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‘This space is not acceptable’
Success Academy rejects Mayor de Blasio’s proposed middle school location
SCI-FI FEVER!
Resorts World Casino invited hundreds of sci-fi enthusiasts to Queens for
Wintercon last weekend. See photos on Page 3. Photo by Dean Moses
BY ANGELICA ACEVEDO
Success Academy (SA) has rejected
Mayor Bill de Blasio and the Department
of Education’s proposed location
for a middle school in South Jamaica
(125-18 Rockaway Blvd.), after touring
what they called a “small” and “aging”
building.
“This space — about half of what
any other student in New York City
gets — is not acceptable” Gisselle Valiente
Sukh, a Far Rockaway parent of
an SA fourth grader, said. “This building
will work for only a year and then
we’d have to start this whole process
all over again. This is unreasonable.”
The 70-year-old building, which
used to house Our Lady’s Catholic
Academy students until 2016, will require
a complete renovation in order
to fix electrical and water damage that
would cost “several millions of dollars,”
according to SA.
De Blasio and the DOE announced at
a Nov. 13 town hall meeting that the location
would be “permanent” and can
house up to “500 students.”
But SA said that the 33,000-squarefeet
building can only accommodate
“330 students,” according to the building
capacity guidelines of New York
State Education Department. SA already
plans to enroll 227 students for
the next school year, and will add more
grades to the middle school, which
starts at fourth grade, after each year.
Additionally, the building only has
a multipurpose room, with no gym or
auditorium, according to SA.
“There are six public school buildings
with hundreds of empty seats and
basic facilities like gyms and auditoriums,”
Sandrian Campbell, parent of
two Queens SA scholars, said.
SA also believes the transportation
to and from the school’s location
doesn’t serve most of their families.
“While it’s a 10-minute bus ride or a
15-minute walk from SA South Jamaica,
travel from the other three SA locations
is problematic,” SA stated. “It’s
an hour and a half from SA Far Rockaway
and about an hour from Rosedale
and Springfield Gardens, with multiple
bus transfers involved.”
SA has maintained that there are
several other buildings in south Jamaica
that could accommodate their
students. They created a report that
lists four “underutilized” schools in
particular that could house up to 600
SA students, including Catherine &
Count Basie Middle School 72 and
Mathematics, Science Research, And
Technology Magnet High School.
State law requires the city to offer
charter school space that is “reasonable,
appropriate and comparable and
in the community school district to be
served by the charter school and otherwise
in reasonable proximity” as
well as help pay their rent when they
lease private space.
SA has asked for the mayor’s help
in finding a permanent home for their
middle school in southeast Queens for
more than two years now. Students,
their parents and educators have held
protests on the steps of City Hall and
at Roy Wilkins Park in recent months
to ask the mayor to keep his promise.
“It’s a shame that Success Academy
is declining such a great educational
space, which is so hard to come
by in Queens,” Miranda Barbot, press
secretary of the DOE, told QNS. “We’ll
make sure someone takes advantage
of the opportunity to use this building
to serve public school students.
We’ll discuss next steps with Success
Academy.”
Vol. 7, No. 48 56 total pages
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