At 8:30 a.m. on a recent Saturday in Harlem, a man stood near the Antioch Church of God in Christ’s painted red steps, shouting a new number every few minutes. “Fifty-one!”

A crowd outside the church talked among themselves quietly, filling the air with clouds of breath in the cool temperatures, continually listening with one ear for their number to be called. “Fifty-two!”
“The earlier you come, the better stuff you get,” Eugenio Prado explained. “You come later, you get leftovers. But you always get something.”

The Antioch Church’s Outreach Program is one of 99 food pantries in Manhattan, according to Food Bank NYC. With the most recent 2011 Census Bureau figures showing an increase in the number of people living below poverty level in New York City, from 20.1 percent to 20.9 percent, food pantries like Antioch Outreach are seeing larger crowds gathering for assistance.

Antioch Outreach’s organizer, Peggy Allen, says that the program typically serves between 240 and 250 people each Saturday. On this Saturday, however, the Outreach served 296.

“The numbers have increased,” said Allen. “It’s so busy that it’s difficult.”

Though food is not served until 8:30 a.m., Allen sees a line already forming when she arrives at the Outreach at 6 a.m.

“I rely on this,” said Prado, who has come to the pantry every Saturday for the past six months.
Antioch Outreach offers cereal, milk, juice, canned goods, pasta, vegetables and various other products to clients on a weekly basis. Allen explains that food is supplied by the New York City Food Bank as well as through grants. On this particular Saturday, fresh chicken and ham were available—a rarity, Allen said.

“I was so sure we had enough for everybody,” said Allen. “But we did run short, maybe 25 people.”
Clients said they are still pleased with the food. “You want canned foods? Take the chicken tuna,” suggests Prado. “It’s soft. It’s rich. I don’t know how they do that.” Prado said he has difficulty working due to diabetes and psychiatric ailments. He currently lives with his parents in Harlem.
The food given out at Antioch Outreach feeds more mouths than those seen on a Saturday morning. Due to his diabetes, Prado says he often gives away items he receives that he can’t eat. Hassan Stevens, who has been visiting the pantry every weekend for the past two years, said he does the same thing.

“If there is pork, I give it away,” said Stevens, a practicing Muslim who is unemployed and looking for work in maintenance.

The Outreach also serves as a social time for community members who stop by. Mike Evans comes to the pantry from time to time on his Saturday mornings, although he doesn’t hold a number. “Somebody else needs it better than I do,” he said.

By Erin Brodwin

Jackie Albers Photo By Dale Eisinger

When a parent arrives in Principal Jackie Albers’ office to ask whether her student should take classes in music or math, her answer is both. Albers, who oversees an elementary charter school in central Harlem, said the most important aspect of her job is making sure students who leave her school are prepared for the real world.

“When we talk about our curriculum, we call it joyful rigor,” Albers said. “It’s challenging, but it’s also engaging and fun.”

After a two-year stint teaching English at a public school in the Bronx with Teach for America, Albers said she was drawn to a career in the charter school system.

“As the leader of a charter school, I’m able to see the needs in the curriculum and make adjustments immediately,” said Albers. “On any given day, I’m able to walk in and watch a teacher give a math lesson, and then talk with him or her afterward about what went well and what we can work on. It’s an atmosphere of open communication,” she said.

Harlem Success Academy 1, with its 60 teachers and 616 students—or scholars, as the school calls them—is a lot to manage. But for Albers, who has adored school since setting foot in her first English class, leading the Harlem elementary is a labor of love. “School opened doors for me,” said Albers. “I want to play a role in making sure other students have those opportunities as well.”

Albers’ school is one of 15 public charter schools managed by Success Academy Inc., a nonprofit that relies on funding from government and private donations. As a public charter school, the campus selects its students at random each year through a lottery.

Students attend classes daily from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., more than two hours longer than students at traditional public schools. In addition, the school allows its students to choose from a diverse range of classes, from music to chess, art, sports and science.

