Principal Nancy Harris, left, of a K-8, Spruce Street School, said she has her first waiting list, while Principal Ronnie Najjar of P.S. 89 said some thought should be given to enlarging her zone since her school is “shrinking.”
BY DUSICA SUE MALESEVIC | Downtown K-8 principals are warning that they could soon get squeezed at both ends as they look for space for kindergarten and sixth grade students in the same building.
Terri Ruyter, principal of P.S./I.S. 276, said at Assemblymember Sheldon Silver’s Overcrowding School Task Force meeting Wed., Apr. 15 that kindergarten overcrowding could have repercussions for the school’s sixth grade class.
For the upcoming school year, there are 161 children, who are zoned for the school, for 100 kindergarten spots, she said. Offers were made to 105 children and there are 41 on the waitlist. There are 15 kids on the waitlist for first grade and 14 for second grade, which is unusual as the waiting lists are typically concentrated in kindergarten.
Overcrowding at the elementary level affects middle school grades at K-8 schools, like P.S./I.S. 276, twofold: classrooms are diverted to handle more sections and then there are more children for the sixth grade spots.
Lower Manhattan has been plagued with kindergarten waitlists. Two years ago, 148 children were on the list for P.S. 276, P.S. 234, Peck Slip and P.S. 89. Last year, P.S. 276 also had a waitlist 41.
“We have a lot of concern about fitting our middle school students in because our students are guaranteed seats,” said Ruyter. “We can take three classes of middle school — we just don’t have room for more than that.”
There are maximum 99 sixth grade spots for current fifth graders, she said. Ruyter said that works for this year but the following school year, there are 106 fourth graders.
“I’m a parent of a fourth grader at 276 in this bubble year where I believe we have 15 to 20 extra kids beyond the 99 capacity,” said Matt Schneider, who has also been P.T.A. president. “I’d like somebody to respond as to what will happen with those students who are promised a seat from fifth grade to sixth grade.”
Drew Patterson, executive director of strategy at the Department of Education, said, “Students who are in the school have the right to remain.”
Patterson noted there are many popular middle schools in District 2 and it remains to be seen whether each child will decide to stay at the school. But if they do, the students will be accommodated.
We would have to open a fourth section, interjected Ruyter.
Right, said Patterson.
“I’m going to push back,” said Ruyter. “We do not have the real estate for that.”
Increasing sixth grade sections would mean enlarging the kindergarten waiting lists by reducing down to three sections, which is 75 children, she said. Each kindergarten class can have a maximum of 25 students.
“There are problems here,” she said.
There has been “playground chatter,” said Ruyter, of parents who have kept their children together at other schools making the switch to 276 in fifth grade to ensure a guaranteed middle school seat.
Ruyter said she wondered how it is going to play out down the road, and parents of current second, third and fourth graders are understandably nervous. The middle school choice admission process has been described by some as “broken” and lacking any real choice. Many parents have found it overwhelming.
“I can understand that as a parent having gone through the middle school choice process in New York City that you want to hedge your bets about middle school,” she said. “I have to respect that parents are rightfully concerned because middle school choice is really traumatic.”
Later in a phone interview, Schneider said parents at P.S. 276 are in a unique situation being in a K-8 school and that the middle school choice process isn’t as stressful for parents looking to stay.
“The big concern, of course, is these families who may move into the zone to help them get a spot in our middle schools,” said Schneider.
Ruyter said the same problem could happen at Spruce Street School.
“We have our first waitlist,” said Nancy Harris, principal of Spruce Street.
Harris said that the school will have three sections of kindergartens and made 83 offers. Spruce Street has 20 students waitlisted, she said, while a D.O.E. official at the meeting seemed surprised to hear this, because she had only 10.
Spruce Street will have its first sixth grade class this fall, then expand to seventh grade in fall 2016 and eighth grade in fall 2017. The school has 47 fifth graders so it has enough space and then some, said Harris, who doesn’t see it being an issue in the near future.
“The concern is always there that you’re an attractive school for people to transfer into in upper elementary,” said Harris.
Gentian Falstrom, senior director, admissions for kindergarten, said the D.O.E. was able to keep children who were zoned for one of the Downtown schools to stay in the area. It was a change from previous years, when the officials did not know if they’d be able to find space in Lower Manhattan when the waiting lists came out.
Children who were unable to get into Spruce Street and P.S. 276 were offered a spot at P.S. 234 or Peck Slip School, which moves into their permanent building this year.
P.S. 234 will have six sections of kindergarten and made 181 offers — 167 to children who are zoned for that school and 24 kids from Spruce Street and P.S. 276. P.S. 234 is calculating that some of the offers will be declined, either by children who enroll in “Gifted &Talented” programs or private school.
Magda Lenski, P.S. 234’s parent coordinator, filling in for principal Lisa Ripperger, said there are six kindergarten classes this year, leading to 12 sections of kindergarten and first grade next year.
“It works right now, but as the school grows and if we have to continue taking in more sections than what our school was originally built for, it eventually does create a problem down the line,” she said.
Peck Slip School Principal Maggie Siena said all 90 children zoned for the school got an offer for kindergarten and 42 were made to children from 276 and Spruce Street.
Siena said there could be four or five sections of kindergarten, depending on how it all shakes out.
P.S. 89, which will have four sections of kindergarten, does not have a waitlist, said Ronnie Najjar, principal, and all 92 children zoned for the school were given offers. Najjar faces the opposite problem: getting smaller.
“In my part of Battery Park City, we’re actually shrinking,” she said. “And shrinkage is not good for a school that’s depending on a budget to support programs. I’ve never been in a position where we’ve gotten smaller and I’m concerned about that.”
Najjar suggested something that she said was “a very dirty word that people don’t like to hear:” rezoning. She acknowledged that it is not an easy solution and it does bring up emotion, but perhaps now was the time to rezone.
“It just doesn’t make sense to have these schools that are coming in below capacity and schools that are jam-packed sitting in neighborhoods right next to each other,” Schneider said in the phone interview.
If a location is found for the proposed 456-seat elementary school, there would need to be a rezoning, at which time officials would likely look to shrink the P.S. 276 zone. The new elementary school was announced as part of the capital plan in November 2013.
“The [School Construction Authority] is still looking for sites and speaking with property owners for the school. We unfortunately don’t have an update as of yet. But they are continuing the search,” said Ben Goodman, South Manhattan and Staten Island Borough Director for the D.O.E.
Silver was more hopeful, saying, “Let me say it this way, there are rumors that the search has been narrowed.”
Community Board 1 Chairperson Catherine McVay Hughes brought up the possibility of a school at 5 World Trade Center site, and rumors have been swirling around the former Syms building at 42 Trinity Place, which reportedly could be 80 stories and 1,015 feet tall.
Jeff Sun, C.B. 1 planning fellow, presented an update on population in Lower Manhattan, which Hughes said “emphasizes the need for locating a school.” There is an estimated 1,030 increase in residential units for this year, with that number jumping to 2,739 next year.
Based on those numbers, the population could grow from 70,088 in 2015 to 74,402 in 2016 with over 11,800 being under the age of 19.
“I’m going to sound like a broken record: These data show the need for yet another school in addition to the one that still hasn’t been sited,” said Eric Greenleaf, who has conducted detailed analyses of Lower Manhattan’s school population. “It’s physical evidence. This isn’t a projection, these buildings are going to be built.”
