Three years after the state passed a law assuring public charter schools fair access to public facilities, the city keeps dragging its feet costing highly sought after charter schools seats and millions of taxpayer dollars, according to a charter school advocacy report issued this week.
The Families for Excellent Schools (FES) report found that the city denied public spaces to public charter schools 79% of the time since a state law was past.
In District 13 covering Bedford-Stuyvesant, for example, the report found that 10 school buildings were underused while more than 600 students in the district are waiting for charter school placement. It also found that ten buildings are underused within the same district.
“The administration has delayed the process wherever possible, rejected applications in districts with ample public space, and forced educators to identify, secure, and pay for private space they often can’t afford,” the report says.
The report includes harrowing accounts of students forced to wonder where their schools will actually be located. In Brooklyn, the costs of not being able to find a space to teach children has been stark.
“Our inability to access a permanent home has taken a toll,” said Matthew Levey, founding Executive Director of the International Charter School of New York (ICS) in Downtown Brooklyn. “This is the number one anxiety for our parents. And it comes up in every prospective parent tour as well.”
Meanwhile Brooklyn has 23 renewal schools, which are traditional public schools that have been listed by the State Education Department as underperforming schools. Within District 13, there are 10 buildings with available spaces, according to the report.
But DOE Spokesperson Michael Aciman said that the report does not take into account that schools look at different metrics that would influence if a public charter school would get space. Those metrics would include projected availability of space in a school, to the number of schools that actually had available space.
“This analysis is deeply flawed and misleading. Each request for space is individually assessed based on a variety of factors including building layout, type of space, ability to provide a contiguous school environment, and the needs of the greater school community We continue to work with charter schools to ensure the equitable use of school buildings and provide high-quality school options for all students.”, said Aciman.
The report also claims that the State Education Department has overturned nearly all city denials of public space. The SED does not reverse denials for public spaces according to the DOE.
The DOE through a spokesman also dismissed the claim that more than $43 million has been spent on lease assistance. The actual number is $28 million for 2017, the spokesperson said.