“It’s important to us that school is fun for our students. We want it to be something they look forward to,” said Albers.

The cleanup begins at the South Street Seaport. Photo by Aaron Adler.

Want to help out with the hurricane relief effort but not sure how? Below are links to volunteer opportunities around the city as well as places accepting donations of blankets, batteries and nonperishable items. You can also consider donating money or blood at redcrossblood.org.

• List of blood drives in NYC
• JCorps Volunteering Lower Manhattan
• Help Stuyvesant Cove Park rebuild this weekend 
• Donate or volunteer at a NYC soup kitchen 
• Places to help out in Brooklyn

Harlem:

• Residence 47 St Nicholas Avenue, #4D between 112 and 113 (volunteering & donation)
• 938 St Nicholas Avenue, #25 corner of 157th and St Nicholas Avenue (volunteering & donation)

Downtown/Lower East Side:

• Community Access (donate & contact online for information)
• Lower East Side Recovers (check website for information)
• CAAAV 46 Hester Street, Frnt A 212-473-6485 (drop-off for food, water, batteries, clothing)
• The Bowery Mission 45-51 Avenue D, 212-777-3424  (drop-off for food, water, batteries, clothing)

Upper East Side:

• Rockaway Relief 85th & 2nd Ave at Molly Pitcher’s bar (accepting a variety of donations)

Upper West Side:

• Brandeis High School on West 84th Street (overnight volunteers)
• BJ Synagoguge 88th Street Sanctuary at 257 West 88th Street, Thursday from 7:30 a.m. to 8 p.m (donations of bottled water, non-perishable kosher food, toiletries, batteries, radios and blankets)
• BJ Office at 2109 Broadway, Thursday from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. or Friday from 9 a.m. to noon (donations of bottled water, non-perishable kosher food, toiletries, batteries, radios and blankets)

—Compiled by Alissa Fleck

Photo Courtesy of Wiki Commons

Madison-Jackson, former P.S. 12 before being converted to condos, is now up for sale in its entirety, reports The Lo Down. The building was developed into apartments within the last 30 years, but sales of these apartments have been put on hold, as the current building owner has received many offers from buyers looking to purchase the entire building.

Michael Bolla, who worked with the the building owner to develop and market Madison-Jackson, attributes the high demand to pending plans to redevelop the Lower East Side area. The Madison-Jackson itself, for which sales only recently began and are now on hold, has an indoor swimming pool and apartments currently ranging from $500,000 to $1,000,000. The Lo Down reports “Prospective investors could stay the course, turn the building into a very high end development or convert the Madison-Jackson to rentals.”

Other schools around the City have “graduated” to residences in recent years as well. Former P.S. 90, now P.S. 90 Condos, in Harlem now boasts luxury condominiums, which its website says were “over 98 percent sold” as of last fall. Former P.S. 109 in East Harlem is under renovation to become a living space for artists, which should be ready to lease in 2014.

—Alissa Fleck

A new book reports on the surprising ways that traits like grit and curiosity can improve success in school and—even better—in life

By Tali Rosenblatt-Cohen

A journalist with long-time gigs as an editor at Harper’s and the New York Times magazine, New York City dad Paul Tough has spent much of his career thinking, reporting and writing about education. In his first book, Whatever It Takes: Geoffrey Canada’s Quest to Change Harlem and America, Tough chronicles the challenges and triumphs of the famous Harlem Children’s Zone.

His new book is called How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character. In part, it grew out of his reporting on kids from low-income neighborhoods. But it also became personal. “I had my son, Ellington, who is now 3,” said Tough, “and I found myself wondering about this question as a parent as well: What do you do to help your child succeed?”

Your book makes the case that noncognitive skills (which you call “character”), even more than academic achievement, are the key to long-term success. Can you define noncognitive skills?

