Dmytro Fedkowskyj, left, said one of his greatest accomplishments while serving as Borough President Helen Marshall’s appointee to the the city Panel for Educational Policy was cementing bonds without parents from all corners of the borough. Photo Courtesy Dominick Totino Photography
There have been the meetings that last until the dead of night, the fights with Mayor Bloomberg’s administration against the widespread school closures and co-locations that have dominated the city’s educational policies in recent history, the deep-rooted frustration throughout Queens over standardized testing, overcrowded classrooms and the loss of power on the part of parents and teachers.
There has been the constant push to get the city Department of Education to pay attention to those not in City Hall or the Tweed Courthouse – where the DOE is headquartered, the nonstop negotiations to do everything from ensure principals’ budgets wouldn’t be drastically slashed to making sure the city would not move a school against the students’ wishes, the constant attention to funding for education.
For more than five years, all of this, and, of course, more, has been the life of Dmytro Fedkowskyj, Queens Borough President Helen Marshall’s appointee to the city Panel for Educational Policy – a decision-making group dominated by mayoral appointees that votes on education plans for the city’s public schools, including the controversial string of closures and co-locations that Bloomberg has pushed through since assuming mayoral control not long after first taking office in 2002. Under the mayoral control legislation, which was passed by the state Legislature, the PEP was formed – and while it holds public meetings at which outraged parents often scream into the early morning hours, the group has been known as a rubber stamp for Bloomberg because he appoints the majority of the panel. None of the members are paid.
“When I started, I had no idea what I would be in for – I know this was going to be time consuming but rewarding, and I’d be able to have an impact on educational policy,” said Fedkowskyj, who lives in Middle Village with his wife and three children and has been a frequently adamant critic of Bloomberg’s educational policies – controversial plans that have focused on shuttering large community high schools, such as the more than century-old Jamaica High School, and replacing them with smaller, and often more specialized, institutions.
But despite noticing that the DOE, and Bloomberg administration in general, become increasingly dismissive of parents and teachers over the years, Fedkowskyj did say that the city would always respond to his concerns.
“They never ignored me,” he said. “They may not have agreed with me, but they heard me out. If I had a battle to fight, they recognized that, and they dealt with me on it. On occasion, they made changes to accommodate me.”
Fedkowskyj, who works as an accountant when he’s not knee-deep in educational matters, worked with each of Bloomberg’s three chancellors – Joel Klein, the short-lived Cathie Black, and Dennis Walcott – on a nearly countless number of issues, from capital budgets to saving funding for principals to parent engagement.
“Joel Klein – his policies were ‘my way or the highway,’” he said. “He only listened to you if you fell into his plan, and Bloomberg’s policies directed him to do that.
“But the way you create change is by talking to people and seeing what works in different communities – we are not one size fits all,” Fedkowskyj continued.
Walcott, meanwhile, did try to encourage parent participation, the Queens PEP member said – but he still was working within the context of Bloomberg’s policies and was, by the time he took control of the department, facing such intense resentment on the part of the general public that it was difficult to truly inspire change.
While the DOE seemed to turn deaf ears on parents, Fedkowskyj said if there is one thing he has been most proud of during his tenure, it is the relationships he has built with the educational community, from parents and Community Education Council members to legislators.
“They knew they could come to me, and I’d do whatever I could to help them,” he said.
At the most recent Parent Advisory Board – a group led by Fedkowskyj that included CEC leaders, parents and other interested parties – a number of parents lamented what will likely be a departure by the Queens PEP representative. Borough President-elect Melinda Katz said in an interview with The Forum this week that she has not yet decided on her PEP appointee, and Fedkowskyj said he would likely only want to continue on the PEP on an interim basis until Katz could find his replacement.
“I want to thank Borough President Marshall for appointing me with trust to be the Queens representative on the PEP,” he said. “It was a challenge, pleasure and joy to be the ‘go to guy’ on education. The job was a life lesson with many teachable moments – and one that I will never forget. It offered me a lifetime opportunity that many of us will never experience, one that had an impact on the education of our children. It was a position that represented the values of Queens, and I will always be honored to have been the one that championed the ideas and desires of school communities with the trust of our borough president.”
By Anna Gustafson
