PS 145 begs for more space, with overcrowding worsened by co-location and now influx of refugee students

See email and petition below sent to the District 3 Superintendent about the extreme overcrowding at PS 145 on the Upper West Side that opened its doors this fall to 85+ additional students, both refugees and asylum seekers.  Even earlier, the school had lost their library and dedicated rooms for special education service providers to a co-located school.  

For more on how welcoming the school has been to their new refugee students, see this 60 Minutes segment from November, and  60 Minutes overtime.

From: PTA President <pta.president@ps145m.org>
Sent: Wednesday, February 15, 2023 11:33 AM
To: KSamuels@schools.nyc.gov
Cc: CEC3@schools.nyc.gov; Lucas Liu <lliu@cec3.org>; soumounthakeophilavong@gmail.com; ursila@cec3.org; kent@cec3.org; jeanie@cec3.org; scollins@cec3.org; mark@cec3.org; victor@cec3.org; helen@cec3.org; ramatasacko@yahoo.com; davidbanks@schools.nyc.gov; nycchancellor@schools.nyc.go; dweisberg@schools.nyc.gov; ykalban@schools.nyc.gov; cwhitemore@schools.nyc.gov; jmeller2@schools.nyc.gov; mn07@cb.nyc.gov; gbrewer@council.nyc.gov; sabreu@council.nyc.gov; MarkLevinenyc@gmail.com; Leonie Haimson <leonie@classsizematters.org>; Naveed Hasan <naveed@cs.columbia.edu>
Subject: Petition from the PTA of PS 145 to evaluate building space sharing  

Dear Superintendent Samuels,

As parents and guardians of students attending P.S. 145, we are formally requesting a firm commitment to re-evaluate the distribution of space in the P.S. 145 building that you provided during the January 18 CEC 3 meeting. We request a space evaluation in early March as promised, and as a result, more space allocation to PS 145 according to the growing needs of our student population. Our students are increasingly crowded into too little space: current enrollment at the school is 515, and our designated space is for 438 students. Our principal and teachers have displayed admirable flexibility and ingenuity in their use of the space we have, but our building administration requires your partnership in their commitment to our students. 

Please find the petition outlining our parents' and children's concerns and requests. We sincerely appreciate your urgent attention to this matter.

Thank you,  P.S. 145 PTA Co-Presidents and parents

Hearings on DOE enrollment/admissions policies: testimony from Deputy Chancellor Weisberg, Jenn Choi, and me

On Wednesday, Jan. 25, the City Council Education Committee held hearings on the DOE's revamped admissions policies.  The parents and advocates who testified as well as the Council Members were divided.  Some said that the new policies that removed academic screens from many middle schools, while basing admissions in selective high schools on a lottery after separating students in four tiers determined by their grades in 7th grade, cheats academically advanced students of the challenges they need to achieve their best.  Other parents and advocates were disappointed that the administration expanded the gifted programs in elementary schools, and in too many middle and high schools, academic screens remain and clearly have a discriminatory and segregating impact. The Council Members also seemed split on whether the current system is equitable and fair.

Council Members Alexa Aviles and Shekar Krishnan questioned Deputy Chancellor Weisberg if the DOE would alter any of their admissions/enrollment policies to more evenly distribute students across schools, to lessen the overcrowding at schools over 100% so they will be able to meet the class size goals in the new state law.  Sadly, he said  no; and he argued that more evenly distributing students across schools would depend on principals at underutilized schools to make their schools more attractive to parents. 

My testimony (see below) dealt  with how how it is DOE's responsibility to ensure that all students and schools can provide a quality education and meet the class size goals in the law.  I also point out that by more evenly distributing students, it will help underutilized and thus underfunded schools provide the staffing and programs their students need.  Chalkbeat recently ran a heartbreaking piece on principal in the Bronx, desperately trying to avoid excessing teachers, by spending days distributing flyers and producing a video to post on Instagram to recruit more students and thus receive more funding, though he was ultimately unsuccessful.  

Why should any principal have to spend their time marketing their schools; isn't it the responsibility of the DOE to ensure that every school has the resources it needs to provide a quality education?  If enrollment was more equally distributed, many schools would likely become more diverse as well, as the most underutilized schools are those that tend to have the highest percentages of Black and Hispanic students.

Weisberg repeatedly insisted they have a plan to meet the goals in the plan, without producing any evidence for that claim, though at times he seemed to limit his comments that they will meet the goals in the first year.  Because of enrollment decline, it is likely that the DOE will be able to make the first year goals for 20% of classes meeting the new class size caps without any effort , and maybe even the second year goals of 40%, if they don't continue cutting school budgets and enrollment continues to fall. 

