A proven model can amplify parents’ voices without undermining accountability.

As a candidate, Zohran Mamdani opposed mayoral control of the schools — saying the public needed a much bigger voice in educational decisionmaking. Soon after becoming mayor, he changed his mind, urging the legislature in Albany to preserve the authority that’s been law since 2001. But New York City does not have to choose between mayoral control and community voice in our schools. We can have both, and we already do. 

The city’s community schools, now 420 strong, show what it looks like to build structured, democratic input into school decisionmaking while keeping a clear line of accountability to City Hall. We should build on that foundation rather than swing between competing approaches in search of something entirely new. 

Mayor Mamdani has said that he wants New York to “belong to more of its people than it did the day before,” and he’s created an Office of Mass Engagement in City Hall to try to amplify the voices of ordinary residents. In education, the challenge is to translate that promise into practices that are transparent, consistent and inclusive, without weakening the mayor’s ability to mobilize resources and deliver results. It’s easy to say, tough to execute.

Giving control to ordinary New Yorkers sounds great, but in this city, almost everyone disagrees on almost everything, some voices are much louder than others and decisions still have to be made. For the mayor to deliver on goals as ambitious as universal childcare and stronger literacy outcomes, he needs to be able to coordinate across agencies, set priorities and act at scale with a clear line of accountability. That is why Albany should extend mayoral control for the next four years.

The debate, then, shouldn’t be whether a mayor should lead our public schools. The debate should be whether leadership can be structured so it is informed by the people most affected by school decisions — all of them, not only those with lots of time on their hands or those who are fluent in English, or those who already know how to navigate the system — and in ways that are transparent and consistent. The good news is that New York City already has a practical template for how to do that. It is community schools.

Today, New York City has a large network of community schools, district schools that combine academics with deeper family engagement, integrated family supports, expanded learning time and formal partnerships with lead nonprofit community-based organizations. The city’s initiative began in 2014 with 45 schools and grew significantly over the following decade. These are not charter schools or separate governance entities. They are “traditional” district schools, but they use a model that integrates academics with supports families often need, from mental health services and health care to food pantries and after-school programming, while giving families and community partners a more meaningful role in shaping school priorities and preserving clear accountability for final decisions. They run the gamut from P.S. 154 in Mott Haven to Port Richmond High School on Staten Island.

Research says these schools deliver results for kids. The RAND Corporation evaluated New York City’s community schools in two stages. A 2017 implementation study of 118 schools found that about 81% reported families were more present in the school as a result of becoming a community school. Then, in its 2020 impact study, RAND found that community schools posted stronger outcomes than comparable schools, including higher graduation rates and lower rates of chronic absenteeism.

I have seen what this looks like when it is done right. During the de Blasio administration, I had the privilege of serving as the founding senior executive director of New York City’s Office of Community Schools. In that role, I worked with educators, community-based organizations and city agencies to build the approach and strengthen how schools engage families and respond to the needs of the whole child and family.

One example is M.S. 50 in Williamsburg. Each year, the school holds a forum where families review data, identify the school’s strengths and gaps and help shape the school’s priorities and comprehensive education plan. The forum is multilingual and designed to make families feel welcome, with celebrations of student work and food that reflects the school community, because honest input depends on genuine belonging. After reviewing the data, families share their perspectives on barriers to success and on the programs and supports students need, from academics to enrichment. Done well, this creates something rare in public systems: a structured way for families to influence priorities, grounded in evidence and connected to planning.

If Mamdani wants to honor his commitment to a more inclusive style of governing, he should treat community schools as a way of running schools, not a special initiative on the side. That means making two moves at once: expanding the number of community schools over time and bringing the practices that make them work to more schools, not just those formally designated as community schools. 

The fastest way to scale this work is to standardize transparent, inclusive school-level priority-setting and invest in helping parents and caregivers build the skills, knowledge and confidence to lead. Community input works only when families have the time, information and support to participate on more equal footing. That is how participation becomes broad and representative.

Here is what this could look like in a Mamdani administration.

First, set a citywide expectation that every school holds an annual community planning forum, based on the Community School Forum model, with accessible information, multilingual participation and a clear set of questions designed to surface priorities. Require all schools to publish what they heard and the priorities they will act on. This is not meant to replace existing channels for parent engagement, including PTAs and School Leadership Teams. Those structures still matter. But they are limited by design and often draw from a relatively small group of parents. A broader community planning process would widen participation and give formal governance bodies better, more representative input to work from.

Second, invest in building a stronger corps of parent leaders through Parent University, NYCPS’s existing learning platform, offering free workshops, resources, and events to help families support their children and navigate the school system. Without support, even highly engaged parents can struggle to interpret school data, understand where decisions are actually made or feel comfortable speaking up in meetings dominated by educators that freely use acronyms and jargon. Parent University could be used more intentionally to help parents build the skills to interpret school data, facilitate discussion and represent their communities in school-level and district-level bodies. Community-based organizations could help recruit, coach and support parent leaders on the ground, while the City provides the practical supports that make participation possible, including translation and child care.

Third, create a simple, systemwide accountability loop so community input is visible even as elected leaders make major decisions. Central offices should aggregate and incorporate what schools are hearing, identify patterns the city can address and report back publicly on what actions are being taken. The Panel for Educational Policy should receive regular public updates on what communities are raising and how the system is responding. That would make community input easier to trace, and harder to ignore. 

This approach would keep the line of accountability clear while bolstering community input in ways that matter. It would keep the mayor responsible for results while using an existing and effective strategy to bring families and communities into the work in a structured way. Community schools show New York City does not have to choose between strong leadership and a system where people have a voice. We can do both.