In turn, plaintiffs argued, the school board majority could draw up budgets that favored the private school community over the interests of public-school children. 'Substantially equivalent': State could OK use of test scores in assessing private school educationĬomptroller: East Ramapo is the most 'fiscally stressed' school district in stateĭuring the trial in White Plains, the NAACP’s attorneys called to the witness stand members of East Ramapo’s Orthodox Jewish religious community in an effort to show how a “white, slating organization” worked behind the scenes to elect school board members. The federal voting rights case launched in 2017 by the Spring Valley NAACP with the New York Civil Liberties Union.Ĭonflict of interest? Civil rights group questions East Ramapo contract awards to Monsey nonprofit The district, once considered among the best in the state, now has a four-year graduation rate of just 65% and is considered a “target district” by the state, meaning one or more student subgroup has been consistently underperforming or the overall graduation rate is low. Nearly 70% of East Ramapo’s nonpublic students - 20,673 of 30,276 - and 82% of public school students - 7,469 of 9,084 - are classified as low-income. The Martin Luther King Multi-Purpose Center, in the Hill neighborhood of Spring Valley, received $125,000 for a one-year “Saturday Academy” that will provide English lessons for students and their families, tutoring, STEM programming, and related support including hot meals and health programming. The new foundation has already awarded its first grant. To comply with the ruling, the district now uses a "ward" or neighborhood voting system to elect its nine-member school board, rather than an "at-large" system in which the top vote-getters from a districtwide election win a board seat. Many youngsters in the district, which encompasses the greater Spring Valley area, attend yeshivas that serve the Orthodox and Hasidic Jewish community. The private-school enrollment in East Ramapo outpaces public-school enrollment by more than 3-to-1. The "at-large" voting system, the ruling found, skewed toward a board majority of men whose policies were seen as favoring private yeshivas, used by the area's large Orthodox Jewish community. The 2020 voting rights ruling, upheld on appeal, found that the system for electing East Ramapo school board members disenfranchised Black and Latino residents who used the public schools. “Every penny” of fees received by the law firm has been put into the foundation to benefit East Ramapo public schoolchildren, firm partner Andrew Clubok said. The $3.9 million charitable fund has been set up using money the district was ordered to pay to Latham & Watkins to cover plaintiffs' legal fees to the law firm. Watch Video: Tom Zambito breaks down the East Ramapo School Board trialĪ new charitable fund has been formed by the victors of a federal voting rights case against East Ramapo's school board that led to a change in the way school board elections take place.
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