As predicted, the city Department of Education is maneuvering to deny space to charter schools looking to open or expand next fall.
This, despite a Citizens Budget Commission study that shows lots of underused schools in precisely the neighborhoods where 25 charters are requesting space.
The city educrats even got Politico to report on this summer’s rebuttal by Deputy Chancellor for Operations Elizabeth Rose to a pro-charter study that found 150,000 excess seats in the 10 districts in question. That figure, she wrote, “does not accurately reflect the space available for new and/or expanded co-locations.”
Some of the extra space is in high schools, she noted — and DOE (rightly) won’t let an elementary school “co-locate” in a building with older teens.
A fair point — except that a Families for Excellent Schools analysis shows nearly three-quarters of underused school buildings citywide now serve students in grades Pre-K-8. Very few high schools are underutilized.
And in 10 districts at issue, 78 percent of the buildings with at least 300 open seats serve kids in grades Pre-K-8.
Yes, the CBC and FES studies were based on building use during the 2014-15 school year. But DOE data show that the overwhelming majority of highly underused schools, with at least 150 open seats, were still in that category the following year.
After all, these are districts full of failed schools — which parents tend to flee.
And it’s absurd for DOE to argue the buildings will somehow reach capacity in the coming months.
In short, the city has plenty of space to allow at least 50 new public charter schools to open over the next two years.
The de Blasio administration should quit playing games and give these schools the space they need — so that the schools can give more New York City children the opportunities the regular public schools now deny them.