New York City Wins 2007 Broad Prize in Education

By ELIZABETH GREEN
Staff Reporter of the Sun
September 18, 2007 updated 10:25 am EDT

New York City has won the nation’s most prestigious prize for urban education, known as the Broad Prize.

The announcement by the Broad Foundation is expected at noon today in Washington, D.C. Mayor Bloomberg, the city schools chancellor, Joel Klein, and the president of the city teachers union, Randi Weingarten, are scheduled to attend the announcement, spokesmen for the leaders said.

The prize was established in 2002 by the Los Angeles philanthropist Eli Broad to honor urban school systems that narrow gaps between racial groups and boost the performance of poor students. It relies heavily on test score data to determine which school systems are named finalists.

A member of the prize’s jury told The New York Sun that he favored the city above the four other finalists because of its sheer size — with 1.1 million students and 1,450 schools, the public school system here is the largest in the nation — and its progress in closing the racial achievement gap.

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