limited by where you live. For remaining screens at the high school level, we invite schools to unscreen now. If they and their school communities wish to do so, we will support you. If they wish to maintain academic or other screens, they will use the previous year’s State tests, previous year’s grades, and the grades from the first part of last year for their screening criteria. And the rubric process – the criteria that is used to rank students will be more transparent than ever before. We're requiring all schools to publicly post their rubrics on myschools. DOE Central will run the ranking process to be faster, fairer, and much more transparent. We also heard that loud and clear from all of our engagement sessions. The specialized high school admissions test – the SHSAT – will continue, as required by State law, and registration will open on December 21st for the SHSAT.
Now, I know this is a lot to take in at once for our family. So, our enrollment team will be offering more support than ever before. And in multiple languages, all rising middle and high school families will receive additional detailed updates on how this will impact them and to help them find an excellent school that is right for them. We remain at the ready to help in any way possible and these changes will help ensure that our classrooms reflect the great diversity that is New York City. And it's also a true representation of the values that we hold dear as a city, that equity, inclusivity and accepting nothing less than excellence for all children is at the cornerstone of what we do. Making these changes helps us meet this challenging moment when our children need us the most. And by lifting up all children, in all schools, we're able to chart a bold path forward. Mr. Mayor, this is not only the practical thing to do, this is the right thing to do.
Mayor: Amen. Thank you so much, Chancellor. Chancellor, thank you. You put an immense amount of time and energy into determining the right way forward here under extraordinary and challenging circumstances. And I want to thank you. I want to thank Deputy Chancellor Josh Wallack. I want to thank your whole cabinet, they put a lot of energy into figuring out the right way to do this going forward. And this is an action based on this year, but it has a lot of ramification for the future. Also, tremendous, thanks to First Deputy Mayor Dean Fuleihan and his team who really focused on how we get this right.
Everyone, the Chancellor clear that based on current state law we will be administering the specialized high school exam. I want to emphasize that timeline registration for the exam begins this Monday, the 21st of December and the test administration will begin on January 27th. There'll be a lot of information coming out to make sure everyone who wants to participate gets the information they need. The Chancellor and I continue to feel that we need a better way going forward on specialized high schools. I want to make sure it's crystal clear. I still believe the status quo in our specialized high schools is broken. I don't think it's inclusive and fair. I think we need to do better. We understand to do that, we will have to have common ground with communities all over the city. We'll have to listen to people, work with people, obviously see if there's something our legislators in Albany feel are comfortable with. But it's important to let people know that process will continue as it has been. And when [inaudible] it's also important to say we can do better in New York City.
Okay. Let me move to a couple of other quick things – again, so much going on, but let's take a moment to reflect on the last 48 hours or so. We came out of the storm. I think the city has come out of this storm very smoothly. I want to really thank everyone at the Sanitation Department and Emergency Management. You did a great job. Special appreciation to New York Strongest, our Sanitation workers who are out there all night, braving the elements to make sure that our streets were clear and safe for all of us. They did a great job. Congratulations, guys – job well done. Thanks again to everyone at Emergency Management who coordinated, kept us all informed, made sure things kept moving. The snow did not affect something that couldn't be more important – the number one topic right now, vaccine, and the distribution of vaccine. The snow did not affect the vaccine distribution and the vaccine schedule. Vaccines were administered as scheduled yesterday in health care facilities. New vaccinations since yesterday morning, almost 4,000 – number to-date, over 9,000. Again, this is a small beginning compared to where we will be going over the coming weeks. But what we're seeing is continued good results from these vaccinations process is going smoothly. It will take off and intensify in the coming days and weeks. In the meantime, we all are dealing with a real challenge, as our indicators make clear, and we all need to focus on wearing masks, on social distancing, avoiding gatherings, not having big family gatherings, not traveling – all of this matters and these indicators will continue to make clear why.
So, let's go over them. Number one, daily number of people admitted to New York City hospitals for suspected COVID 19 – now, this is actually a pretty good report – today's report, 158 patients. More than we want, but well under the 200-patient threshold. That's good, but here's, what's not so good – the hospitalization rate per 100,000, now 3.1 percent. That's too high, we want to be under two. New cases, through the roof, honestly – 2,805 when you do probable and confirmed together. Way too high, we want to get under 550. We’ve got a lot of work to do there. And the percent positivity continues to increase, seven-day rolling average – the next indicator – is 6.16 percent – 6.16. That is way too high. We got to get under five. And, everyone, I will keep saying it – everyone has to participate. What you do makes a huge difference.
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