At the end of the school day, gaggles of excited students at P.S 139 burst out the doors, some to frolic in the playground, while others join waiting parents to walk home, usually hand-in-hand.
It’s a timeless American scene that warms the heart, but what it hides is something else. P.S. 139, and many other schools throughout Brooklyn, are growing increasingly over-crowded—and the problem is likely to only get worse for the foreseeable future.
According to the New York City Department of Education’s 2010-2011 capacity report, about a third of NYC elementary school buildings are over capacity. Nearly a hundred of these schools are in Brooklyn. Out of the 5,003 new seats the department provided to schools this year, Brooklyn— the most populated borough—received only 343 of them. Yet, the borough continues to grow as a popular destination for young American and immigrant families looking for affordable housing and charming neighborhoods.
But as Mildred Decker, a young single mother with a child in P.S. 139, worries: “If the school’s overcrowded, how is a kid supposed…to get the right amount of help?”
Her concern can be seen in spades in Community Board 14, which represents the Flatbush, Midwood, and eastern Kensington neighborhoods. Three schools in CB14’s part of school district 22— P.S. 217, 139 and 315— are over-capacity, according to the department of education’s report. In October, the board completed its fiscal year 2013 capital and expense budget and recommended that a new elementary school be built.
“Overcrowding has been a persistent problem…for many, many years…and this has been a recommendation for consecutive budgets” stated Shawn Campbell, the community board’s district manager. “The biggest challenge in meeting this or any other capital need is the constraints on the budget in the City of New York in these difficult financial times.”
“It’s been a problem in Brooklyn and citywide” said Christopher Spinelli, president of Community Education Council District 22, the “budget is degrading year by year.” Recently, the state reduced its contribution to city education by $1.4 billion. There have been thousands of teacher layoffs and a series of school budget cuts.
Schools are having trouble finding room for incoming students. “Principals are having to do more with less. They’re not able to open up additional classes, so… they have to continue to fill a class until it’s at capacity” Spinelli said. “In some cases they wind up going over capacity since you really can’t turn a child away.”
Residents are growing increasingly restless. “We’re getting more complaints now than ever before,” Spinelli said, “because principals are not able to open up more classes and hire more teachers. So we’re definitely seeing more issues with overcrowding.”
Spinelli went to an overcrowded school as a child, and his children are now in the same situation. “My children have always been in classes that are at the maximum capacity and I don’t think that is an ideal learning situation” he said. “You always want a smaller class size.”
Repeated research shows that class size has a major impact on learning, student-teacher relationships, teaching quality, and overall academic success. In the 1980s, the landmark Tennessee Project STAR study, for example, showed that a class size between 13-17 students, for grades K through 3, resulted in higher test scores. According to the U.S. Department of Education, these results were especially significant for minority children and those from economically disadvantaged backgrounds.
Subsequent research also supports the Tennessee findings. In a study published this year by Switzerland’s University of Teacher Education St. Gallen and the University of London, reducing class sizes by even one student can improve learning. The study also suggested that a class of 17 students or less is ideal.
The city department of education has a set of target class sizes for different elementary school levels— 18 students for Pre-K, 20 for grades K-3, and 28 for grades 4-8. All of these numbers are lower than the city’s previous class size standards, but they are higher than what many researchers think is the best class size for optimal learning.
Deckard’s five-year old daughter is currently enrolled in one of P.S. 139’s kindergarten classes. “I was aware of [the overcrowding] that’s why I didn’t want her to go to that school” she said, but she felt as though she had no choice. She was told to send her daughter to a zone school. Before registering her child, she tried to contact the school board to see if there was any way for her child to enroll someplace else, but she was either shooed away or left without a response. “I just feel like it’s kind of messed up” she said.
Her child’s kindergarten class has about 21 students. Deckard says she was in a kindergarten class about that same size when she was little, but there was one major difference. “I remember when I was in kindergarten I had two teachers” she said. If the school cannot reduce the class size, she wishes there was at least another teacher in the classroom so that her child could receive more attention and better instruction.
Beth Orchulli, a stay-at-home mother of two, never went to an overcrowded school— but because of P.S. 217 her children now do. Although her son’s pre-k class is a descent size, her second grade son is in a class with about 25 other students.
When her family moved into the neighborhood two years ago, she already presumed that her sons would go to an overcrowded school. “It’s unavoidable unless you can afford private school,” she said.
Nevertheless, she wants change. “I think the children suffer,” she said. “There should be a bigger commitment to building more schools.”
Leonie Haimson, founder and Executive Director of Class Size Matters, is determined to stop overcrowding in New York City public schools. For the past 15 years she has used her organization as a means to inform the public about large class sizes and to push government into using state funding more effectively. “The Department of Education is legally mandated to [reduce] class sizes in all grades and they have not done so,” she said. “Instead they have allowed class sizes to increase.”
The Contract for Excellence has been providing state funding to the city department of education since 2007. Under contract, the money can only be used for certain purposes, which includes reducing class sizes. However Haimson believes officials are not doing enough.
Since 2002, Mayor Bloomberg has had control of the New York City education system, not the Board of Education. “The city has been neglectful and remiss for many years, and it has gotten much worse under the Bloomberg administration” she said. Mayoral control will stay in effect until 2015.
“Early grades [are] the largest in 11 years” Haimson said, “so [the administration is] violating the law and [is] in essence violating our children’s constitution rights to adequate education.”
Although people are troubled by the current overcrowding situation, the city’s education department does not provide them with much hope. Frank Thomas, a spokesperson from the city department of education, said that overcrowding in CB 14’s part of school district 22 is not severe enough to cause much concern. “We only have so [many] resources to do work with,” he said.
And so after receiving proposals from across the city, the department believes that other parts of New York are in greater need for new schools at the moment. It may be some time before the residents in the CB 14 area see that desired new school.
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