Queens Tribune

PS/IS 87 in Middle Village was never meant to handle the number of students it has today.

The century-old Middle Village School, located at 67-54 80th St., handled students from kindergarten through fifth grade until about eight years ago, when the Board of Education asked parents if they wanted to turn the school into a K-8 school, the first in District 24.

Until its conversion to a K-8, the top two floors of the school were district offices and were not equipped to become part of a school. The school board opposed the expansion, but eventually they agreed and the school was expanded.

Within a few years, as the first eighth grade class entered the school, parents began to realize the school was not equipped to handle them. On the first and second floors of the school, there are only one girls’ bathroom and one boys’ bathroom, and each bathroom only has one stall and one sink. These bathrooms are meant to accommodate approximately 125 students.

In the basement, the cafeteria is severely overcrowded, and the gymnasium is in a room not originally intended to be a gym, and is riddled with exposed pipes and wires. The building also has limited handicapped access; the only handicapped accessible entrance is a ramp into the basement and the school has no elevators.

This has become a larger issue recently as the school has attracted a large percentage of special education students, who are hindered by the lack of handicapped facilities. The school’s auditorium is located on the third floor and is therefore not accessible to all students.

The process of rectifying the problem has been long, arduous and very frustrating for students, parents, and policymakers in the community. Jeanne Forster, who has a daughter in fifth grade in PS 87, and who serves on Community Education Council 24, said students and parents love the school regardless.

“It’s a great school, great building with great teachers,” Forster said. “It just needs the facilities to match”.

Her daughter began at PS/IS 87 in the fourth grade after attending a private school on Long Island. Forster said her daughter’s academic performance has improved drastically since she began attending PS/IS 87.

The movement to update the school’s facilities began early in the decade. While he represented the area in the New York City Council, Thomas Ognibene allocated some money for updates to the school, including a new gym and an extension, but after mayoral control of schools began in 2002, the deal was eventually killed.

“Promises went out the door” said CEC District 24 President Nick Comaianni.

A few years later, Ognibene’s successor, Dennis Gallagher, was able to allocate money for new science labs, which were eventually constructed. The Community Education Council put the needed PS/IS 87 renovations and expansion on the top of its five-priority list in its five-year capital plan and submitted it to the Dept. of Education, but the DOE eliminated the school from the list.

“Normally, we don’t have a problem getting our top five projects approved,” Comaianni said, “but [PS/IS] 87 was bypassed despite being in the top five.”

Comaianni said the issue with the DOE came about because the DOE said a school needed to be overcrowded to warrant an expansion, and PS/IS 87 is not overcrowded. Comaianni said the CEC considered PS/IS 87 a special case and pleaded with the DOE to make an exception for the school.

Recently, the school expansion gained the support of the area’s current representative on the New York City Council, Elizabeth Crowley (D-Middle Village). Comaianni said he will resubmit the school’s expansion in the next five-year capital plan priority list, which was approved by the CEC Tuesday night.

The plans will include additional classroom space, with 612 more seats, a proper gymnasium, and a cafeteria to accommodate a minimum of 240 students with a properly serviceable kitchen. An elevator would be constructed to make the school fully handicapped accessible. Finally, bathrooms would be constructed on the first and second floods with a minimum of six stalls in each bathroom.

Comaianni said the CEC decided adding more classroom space was the only way to get the needed expansion to happen, but that it “kills two birds with one stone.” It adds much-needed seats that can be utilized to ease overcrowding in nearby district schools and allows for the school to get the new gymnasium, cafeteria and other renovations that are needed.

Reach Reporter Domenick Rafter at drafter@queenstribune.com or (718) 357-7400, Ext. 125.