But it is very unlikely that the class size goals in the 3rd to 5th years in the law can be achieved, without a plan to create enough space, either through aggressive expansion of the capital plan, and/or efforts to more evenly distribute students across schools, by rezoning elementary and capping enrollment severely overcrowded middle and high school enrollment at lower levels. 

In my testimony I also explain how the current "school choice" policies with parents applying to up to ten schools and the schools essentially deciding who to admit are based upon a failed free-market model from the Bloomberg years, in that the best schools will "win" by attracting more students, and the others would be allowed to wither and die, with other new public schools or charter schools put in their place. 

I found the testimony of parents of students with disabilities also quite affecting as to the hurdles their children face in being admitted to high schools that will help them reach their full potential.  Discrimination comes in many forms, and below my testimony is that of Jenn Choi, the mother of a student with special needs who also works at Special Support Services, which advises parents on how to navigate the labyrinthine and often very frustrating special education system in the NYC public schools.

Risk of Covid worse in crowded lunchrooms; and in many overcrowded schools lunch already starts at 9:30 AM

One of the most concerning risks of Covid transmission will take place in the cafeteria or other eating spaces, because students have to take their masks off to eat, often in very overcrowded conditions.  That's why NYC is now requiring proof of vaccination for anyone eating at a restaurant indoors.  Sadly, no vaccination is required for any student, even those 12 and up who are eligible.

In a Chalkbeat article on this issue earlier this month, the DOE advised the following:

In New York City, officials with the education department recommend that schools use outdoor spaces or other large areas for meal times, and to start lunch earlier or later so fewer students are in the cafeteria at once.

Yet the proposal to start lunch earlier ignores how many overcrowded schools already start lunch very early. In Feb. 2019 an article in City Limits pointed out in some schools, students were forced to eat lunch as early as 9 AM. 

Despite DOE promises to improve the situation after the Daily News and WNYC had posted data listing 75 overcrowded schools where lunch was served before 10 a.m. five years before, these early lunch periods still occurred at 41 of the 75 schools. Three schools had closed and 21 others served lunch between 10 a.m. and 11 a.m.

This was followed up by another expose in March 2019 in the Daily News, revealing that students at more than half of all NYC public schools were forced to eat lunch before 11 AM.  In response, the DOE spokesperson said,  “Students shouldn’t eat lunch before 11 a.m., and we’ll work with each school serving lunch before 11 a.m. to make adjustments if possible for the 2019-20 school year." 

A few months after the Daily News article appeared, Mayor de Blasio promised to take action: "That has to change. It's unacceptable. I'm a parent and I can say parents don't want to see that for their kids,"

It's impossible to check to see if the situation has improved, as the data on lunch times is no longer on the webpage where it once existed. Peter Fois of the DOE Office of Food and Nutrition Services emailed me that updated info may be posted in mid- to late-October.  

Yet you can take a look at a list provided by City Limits of the schools that had exceptionally early lunch times in 2014 and still did in 2019 here.  I doubt it's changed much since then.  There is also a list by school of how many lunch periods they schedule per day, as required by Local Law 60-2011, but there's no data posted since 2018-2019.  City Council sent me a copy of the report for the 2019-2020 school, and I sorted the tab entitled "meal periods" by the number of  lunch periods for each school per day.  Though it's hard to interpret the time that lunch is served from the data, one can assume that the more periods a day, the earlier lunch starts and the later it ends. John Adams HS in Queens was the worst, with eight periods of lunch a day.

Of course, the problem is generally made worse by the number of co-located schools in the same building, which not only increases overcrowding overall but makes scheduling lunch far more challenging, since each school wants its own dedicated time in the cafeteria.  I wrote about how the DOE has continued to co-locate schools throughout the pandemic in our  testimony to the Council on Sept.1.

Schools have reopened, as overcrowded as ever, with insufficient Covid screening

UPDATE:  On Monday, Sept. 20, the DOE announced their plans would shift again.  Now 10% of unvaccinated students whose parents give consent would be tested weekly, instead once every week.  

But to minimize quarantining, NO students in the same classes as positive cases would  quarantine, as long as they were masked and maintained three feet of social distancing -- which we know does not exist in many if not most schools.  It's like the Emperor's New Clothes.  Who will call out the Mayor and the Dept. of Health on this new fantasy?

Instead, if the Mayor and the Chancellor want to minimize disruptive quarantines, they should be administering rapid Covid tests to students in the same classes as those found to be infected, as they are doing elsewhere in the country, including Maryland, Massachusetts, Quebec and elsewhere. They should also be administering weekly testing to ALL students and staff, and mandate vaccination for all students over 12, as LA schools have done.