The phrase comes from economists and, in particular, a Nobel Prize-winning economist from the University of Chicago, James Heckman. He started using this phrase about 10 years ago to explain what he was seeing in his data. He found that there were certain kids who scored low on IQ tests but would go on to succeed, or who would score high on IQ tests but not go on to succeed. As he looked deeper into the data, he identified these other skills that seemed to determine success. Some of the skills have to do with self-regulation, like conscientiousness and self-control. Some of them have to do with optimism, curiosity, zest—basically wanting to explore new things. And grit and perseverance are another set—they’re about intensity, sticking with something, bouncing back from failure. In lots of ways, I find “character” a more accurate or evocative term for these skills because it gets at how important they are. They are a really deep part of what it means to be human.

You place a lot of importance on the first few years and parent-child attachment. Should we be worried about a kind of backlash against trends like early enrichment programs, where everyone shifts from an extreme focus on academic performance to an intense anxiety about connection?

I do worry about stoking parental anxiety, but I hope the book will encourage parents to relax rather than freak out. To me, what the research on attachment implies is that most children need a basic level of love and security and nurturance. Studies on attachment indicate that 60 percent of American 1-year-olds display a secure attachment with their parent or parents. That’s a pretty big group. Attachment, the way I see it, is not a way to produce super-children; it’s about providing enough love and attention that your children wind up in the secure 60 percent. You can make a lot of mistakes as a parent—as we all do—and still get it right. And if you get it right, your child has a big advantage starting out.

You talk about adversity and how experiencing some adversity in childhood or early adulthood can make for a more well-adjusted and successful adult. If a child is lucky enough not to face much adversity, are there ways parents can challenge them?

It’s important to note that the kind of adversity many kids are experiencing in the South Bronx or in Harlem isn’t good in any way. It does real damage. But for affluent parents, it’s about a bigger shift in how you think about childhood. As we all know, kids in high-achieving, high-pressure schools are working incredibly hard. They are often burned out, stressed out. But at the same time, people like Dominic Randolph [head of the Riverdale Country School] are right—these kids are not experiencing real failure; they’re not open to real adversity or taking real chances. They’re not even enrolling in classes they might be interested in if it might pull their GPA down. But you can make the case that those are just the kind of classes they should be taking.

In some ways, the advice I would have for parents in that situation is to expand their definition of successful to include [the word] “challenge” much more than it is included now. The big message is to give kids the opportunity to take on more serious challenges, to go off in strange directions sometimes and have the opportunity to fail.

Why write a chapter about chess? Could children learn whatever skills chess helps them develop from an art program, a musical instrument or sports?

I think so. Chess was there to show how far kids could go with this type of noncognitive training. We think of chess as such a cognitive skill. But the most amazing thing to me going on at I.S. 318 [the Brooklyn middle school in a low-income neighborhood that won the 8th grade national chess championship] was that the chess teacher, Elizabeth Spiegel, was able to use noncognitive techniques to increase her kids’ skill level. Those skills can absolutely come from something other than chess. Sports, when they’re done right, develop the same things.

Kids learn that they can exceed what they think of as their limits—that they can keep pushing themselves. When you’re practicing piano, you get that same kind of instant feedback that you do in a chess game. When you’re playing chess and you make a mistake, an opponent takes your pawn; when you’re playing piano and make a mistake, you sound terrible. That sort of feedback, if you have the right kind of teacher, can lead to much bigger success.

Going back to optimism, zest and curiosity—how does one get those? Can they be taught?

One thing that was really striking to me in the research was how much those skills correlated with good parenting. When parents in the first few years were able to create strong attachment, a real sense of security in kids, those kids were more optimistic and more curious and were happier and psychologically healthier as a result. Those skills are really built very early on.

And what if they’re not?
Schools can do a lot. [But] the way we run our schools is not focused on curiosity. When you’re focused on tests, you’re focused on a single right answer. Successful scientists, though, are ones who go beyond the right answer and look for alternative solutions. There are ways to teach that and it involves a more open approach to learning than traditional public schools typically offer.

