City Offers Some Schools More Control

New York, NY —

The city is offering more than 300 schools a shot at having greater control over their curriculum and spending in exchange for tough new performance standards.

REPORTER: Only 48 schools are currently part of the program but invitations went out this week to hundreds of others. Mayor Bloomberg says principals will have a lot more responsibility if they accept the invites.

BLOOMBERG: And we'll do everything we can to help them do that, training and support and funds. But in the end that's why they are here. And if they don't do it we are going to switch principals because we're going to educate our kids. :16

REPORTER: The schools will get an extra 150-thousand dollars, on average, which they can use however they want. The money will come from eliminating 350 administrative positions in the central and regional offices through a combination of layoffs and attrition.