Education
Overcrowding in East Side public schools threatens to deny a generation of children their constitutional right to a "
sound basic education." We must make more school seats available now, build more schools to keep up with current development, and investigate new solutions for building educational infrastructure.
I have a strong commitment to public education that stems from being a graduate of the
Bronx High School of Science, State University of New York's
University at Albany and
University at Buffalo Law School. I helped create Community Board 8’s Youth and Education Committee, identified a
Free Yellow Bus Program for local youth service providers, and created an internship program to better serve the youth and education needs of our community. As your Council member I will continue to fight for increased funding for youth services and education.
It’s really hard to get parents to come to community-board meetings,” he said in a phone interview. “Along with that comes a lack of diversity in the people I see involved in government and politics.”
There isn’t yet a cost estimate for the legislation, Mr. Kallos said. The measure would require the city to provide child care upon request through the Administration for Children’s Services, the child-welfare agency.
New York City Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña announced this week that the city's 1.1 million public school students will receive free lunch. This program comes as the city changed the way it reports its data to the Washington, making it eligible for the lunch expansion at no additional cost to taxpayers.
While individual families are set to save roughly $300 a year on school lunches, the issue touches on much more than cost. Incidents of "food shaming" have been reported at schools around the country, as students are often targeted on the lunch line for their family's inability to pay off their meal debt.
Could this new program serve as a model to districts around the country? New York City Council Member Ben Kallos, who represents New Yorkers in the Upper West Side and Roosevelt Island, joins The Takeaway to discuss the importance of ensuring that every student receives lunch at school.
This segment is hosted by Todd Zwillich.
