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Two years ago, the Department of Education agreed to reduce classroom sizes. Since then, it has accepted hundreds of millions of dollars from the state to get there.

On Tuesday, members of the City Council Education Committee couldn't get over the fact that last year, despite the mandate and the money, class size averages actually went up.

"Maybe it is acceptable to the Department of Education, but to everyone else I know, it is unacceptable," said City Council Education Committee Chair Robert Jackson. "If we are receiving hundreds of millions of dollars to decrease class size, it is outrageous to see class size increasing."

The agreement, called the Contract for Excellence, was for the city to receive $3.2 billion in extra state aid over four years, meant to help the neediest students. But the DOE says it won't be able to meet the class size reductions it agreed to because of city budget cuts.

"It is highly unlikely that we will be able to not adjust that class size plan given the economic situation," said Department of Education Chief Operating Officer Photeine Anagnostopoulos.

The Contract for Excellence money was always supposed to be used in addition to a school's budget. But the way the city cut school funding last year, forced the schools that received this extra state money to use it as part of their regular budget, rather than for extra initiatives like reducing class size.

Advocacy organizations and the teachers union argue the state should hold the city's feet to the fire, limiting the size of every class and not just the overall averages. They also recommend withholding funds if the DOE doesn't comply.

"What we really need here is a cap in each classroom that actually caps the number of kids in that classroom," said Teacher's Union Vice President Richard Farkas.

"The state should hold back all contract for excellence funds from the city until the city has shown exactly what has been achieved this year in terms of class size," said Leonie Hamison of Class Size Matters.

Whether the DOE will be able to renegotiate the class size deal depends on the new state education commissioner, David Steiner.

Council members say they want him to force the department to stick to the original class size agreement, but with less than two weeks on the job, the Commissioner has yet to comment.