Room In Schools?
Vacancies Outweigh Overcrowding
By Jessica Ablamsky
It should come as little surprise to Queens residents that despite increased capacity, overcrowding at high schools in the borough remains a persistent problem.
Unlike the rest of the City, where some of the bigger schools had more seats than kids, some 4,000 Queens students overcrowded a handful of select high schools in the 2008-09 school year, according to a new report from the City Independent Budget Office.
Exacerbating the problem, however, were enrollment patterns, which left some borough schools more than half empty and others bursting at the seams.
The Queens Tribune discovered that there were more than 7,300 seats available at under-enrolled schools in Queens, based on information in the report. Of those, about 60 percent were available at schools with a capacity of fewer than 1,000 students.
Excess capacity at the larger schools came almost entirely from four sites: August Martin High School, Beach Channel High School, Jamaica High School and John Bowne High School.
The problem is deeper than expanding capacity, said Doug Turetsky, chief of staff for the IBO.
“Some would argue that the small schools issue may be increasing overcrowding in some instances,” he said. “The question is, how do you get the kids into the schools that have room?”
Although students can apply to any high school in the City, many are choosing overenrolled schools, “perhaps due in part to the desire to avoid lengthy or difficult commutes. In some cases, students apply to schools with strong reputations in spite of overcrowded conditions,” according to the report.
The hands-off policy that the City Dept. of Education has towards promoting schools has left administrators to duke it out for students, said James Vasquez, the Queens High School District Representative for the United Federation of Teachers.
“Absolutely it’s a problem, it’s a management problem,” he said. “You’ve got these 1,400 islands [individual schools]who compete with each other and may the best survive, I guess.”
Those who suffer are students. While Richmond Hill High School has 22 trailers that serve as classrooms and help reduce overcrowding, Benjamin Cardozo High School has had three years of oversized classes.
Critics of the report argue that the IBO’s definition of overcrowding is out of touch with reality.
The IBO report underestimates overcrowding, said Leonie Haimson, executive director of Class Size Matters, a New York City-based nonprofit school watchdog. It assumes a maximum class size of 34, rather than the 30-student maximum that the City says it is moving towards, she said.
Other critics argue that overcrowding is overestimated. With another school in the building, two special education programs for District 75 students and ongoing construction, there is no extra space at Beach Channel, said David Pecoraro, UFT chapter leader for the school.
“If you bring it back to where we were, bursting at the seams six or seven years ago, you end up with a very volatile mix,” he said.
Reach Reporter Jessica Ablamsky at jablamsky@queenstribune.com or (718) 357-7400, Ext. 124.