NYC schools chancellor says of remote learning debacle IBM was "not ready for prime time"
NEW YORK -- There were major problems for New York City public schools trying to operate remotely on Tuesday. For hours, the system was on the fritz and, according to the schools chancellor, "not ready for prime time."
Some parents opted out and others were not amused.
It was a conundrum for city parents. Was it better to let their kids enjoy the all-too-rare snowfall, like some CBS New York saw making snowmen and having snowball fights in Central Park, or force them to learn remotely? Manhattan mother of two Natalya Marakhver said ixnay to the mayor and the schools chancellor.
"Online school is not school. When we tried this during the pandemic it was an epic failure. It made them feel alienated and far from their teachers," Marakhver said.
It turns out the city's decision to have its have more than 900,000 public school kids learn remotely Tuesday could also be considered an epic failure, because for hours and hours kids and teachers were unable to log on to the system.
"There's a reason the word 'glitch' is in the dictionary," Mayor Eric Adams said.
The mayor and Schools Chancellor David Banks put the blame squarely on IBM, the company hired by the city to run the remote learning program.
"In a word, IBM was not ready for prime time," Banks said, adding, "So to say that I am disappointed, frustrated and angry is an understatement."
He said IBM was not prepared for the onslaught of teachers and students to go online.
"I'm concerned about what happened here and IBM's response that we didn't realize that over 900,000 kids were going to get on at the same time, duh," Banks said.
And what's more, the system failed even though education officials did a classroom simulation several months ago.
"You can't fully simulate a day like this unless you're telling close to a million kids to just stay home and we're going to practice for a snow day," Banks said.
Parents were livid. Stefanos Chen called it an "anatomy of a nightmare" on X, the social media site formerly known as Twitter. Others said just send the kids to school like every other day.
"I went to school in Brooklyn. I remember walking to school in the snow, taking buses. It wasn't neat. Our children need to be challenged physically, emotionally and every way," Marakhver said.
City officials said they couldn't close schools and take a snow day without being fined by the state for not meeting minimum school day standards. There was no wiggle room after adding days off for Lunar New Year and Dawali.
An IBM spokesperson said the company regretted "the inconvenience to students and parents."