In the fall of 2006, parents and students from the Northwest Bronx were stunned to hear that the New York City Department of Education recommended a 1,703 seat reduction in planned school construction in the Bronx, most of it in historically overcrowded District 10.  Our own research uncovered how the School Construction Authority is literally planning for failure in our high schools; their school construction plan that claims to “end overcrowding” is counting on 54% of incoming NYC 9th graders NOT to make it to 12th grade. 

At our request, the Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University prepared a report showing how the city’s school construction plans undermine its goal of increasing the graduation rate to 70% in four years and 80% in six years.  The Public Advocate of the City of New York subsequently expanded this research to include every borough and the result was the same.  All over the city, but especially in the Bronx, Brooklyn and Queens, the city is planning for failure. 

The story is quite simple.  The DoE draws on the enrollment estimates prepared by the Grier Partnership, a long-term DoE consultant group based in Maryland.  The Grier Partnership uses a 36% cohort survival rate (the number of Bronx high school students who will make it on time from freshman year to senior year) for Bronx high schools, held constant through 2014, and also projects a decline in enrollment caused by decreasing demographics (although Mayor Bloomberg was quoted as saying that the population in NYC will grow by approximately one million people by 2030).  Using these projections, the DoE is able to show a net decrease in the demand for high school seats in the Bronx, and therefore they have recommended to the City Council to cut planned elementary and middle school seats instead of adding additional high school construction.  City wide the Grier Partnership projects a four-year “survival rate” of 46%. 

However, we know that high schools in the Northwest Bronx remain severely overcrowded.  Based on the New York City Department of Education calculations for Capacity, Utilization and Enrollment, the Walton High School Campus is 689 students over capacity, at a 128 % utilization rate, John F. Kennedy High School Campus is 507 students over capacity, at a 112% utilization rate, and Dewitt Clinton High School is 1189 students over capacity, at a 135% utilization rate. 

The disconnect between the need for school construction (especially in the high schools) and the city’s inadequate plan is called – Planning for Failure. 

Some Common Questions

How does the DoE determine its school construction plans?

First, the DoE assesses the capacity, determining how many seats are currently available and being used.  Then, demographic information is used to project how many seats will be necessary in the future.  This demographic information is provided by the Grier Partnership and includes immigration, movement among ethnic groups, population growth and decline projections, and the cohort survival rate.

How accurate is the DoE’s assessment of current school capacity?

Many education experts are calling into question the way the DoE calculates capacity.  In fact, a study has been proposed for the next budget year to examine this and the DoE’s demographic projections that may be funded by the City Council and receive support from Saint Francis College.   Currently assessments of capacity are inflated because many schools have cannibalized art, music, and other specialty rooms into inadequate instructional rooms.  These are emergency measures that should not increase a school’s official capacity.

What are the problems with the Grier Partnership’s projections?

The figures in the attached data presentation illustrate the problem.  Our numbers are illustrative, not definitive; we are not privy to the enrollment and demographic data that the Grier Partnership employs.  But using their figures and their assumptions, what the following charts and tables demonstrate is that there is a huge gap between the seats needed to maintain a 36% projected survival rate and an 80% graduation rate for students that take up to six years to graduate.

Are the cohort survival rate and the graduation rate separate measures?

Yes they are.  A cohort for a given year is all of the freshmen that enter high school at the beginning of the school year.  The survival rate measures which percentage of them “survives” to the next grade.   In the case of the Bronx, only 36% of students survive to senior year as a cohort in the Grier Partnership projections.   The four-year graduation rate measures the rate at which NYC students who start 9th grade in one year then graduate from 12th grade four years later.

Can you relate the cohort survival rate and graduation rate to determine if the DoE’s capital goals support their educational goals?

First, it’s a challenge to compare anything to NYC high school graduation rates since the city and the state disagree significantly about the true graduation rate.  In 2007, the State of New York determined the NYC high school graduation rate at 50%, while the city maintains that the rate is actually 60%.  For example, in the Bronx, they project a survival rate of 36%.  If the DoE is projecting that only 36% of Bronx high school students will survive to 12th grade, and if it is on these projections that the need for capacity is based, then this explains why the city is not planning to build enough high school seats in the Bronx.  If the DoE wants to raise the graduation rate in the Bronx and the city, then they will have to build more high schools to make room for the additional students that “survive” to graduate. 

Your Help Is Needed

Plain and simple, the DoE’s construction goals have no relationship to their educational goals.  Our schools are exploding at the seams. 

The DoE has recommended that the new capital budget reduce planned school construction in the Bronx by 1,703 seats.  Even though these seats were planned for primary and middle schools, we believe that the need is great enough to redirect this planned construction to relieve the severe high school overcrowding in District 10.

The DoE must initiate a school construction program that will make room for students to “survive” to graduate high school in adequate instructional spaces.

New York City has a $4 billion dollar surplus and should use a significant amount of that surplus to invest in our children.  Do not pass a city budget unless the 1,703 seats are restored to the capital plan and direct them to be created for high schools in the Bronx.  Ask the DoE to align its capital plan to at least mirror the instructional goals of a 70% four year student graduation rate and an 80% six year student graduation rate.

Click here to download a report that details the negative effects of the Department of Education's Capital Plan

Click here to see projected figures of the Capital Plan on the Department of Education's Website