---

The school year has begun and predictably there are reports of lots of Covid cases, and many  overcrowded schools and classrooms. 

Already, one D75 school in East Harlem has closed because of suspected in-school Covid spread, and as many as 663 classrooms partly or totally closed. 

Here are photos of two other schools: the first, to the left, shows classroom overcrowding in an unidentified Brooklyn high school, the other below, a hallway at Midwood HS in Brooklyn.

Below this post is a video taken in the hallway at Fort Hamilton HS, also in Brooklyn.  Today's NY Post has photos of similar levels overcrowding at Forest Hills High School in Queens.   According to Adam Bergstein, the UFT chapter chairman and an English teacher at Forest Hills HS:

“People are wearing masks, otherwise it’s like nothing has changed from February of 2020 until today,” Bergstein said.

Fort Hamilton HS had 4,657 students, as of the latest DOE data, and was at 193% capacity.  Forest Hills HS with 3,705 students was at 184% capacity. and Midwood with 4054 students was at 165%.  

All three were all on the list of the 73 "Tier one" schools  that DOE had originally admitted to principals would be impossible to provide any kind of social distancing without provided with extra space, (though they refused to reporters to confirm the veracity of the list after I posted it.).  Yet fully 727 NYC schools are more than 100% overcapacity, according to the DOE's won data.

Back in June, when principals asked DOE  what could be done in so many schools where students pack "the hallways like sardines",  officials claimed they would provide solutions, including finding more space for the most overcrowded schools:

DOE spokeswoman Katie O’Hanlon said Wednesday that “there will be enough space to safely accommodate all of our school communities in the fall.” “We have three months until the start of next school year – part of our work to get ready is actively supporting a small number of schools that may face spacing challenges so that we can accommodate all students,” O’Hanlon said.

Clearly, that didn't happen. This level of overcrowding is inhumane - even in "normal" times. During a pandemic, it is simply unacceptable -- especially given the lax Covid testing regime of only one-tenth of unvaccinated students every two weeks. 

In the NY Post article, one Forest Hills parent suggested that the "school should offer a remote learning option to free up space, stagger classes or perhaps reduce the course load for juniors and seniors so they take only classes necessary for graduation."   

One epidemiologist warned against letting students eat in crowded cafeterias, where they have to be unmasked; another strongly urged the city to stagger classes and test for Covid more frequently.

Today, the UFT called for more testing : "Weekly testing of students under age 12, along with those in District 75, must be reinstated if we are to meet that goal."  Presumably this means the same 20% random weekly sample as last year, and only for children under 12 and D75 students.

But as Dr. Kitaw Demissie, the dean of SUNY Downstate’s School of Public Health told the NY Post, "Every student, every week needs to be tested,” Demissie said. “Ten percent is very small.”

 

Original list of "Tier one" schools which DOE said couldn't provide social distancing next year, with UPDATED info from DOE

UPDATE 8/6/21: After I posted the below on Wed. August 4, on Thursday Jessica Gould of Gothamist wrote about the confusion of several principals as to what DOE actually expected them to do in terms of social distancing.

Jessica also sent them DOE the list of Tier one schools which I had received from a confidential source, listing 73 schools which the Department had originally admitted had no space for social distancing.   Yet "the education department would not confirm or deny the veracity of the list." 

Then last night, shortly after the article came out,  CSA sent around a message to principals saying that DOE only expects those schools with the space for social distancing to do so.  The message also said the following: "If additional staff is needed to maximize distancing, please make the budget request to your BCO in writing and copy your superintendent."

All parents and teachers should ask their principals if they have a plan for social distancing next year, and if so, what it is.  If they say they lack staff but not space for this, please quote from the above and ask them to request more money from DOE to add teachers to do so.  And let me know know what you hear, please,  by emailing info@classsizematters.org Thanks!

___

August 4, 2021

 Last night at the UFT delegate assembly, Michael Mulgrew said now, the DOE claims that they "have figured out 3 feet of social distancing for all schools except for 50.  We have a hard time believing that."

See this sound file of his remarks at about 40 minute.  At about 1:08 in, he said that the DOE told him that every class in every school will have to adhere to the three feet rule,  except for those 50 schools.

This is literally incredible.  The DOE originally said they had a list of 76 "Tier one" schools which were too overcrowded to socially distance, and so they would find auxiliary space for these schools, though they refused to provide the list of these schools publicly.  

They also said there were more than 100 "Tier two" schools that would have to re-purpose gyms, auditoriums, and even storage closets as classrooms.  

