Shared space, rising tensions for 2 schools

Good morning. It is Wednesday. Today we’ll look at a clash between two schools sharing one building in Manhattan, and how it reflects two of the crises facing urban school districts.

Two high schools have long shared a building on West 105th Street in Manhattan, and as sometimes happens with residents of shared spaces, tensions have arisen. Enrollment at one of the schools, Public School 145, has increased in recent years, while the other, West Prep Academy, has lost students.

I asked Troy Closson, whose reporting focuses on K-12 education in New York City, to explain this two-school story as it highlights the demographic shifts caused by the Covid-19 pandemic and the migrant crisis .

The first deputy schools chancellor said there are too many schools “that have fallen below critical mass.” One of these is the West Prep Academy. How many students, why the decrease and what does the student population look like?

West Prep serves largely low-income Black and Latino students. Before the pandemic, it had about 200 students. It is located in District 3, which includes the Upper West Side and parts of Harlem. That area has lost families and students since the pandemic. West Prep’s current enrollment is approximately 170.

The Ministry of Education wants to move West Prep to another building, and West Prep is also told it needs to grow. That has led to a tense conflict between West Prep and PS 145 over resources, space and what these student populations need.

That reflects the larger problem of declining enrollment across the city, doesn’t it?

We’re now at a point post-pandemic where there aren’t as many families in town, and many schools have questions about their current size and enrollment. School officials have said they are interested in doubling down on what works and what is popular so they can win families back into the system.

But unlike other cities where we’ve seen families leave public schools because of the quality of the schools, here in New York there isn’t much evidence that this has caused enrollment losses. It’s just families leaving New York, especially black families.

One of the questions some teachers at West Prep have is: If they have to move to another building for the purpose of increasing enrollment, and the same number of students are simply no longer in the district, what happens? They worry about the future.

Meanwhile, PS 145 is bursting at the seams.

PS 145 is one of the schools that has had an exceptionally high number of children in the last two years, from Latin America and Eastern Europe – Ukraine and Russia. The school has bilingual programs that make it a good fit for these families, and they have helped increase enrollment.

But parents at PS 145 have said that as student numbers increased, the school made painful decisions about repurposing the library and scaling back programs like music and media.

A complicated debate has emerged about what children deserve. Parents have argued about whether programs at PS 145, such as additional 3-K and pre-K classrooms, are necessary or luxuries when space is so limited.

That added an extra layer to this debate: what is a necessity?

How did the PS 145 change as space became tighter?

Parents say it has been difficult for them. At a hearing a few weeks ago, many parents who may have had an older child there a few years ago and now have a younger child there talked about the differences in those experiences and access to programs that aren’t about math. or reading, but developing other skills that their children do not get.

Where does the money come from – because it will come in anyway?

Funding from the Ministry of Education is allocated to schools based on the number of children they attend. School officials have said their concern is that if a school becomes too small, it won’t be able to offer all the programs it would like to offer. Can we invest in our sports team, or should we offer an after-school program?

What about the building West Prep needs to move to?

The Department of Education is trying to move West Prep to a building a few blocks away, but families and teachers consider it unsuitable and unsafe. West Prep has a special program for students with autism. They wander off more often.

A major sticking point is that the new building has rooms that open onto fire escapes. The concern is that West Prep’s specific student population would likely run down the fire escapes and be injured.

The new building also does not have its own outdoor space. The current building has a unique playground for children with disabilities, so the children at West Prep would actually have to take field trips to the building where they are now.

Later this spring, an education panel will vote on whether West Prep should be moved in time for the school’s opening in the fall.

If enrollment continues to shrink, how far away is New York from closing schools?

School administrators try to avoid having to confront this. We know from research that closures can be tough on children.

Any discussion of closures is unpopular to begin with. It’s something no one wants to talk about in any city, but especially here — because it’s not a school board that runs the system, but the mayor — it’s a particular landmine for City Hall.

Weather

For the first full day of spring – the equinox that ushered in the new season occurred at 11:06 a.m. last night – prepare for a mostly sunny morning with a chance of afternoon showers and temperatures in the low 50s. At night it is mainly clear with a minimum temperature of 32 degrees.

ALTERNATE PARKING

In effect until Sunday (Purim).

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METROPOLITAN diary

Lorimerstraat

Dear Diary:

I lived in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn in the early 2000s and had never ridden the L train past my Lorimer Street stop.

But one night I was out late with colleagues in Manhattan and had a little too much to drink. To get home, I took the L at Eighth Avenue, where I sat as the train idled awaiting its departure.

About an hour later I was woken by the train conductor at the last stop, Canarsie-Rockaway Parkway. He asked what my intended stop was. When I said Lorimer, he asked me to get up and follow him.

I walked him to the front of the train, where he told me to sit across from his booth. He left the door open and we spent the next hour talking about life, work and sports as the train headed back to Manhattan.

When we arrived in Lorimer, I got out, rummaged home to my apartment and went straight to sleep.