Optimism and happiness are definitely related. Some of these techniques that [the charter school group] KIPP is using—positive psychology and cognitive behavioral techniques—are designed to help kids with optimism and psychological well-being. I was really struck by the way these interventions helped kids reorient themselves in adolescence. At that age, they can think about things in a much more self-reflective way: Why do I feel this way? Why do I do this? Why do I keep making the mistakes I’m making? I think schools can really help kids reframe things and think in a broader way.

We keep hearing that American education isn’t up to par with learning in many other industrialized nations. As someone who has covered education for much of his career, how do you feel about the state of education in this country?

I’m very concerned about the achievement gap and the fact that, in some ways, it’s getting worse in terms of class and race. In terms of the education of the majority of kids in the United States, I tend to feel more optimistic. There are lots of schools I visit where kids seem to be getting a great education from Pre-K all the way up through high school. I do feel like this issue of high pressure in schools, the emphasis on tests and not enough on character, does make a difference. But part of the reason I feel less concerned about this in well-off communities is that parents in those communities are really good about responding to research, saying, “Aha! We did go a little too far in this direction.” On the whole, my concern continues to be kids at the bottom and how we still have not designed an education system that allows them to succeed.

After years of lots of love and attachment, New York City mom of three Tali Rosenblatt-Cohen now plans to make sure her children face a lot of adversity.

Photo Courtesy of Wiki Commons

There has undeniably been a spate of gun violence in New York City as of late. Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Councilmembers Fernando Cabrera and Jumaane Williams have announced their decision to launch the CeaseFire program, with the aim to reduce city gun violence.

The CeaseFire program is a  “public health model designed to reduce and prevent incidents of violence across the City.” It was designed in cooperation with the City’s Task Force to Combat Gun Violence, created last fall. The Force intends to release its full report soon.

Quinn called CeaseFire “an innovative approach to preventing gun violence that draws on the strength of our communities, and focuses on both rapid responses and early prevention.”

“We believe this initiative will complement the work of the NYPD and help save lives,” she said.

The program was developed from a model of “violence interruption and personal engagement,” and has been in the works for the past year, while the Force analyzed various safety and prevention approaches and practices. CeaseFire employs a model of immediate response, based on fostering relationships in the community and avoiding retaliation. Essentially it involves implementing a system wherein outreach counselors arrive immediately on scene in the wake of gun violence and try to build and nurture community bonds through peaceful means and dialogue.

Councilmember Williams said: “Our reward will hopefully be the sons and daughters of this city who we see walking our safer streets, rather than lying on them.” He acknowledged nonetheless the City still has a long way to go toward this ideal of safety.

The program will be implemented, with Council funding, in two neighborhoods determined most in need—the South Bronx and South Jamaica, Queens. A pilot program will also be implemented at Richmond University Medical Center to analyze a hospital-based approach.

“Our work in Crown Heights has demonstrated the positive impact that broad-based community-based collaboration can have in fighting the scourge of gun violence,” said Alfred Siegel, deputy director of the Center for Court Innovation.

The City’s Department of Health will fund two other programs in Harlem and East New York in conjunction with the City Council’s project.

—Alissa Fleck

Photo Courtesy of Wiki Commons

Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel, representing the congressional district primarily covering Harlem, won yesterday’s primary despite district redraws (occurring once a decade). The 82-year-old Rangel defeated Adriano Espaillat and three other candidates in the congressional primary, with the New York Times calling it “the toughest re-election fight of his career.”

Rangel’s victory gives him the shot at a 22nd term, despite a recent ethics scandal, reports Fox News. Shortly after his 2010 congressional victory, Rangel was the target of a controversy on tax and financial disclosure statements, which included misappropriation of congressional resources. He was ultimately convicted of 11 ethics violations.

Rangel’s new district includes less of Manhattan and additional parts of the Bronx. The redistricting means Rangel’s constituency consists of fewer whites and more Hispanics, reports the Times. 

Rangel, who received the endorsement of Governor Cuomo and Speaker Quinn, credits his incumbency and long career in the district with the victory. The Democratic Rangel faces a favorable chance in the November general election.

