Years After Ruling, Poor Schools in New York Still Struggle Six years after a landmark court ruling required New York State to increase spending on public education, many schools in poor districts lack basic resources, and some do not even meet minimum state standards in certain areas, according to a report to be released on Monday by researchers affiliated with Teachers College at Columbia University. The researchers interviewed teachers, administrators and support staff members at 33 schools with high proportions of low-income, struggling or disabled students, including 12 in New York City. In many cases, schools could not afford enough staff members to meet standards in core subjects or in services like extra help for struggling students. Thirteen were not meeting state minimums for the amount of instructional time devoted to science, including three New York City high schools that were not offering any chemistry or physics classes, according to the report. The issue, as it has been for years, is money. The recession arrived not long after a ruling by the State Court of Appeals in 2006 and an agreement by the Legislature and Gov. Eliot Spitzer in 2007 ended a battle of more than a decade over financing of poor schools, and the state is $5 billion behind what it pledged to spend, according to the Campaign for Fiscal Equity, the group that won the court ruling. "These constitutional rights are not conditional, and they cannot be put on hold because there is a recession or a state budget deficit," the report's authors wrote. The group issuing the report, the Campaign for Educational Equity, is based at Teachers College and led by Michael A. Rebell, a lawyer and education professor who is the former executive director of the Campaign for Fiscal Equity. The report did not identify which schools researchers visited. It said that 5 of the 33 were not meeting state requirements in social studies, and that 3 fell short of minimum standards in math. Schools could not keep up with standards in art, occupational studies, health and physical education. None were offering the minimum amount of support services for struggling students, like remedial after-school programs. Students with disabilities were not receiving enough extra academic support in six schools, and English-language learners were affected in 13. Cuts, meanwhile, had slashed so deeply at some schools that principals reported taking on the duties of a secretary, a social worker or a janitor. Although a major goal of the lawsuit by the Campaign for Fiscal Equity was to limit class sizes, they remain high, the report said. All the New York City middle and high schools in the survey reported classes of 30 or more students. According to statistics from the city's Education Department, class sizes have been steadily increasing; the average class size in elementary schools rose to 24.4 in 2011-12 from 23.7 in 2010-11, and in middle schools to 27 from 26.8 over the same periods. In high schools, they remained at 26.3. According to the report, teachers said the minimum standards, hard as they were to follow, were still too low to ensure a meaningful education, which the court defined in its ruling as preparing students to become competitive workers and productive citizens. Even if the schools had the resources to meet the minimum standards, teachers said, students were unlikely to meet Regents standards or the state's new Common Core learning standards, which are more stringent. But between the recession and Hurricane Sandy, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo faces a difficult fiscal situation. The governor's office has repeatedly fretted over the fact that New York leads the nation in education spending yet apparently has little to show for it. "The facts on the governor's priorities for education are clear," Matt Wing, a spokesman for the governor, said in a statement. Last year, he invested an additional $800 million in our schools, despite a multibillion deficit, and prioritized low-income districts with a spending formula that gives them a higher percentage of state aid. The $800 million restored to school districts last year followed two years of substantial education cuts, which eliminated most of the extra aid the state had given out in the years immediately after the court ruling. Mr. Rebell said he hoped the reports would prompt Mr. Cuomo and the Legislature to incorporate more education aid into next year's budget. But if not, he said, his group would consider going to court, using the reports as the groundwork for its arguments. The Campaign for Fiscal Equity has also indicated it may sue again. Mr. Rebell has made one concession: given the condition of New York's finances, he and other advocates have offered to help the state find ways to do more with less. "The kids have a right to constitutionally mandated services; they don't necessarily have a right to a dollar amount," he said. I'm aware a lot's changed since 2007.