Yet many principals and even Mark Cannizzaro, the head of the CSA, publicly said that the number of the schools that would not be able to provide socially distancing was really longer. Our estimate suggested that fewer than half of all students could fit in a standard sized classroom, given current class sizes.  According to the latest Blue Book from 2019-2020, 488,708 students were in schools that were at 100% or more -- about half of all students:

We finally did get the list of 73 "Tier one" schools from a reliable source this week, and created our own spreadsheet with their total enrollment and those of their co-located schools; see below.  

Please be aware, however, that even if your child's school is not on this list, the actual list of schools too crowded to provide any distancing is likely much longer. Parents ggshould be asking their principals what the plan is to provide three feet of social distancing next year.  A reliable source told me this week that he believed that the DOE had given up trying to find auxiliary space for even for "Tier one" schools, as they originally said they would. 

Another disturbing factoid from Mulgrew's presentation, at about 38 minutes in:  All students will be tested three times a year not just to discern their academic levels, but also for their social-emotional state, whose findings will go into a database.  What assessments will be used for this purpose and what  privacy protections will be used to protect this highly sensitive data in unknown. More on this soon. 

The list of 73 Tier one schools along with their enrollment of 54, 558 students, along with about 10,000 students in their co-located schools, some of which are even more ovecrowded than the others, is here and below.

Comments on the unacceptable classroom conditions at the Receivership schools, including Flushing and Grover Cleveland HS

Tonight, Class Size Matters will be speaking at the Flushing HS receivership hearings, and tomorrow morning at the Grover Cleveland HS hearings. Here are the schools at risk of being put in receivership by the state, along with the hearing dates.

It is a travesty that 66% of the struggling schools on the State receivership list and 57% of the schools on the City's renewal list continue to suffer from class sizes of 30 or more last year.  I wrote about this totally unacceptable state of affairs for Gotham Gazette last month.

Flushing HS is also hugely overcrowded, and instead of capping enrollment at the school and using available space to reduce class size,  DOE placed two new schools in their building several years ago, which is projected to worsen overcrowding and has caused the school to lose about ten additional classrooms this year.

Here are our comments on Grover Cleveland HS; according to DOE data,  there were classes as large as 54 students per class last year at the school.  Our comments on Flushing HS are below.  We are urging DOE that as a first step, all academic classes should be capped at 25 or less in every struggling school. 

Flushing HS Receivership Comments 9.25.15 by Leonie Haimson

[VIDEO] NYC KidsPAC Education report card for the Mayor press conference

Video taken by Michael Elliot at our NYC KidsPAC press conference on April 19 where we released our education report card for Mayor de Blasio.

Welcome back, parents (and teachers), and please let us know what your child's class sizes are this year

Dear parents:

Welcome back to another school year; I hope you all had a great summer.  There is one big and potentially great addition to our schools this fall – expanded preK.  Unfortunately we expect the damaging trend in K-12 to likely continue:  larger classes, and even more school overcrowding.

Last week, the results of the DOE school surveys were released, and for the 8^th year in a row, smaller classes were the top priority of NYC public school parents.  Yet class sizes have risen for 8 years, and many principals and teachers have told us they were hit with unexpected budget cuts over the summer, forcing them to let go of teachers and increase class size yet again.

We are still looking into why these budget cuts occurred - but meanwhile, we have posted a 5 min. survey for parents and educators to take here.   All responses will remain anonymous unless you indicate otherwise; please parents, also forward this survey to your child’s teachers and principal. If you don’t know your children’s class sizes, please count the roster, or if they’re older, ask them to count heads themselves, and/or ask their teachers.  Most teachers will be happy to let you know.

About a week ago,  parents at PS 85 in Queens emailed the Chancellor and complained that the DOE was forcing their 2^nd grade class sizes to increase to 35-36 students per class.  They copied me and I posted the letter from the PTA co-chair on our blog.  The next day the Chancellor announced she had reversed the decision, and was authorizing the hiring of another teacher to reduce class sizes to 24.

Note:  You can achieve improvements if you can organize other parents in your school and especially if you have your principal on your side. If you too are experiencing such an egregious situation, with outrageous class size increases, especially if they clearly violate the union contract, let me know asap at leonie@classsizematters.org.  Here are the UFT class size limits.

Sadly, the union class size limits are far too large and have not been lowered in forty years, despite the wealth of research evidence since about the critical importance of small classes.  And we really need a citywide school improvement plan; NYC children will never receive their right to a quality education solely on the efforts of parents at individual schools.

Nevertheless, here is a Parent Toolkit we have put together that you can use to organize other parents on the issue of class size, or any other issue you think important.  It has some basic strategies you can use to push for positive change in your schools, and some parents have told me they found it very helpful.