—Alissa Fleck

Williams with his family. Photo by Jon Lentz.

Clyde Williams, a candidate for the new 13^th Congressional District who has been overshadowed by incumbent Rep. Charlie Rangel and another challenger, State Sen. Adriano Espaillat, cast his vote in the Democratic primary this morning in Harlem.

After voting, Williams said he was confident he could come from behind and win today’s primary, pointing to late endorsements from the New York Times and the Daily News, a well-funded get-out-the-vote operation, and voters who want change.

“We’ve gotten many more volunteers of the last few weeks,” he said. “We’ve also had more people who have showed an overall interest in my candidacy, and more than anything else I think we are resonating because people realize we talk about issues.”

He said his campaign has “hundreds of people” out today at polls, driving vehicles, making calls and boosting his visibility. He said he didn’t have any target numbers for turnout, but that his campaign already knocked on more than 38,000 doors and reached at least 188,000 people.

“We’re going to continue what we’ve been doing, which is running a race based on actual numbers and making sure we get these people out to vote,” he said. “There’s definitely a desire for change. We hear that everywhere we go. … I think the only person who offers real change in this race is me.”

But he said it would be a challenge facing two strong candidates who are already in elected office – Rangel and Espaillat – even with a fundraising advantage in the race.

To read the full article at City & State click here.

Our hope has been realized, with two strong candidates in the 13th congressional district’s Democratic primary: State Sen. Adriano Espaillat and Clyde Williams, a man with experience on the national stage as well as in Harlem, still the heart of the newly drawn district.

Our nod goes to Williams, who presents the clearest vision—really a laser-like focus on how to bring more jobs back to the district. With his experience in job and community development in Harlem and elsewhere and with his ties to President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton, he has the best chance to be the district’s most effective representative, particularly if the president wins re-election.

We like Williams’ record, his intelligence and his problem-solving skills.

Espaillat has had an admirable career fighting good fights in Albany, but he hasn’t given us a reason to think he will be as effective as Williams in Washington. Although jobs and the economy are important issues to him, they are not his top priority.

Rangel, for his part, did not present us with a clear vision of what he hoped to accomplish in the next two years. He does not appear to have the energy and focus he once did.

Add to that his ethical problems, which are much more serious than “spitting on the sidewalk,” as he described them us. Even if you accept Rangel’s claim that he was railroaded into an unfair admission agreement and censure, he nevertheless is a fallen political star. The president and other Democratic leaders pay a political price if they get too close to him.

He believes the accusations are no longer an issue because he was re-elected overwhelmingly in 2010, but that ignores the fact that the district has changed and many voters are looking at Rangel for the first time.

Much of the Upper West Side has been cut out to include more of the East Side and parts of the Bronx.

The other two candidates in the race, Joyce Johnson and Craig Schley, have not run strong campaigns and did not give us reason to think they could be effective.

Clyde Williams is the best candidate in the race and we endorse him in the June 26 Democratic primary.

Manhattan’s East 91st Street Marine Transfer Station has long divided people into two camps.

Next year it may divide the candidates running for mayor of New York City.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Council Speaker Christine Quinn and other elected officials who don’t live near the defunct facility on the Upper East Side have pushed to reopen it as a way to haul less garbage by truck, ship more by barge and distribute trash facilities more fairly across the five boroughs.

On the other side of the issue are local lawmakers and community groups worried about noise, pollution and the safety risks of local garbage trucks. They have filed a series of lawsuits to block the planned reopening of the facility, which was closed in 1999.

Some candidates have been openly supportive of the station, which was included in the city’s solid-waste-management plan in 2006. Quinn, the candidate most closely associated with the project, has been a staunch supporter.
Last June she led the Council to allocate capital dollars to build the station after the mayor’s office had decided to postpone the project. She went to then-Deputy Mayor Stephen Goldsmith and convinced him to provide funding for the station and three others.

