NYC schools lag in contracts with businesses owned by minorities and women; policy changes coming
A scant 1.5% of businesses that service NYC schools are owned by minorities and women, prompting a shift in policy at the Department of Education to improve diversity and fall in line with citywide standards.
Officials described the move as a way to “diversify the entire education ecosystem” that currently contracts with the oft-overlooked businesses at one of the lowest rates in the city.
One vendor told the Daily News the city would ask her to submit proposals around midnight — only to find out the following morning that another vendor had been chosen.
“It was clear the contract was already given, and you were being used to check a box,” said Selma Bartholomew, president of Legacy Pathways, a Black- and female-owned business focused on closing the achievement gap in mathematics and on increasing graduation rates.
“When it happens over and over again for over a decade, you realize that this is the culture. This is what I’m facing in a very large system,” said Bartholomew, affectionately known as “Dr. B.”
The policy changes, which were unanimously approved at a Wednesday night meeting of the Panel for Educational Policy, , codifies a commitment to contracting more businesses owned by minorities and women.
“We’re improving our procurement system to open it up to more businesses — with a clear focus on those owned by women and people of color,” said Schools Chancellor David Banks.
Banks said the amendments will expose vendors to the system’s procurement process, build their financial capacity and cut bureaucracy — while creating a vendor pool that reflects the diversity of its students.
“For many years, the DOE did not adhere to admin code,” said Karine Apollon, the chief diversity officer at the DOE, whose team was tasked with hiring more people of color across the school system, from the classroom to its vendors.
The local law — Section 6-129 of the administrative code — sets goals for percentages of total annual agency expenditures to be spent on agreements with Black, Asian Americans and Hispanic vendors, varying by type of contract. Local procurement laws generally do not apply to the DOE, a spokesperson clarified.
This school year, the DOE expects that just more than 3% of its spending will be on non-white and female vendors. That figure is up from the year prior when 2% of expenditures went towards those businesses, and from 1.5% in 2020-21 — but still far below the diversity of New York City.
“For us, this was really an opportunity to take advantage of a law that already existed,” said Apollon, “and know that we have models and examples of where this is working” at other agencies.
The changes make it easier for schools to diversify their vendor pool by removing a requirement that principals get three quotes when purchasing supplies and services from minority- and women-owned businesses. They also provide a point-preference for their products during the evaluation process.
Apollon told The News the amendments will “help level the playing field” and trickle down to children, who can benefit from new services like language resources or culturally responsive food from the suppliers. She added that students may also see themselves in businesswomen or vendors of color and strive to be like them.
“It’s important that we open the doors to those vendors,” she said.
