I was sent to a vocational school in Western Queens and it was refreshing to be with a student body that was well behaved and respectful after my hellish experiences in Southeast Queens. Most of the students go to this school because they want to go into the trades such as plumbing, electrician, and for the girls business and cosmetology.
The school is over 90% Hispanic and while most of the students struggle academically, their engineering program attracts top-notch students who take Advanced Placement courses such as Physics, Calculus, and Statistics. Discipline issues are few and are handled very efficiently by the Deans. Students get to class on-time and few stragglers show up late. The Administration treated me well and accommodated my personal matters by adjusting my schedule after the first day. The teachers were friendly and helpful and the students, for the most part, did their assigned work and gave me little problem.
The downside of this school is parking. There is no parking in the area and if you are on late schedule, as all ATRs are, you cannot even get paid parking spaces! The administration has a cordial but not collaborative relationship with the staff. They suffer from the "top down mentality" that the DOE has instilled on their young principals. Interestingly, the principal hires all "newbie teachers" for all subjects except for Math. Apparently, she believes "newbie math teachers" are not the answer and has hired two experienced Math teachers in the last year.
I was treated well, shown respect, and allowed to go to Professional Development. The school is very nice but don't even bother to take your car there since you cannot find parking. . If only this school was in a more accessible location with parking. I would give the school a try if offered a position there.
GRADE "B-"
Queens Vocational HS. Why are all ATRs on late schedule? Aren't early schedule teachers ever absent? I guess they don't want you taking valuable parking spaces away from their teachers.
ReplyDeleteWhen will the ATR teachers get their respect and get back into the classrooms!!!! Enough already Bloomberg, Klein, Walcott and Black are all gone and forgotten - this policy was instituted by bloomberg and klein who made great teachers, guidance counselors, social workers and even secretaries "rotate" each week to a different school and this has caused the students of nyc schools to suffer because they now cannot see their favorite counselor or teacher due to shortages at the school level.
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