'It was a frustrating day': Tech mishap disrupts education of 1M NYC students

NEW YORK (PIX11) -- The snow caused a technological mess for the New York City Department of Education. 

The day of remote learning for public school students that was announced Monday morning did not go as planned. The city says the system couldn't handle the amount of users for the first part of the day. 

Mayor Eric Adams is calling for a review of the vendor, the tech company IBM. 

Problems logging in began around 8 a.m. as students and staff started the day. The administration says the company added more capacity and attendance was good by noon with more than 970,000 participants. 

About a million students attend public schools in the city.  

Mayor Adams and School Chancellor David Banks said the company was notified before today of the high volume of users. Some testing was done with schools but the company was not involved. 

Mayor Adams says glitches do happen. 

“This is a journey to get to perfection. I hope this is a teaching moment for IBM, as well. We expect more from our partners and vendors and today, they did not do that?” said the mayor. 

Chancellor Banks apologized to the parents. 

“It was not a wasted day. But it was a frustrating day and that is unacceptable. I want to apologize. This was a test and we did not pass the test,” Chancellor Banks said. 

Councilmember Shaker Krisnan (D-Queens) calls it an entirely foreseeable problem and a failure of the Department of Education.  

“It was understandable during the pandemic. Four years later, the Department of Education should’ve been prepared. Remote learning requires much preparation and planning. Make sure students have the technology they need or give the students a snow day,” said Councilmember Krisnan. 

Chancellor Banks said the city could not simply add another day at the end of the year, and the state requires a certain number of instructional days. 

In a statement, IBM said it has been working closely with New York City schools to address this situation as quickly as possible. The issues have been largely resolved, and we regret the inconvenience to students and parents across the city.”

The mayor says the city will do an analysis and review the contract.