New Jackson Heights School ready for fi rst classes
BY BILL PARRY
With more than 1.1 million
students heading back to
public schools on opening day
on Thursday, Sept. 5, the most
excited pupils can be found
along the Jackson Heights/
Woodside border — where
P.S. 398 opens its doors for the
first time.
The $62 million state-ofthe
art, five-story building
features 476 seats for pre-K
through fifth grade in
Community School District 30,
the second-most overcrowded
school district in Queens.
Councilman Daniel
Dromm, a former New York
City public school teacher
for more than 20 years at P.S.
199 in Sunnyside, became
an advocate for class size
reduction after teaching in
one of the most overcrowded
schools in the city, he said.
“They had to make space in
closets, locker rooms, dressing
rooms and elsewhere,” Dromm
said. “Class size reduction
will help teachers provide
instructional class lessons and
the city has never tried class
size reduction. With 34 kids in
a classroom, they can’t spend
as much time with each child.
The Department of Education
doesn’t take into account new
developments in the city and
the influx of immigrants
to the community, such as
Jackson Heights, Elmhurst
and Astoria.”
The school is located at 69-01
34th Ave. along the Brooklyn-
Queens Expressway, on what
was once White Castle’s
regional headquarters. A
developer once planned to
build an apartment complex
at the location, but Dromm
was able to get the School
Construction Authority to
step in and by the land for
$6.3 million in 2015 in order
to build the 65,000-squarefoot
school that includes a
rooftop playground.
Elsewhere, P.S. 303 in
Forest Hills will cut the
ribbon on its $66 million
addition that will allow the
school, known as the Academy
for Excellence Through the
Arts, to add grades 4 and 5 to
existing grades pre-K through
3. The new facility includes
Worker puts some finishing touches on P.S. 398 in Jackson
Heights, the borough’s newest school opening Monday, Sept. 5.
Courtesy of School Construction Authority
a two-story gym, science
rooms, a reading library and
special education rooms at
108-55 69th Ave.
Also in Forest Hills, there
is a $52.4 million four-story
addition set to open at P.S.
144, the Colonel Jeromus
Remsen elementary school.
The new construction added
26 new classrooms with a new
entrance lobby and seats for
590 students.
P.S. 66, The Jacqueline
Kennedy Onassis school in
Richmond Hill, which first
opened its doors in 1893 at
85-11 102nd St., also opens its
new addition with six new
classrooms for 124 news seats
with a cafeteria, exercise room
and new office space for school
administrators.
The School Construction
Authority is also opening four
new 3K for All centers across
the borough including the
District 27 Pre-K Center at 101-
49 Woodhaven Blvd. in Ozone
Park, the District 27 Pre-K
Center at 100-02 Rockaway
Blvd. in Ozone Park, and
the District 27 Pre-K Center
at 160-06 Cross Bay Blvd. in
Howard Beach.
Reach reporter Bill
Parry by email at bparry@
schnepsmedia.com or by
phone at (718) 260–4538.
Congressman
Gregory W. Meeks
5th Congressional District of New York
@GregMeeksNYC @GregMeeksNYC @GregMeeksNYC
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