“The building of marine transfer stations has been done with community input, and we expect New Yorkers in every neighborhood to come together and do their part,” Robin Levine, a spokeswoman for Quinn, said last year. “In fact, Speaker Quinn’s own district on Manhattan’s West Side will include a transfer station to help ensure the borough is taking full responsibility for its waste.”

Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and City Comptroller John Liu cast votes for the marine transfer station when they were both in the City Council, and neither one has changed his position.
Mike Loughran, a spokesman for Liu, said the city has to make sure it has the necessary infrastructure to meet the growing demand for waste removal.

“This is an issue of borough equity,” Loughran said. “The community has every right to be heard on this issue and has even taken their concerns to court. Comptroller Liu will keep a close eye on this project, as well as the spending associated.”

But among the other Democratic candidates, the positions are less clear-cut.

Bill Thompson, who ran against Bloomberg in 2009, said he still had a lot more to learn about the facility and had not yet taken a position. “I’ve had one meeting with the residents and they laid out why they thought it was not a good site and why it was not cost-efficient,” he said.

David Mack, the vice president of Residents for Sane Trash Solutions, said his organization has recently started reaching out to the candidates to make the case for leaving the facility closed.

“We believe that it would be a very important question for all candidates in the primary season, especially given that Speaker Quinn seems to be supporting the construction of the facility,” said Mack.

Perhaps more than any other candidate, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer exemplifies the risks of explicitly supporting or opposing the facility. The Upper East Side is a key bastion of support for the borough president, so supporting the facility could result in campaign dollars drying up. Opposing it could hurt him in the outer boroughs.
Yet in 2004, then-Assemblyman Stringer was among the lawmakers who criticized the plan, calling on the city to build the waste transfer station in a commercially zoned location somewhere else.

“I’m here today because I believe that siting such a facility is a process ripe with difficulty,” Stringer said at the time. “While we acknowledge the need for a station, no one desires a waste transfer station in their backyard. They’re right, it does not belong in this backyard, but it also doesn’t belong in anyone’s backyard.”

Asked about his stance now, Stringer refused to answer. Josh Getlin, Stringer’s spokesman, declined to say whether the borough president is still opposed to the project, supportive of it, or neutral.

“Since becoming borough president in 2006, Stringer has committed his office to working with city agencies to minimize any negative impacts to the Upper East Side and Harlem communities that may result from the construction and ongoing operation of the facility,” Getlin said in a statement.

One of the opponents of the transfer station is Charles Dorego, a senior vice president of Glenwood Management Corp. and a member of the Gracie Point Community Council, another group opposed to the facility. Glenwood owns a number of buildings that face Asphalt Green, the recreational space next to the marine transfer station.

Dorego has also raised $149,900 for Stringer, making him not only the borough president’s biggest campaign bundler but the biggest bundler for any city candidate. But Dorego said his support for the borough president isn’t tied to his views on the marine transfer station.

“I don’t support anybody based on one particular issue or not,” Dorego said. “I met him personally through this thing years ago, and we’ve become friends since, and I’m a supporter of his. I don’t necessarily tie my support to him to the marine transfer station, because I’m not naive enough to think the borough president could stop this plan. He has absolutely no control over it whatsoever. You could talk to the person who lives on 79th Street about that.”

But one longtime observer of the controversy over the marine transfer station said that Stringer has “always been purposefully vague.”

“His thing is always ‘I’ve never wanted to directly oppose the East 91st Street Waste Transfer Station, because I don’t want to alienate communities of color,’ but at the same time he has been willing to smack around the process, how it came about,” the source said. “He’s attacked the process, not the site. So he thinks that gets some goodwill with the community here. He’s basically playing both sides.”

If nothing else, there is digital evidence that offers a hint of where Stringer’s loyalties actually lie: On Facebook, the borough president “likes” Residents for Sane Trash Solutions, the group opposed to the transfer station.

jlentz@cityandstateny.com

This article first appeared in the May 7, 2012, edition of City&State.