Hunts Point charter school facing imminent closure
BY JASON COHEN
Facing impending closure
at the end of the school year,
a charter school in the south
Bronx hopes it can win its
fi nal appeal next week and
stay afl oat.
Heketi Community Charter
School, located at 403 Concord
Avenue in Mott Haven,
is a dual language kindergarten
through fi ve school
chartered by SUNY Charter
Schools Institute. In December
SUNY offi cials notifi ed
principal David Rosas they
would be shuttering Heketi.
The school opened in 2012
and has been embraced by
the community, Rosas said.
SUNY offi cials evaluated
the school in 2017 and gave
it a partial renewal for three
years, not the typical fi ve.
“It came as a surprise,”
Rosas said to the Bronx
Times. “Here we are making
this growth and putting
changes in place based on
the recommendations that
they made.”
The state agency was worried
about poor test scores,
however even after improving
the numbers in 2019 and
outperforming the public
THE
schools in School District 7
last year, it still was not good
enough for SUNY. English
test scores increased from 21
to 38 percent and math 26 to
47 percent.
In November 2019, SUNY
representatives observed
several classrooms and
spoke with some teachers.
The SUNY observers did
not like what they found the
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principal said: they took issue
with poor classroom behavior
and disapproved of
the students using English
and Spanish in class, instead
of focusing on one language.
Specifi cally, the reps did
not like when a teacher asked
questions in Spanish that
were answered in English.
“They continued with this
narrative that the dual language
program is not strong,”
he said.
The classrooms may sometimes
appear out of control,
but in actuality they are just
letting them take a break, he
explained.
“Our mission here is not
to produce robots,” Rosas remarked.
“It is very hard to
have visitors who don’t work
in school say what it should
look like.”
On Monday, December 16,
Rosas was notifi ed the school
would be closing. He told the
teachers immediately and
sent a letter to the parents on
Wednesday, January 8.
A day later, moms, dads
and kids arrived at school
crying and asked why it was
happening.
“It was a grieving process
and still is,” he said. “I
myself had a little bit of an
emotional moment. We all
thought we were going to get
a fi ve year renewal.”
On Tuesday, January 28,
the school appealled its imminent
closure with SUNY and
in February they learned it
was denied. Their last and fi -
nal appeal is Tuesday, March
10 in Manhattan. Many parents
are concerned and will
be joining Rosas next week at
the hearing.
Parent Teacher Association
president Dolores Hook
and Stephanie Caban have
sons in the second grade and
are both devastated about the
news. Hook said the teachers
know the kids by name
and called Heketi Community
Charter School a special
place.
“I’m very upset about this
happening,” Hook said.
Caban, whose son Tyler
started at the school in October,
was despondent when he
heard about the closure.
“I went straight to the
principal and said what can
we do to fi ght,” Caban said.
A teacher with a student at the Heketi School.
Photo by Wendy BarraleHeketi School
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