Last Day For PS/IS 338 Middle School Petition

A group of concerns parents in Ditmas Park and Flatbush have launched a petition to limit enrollment for the upcoming PS/IS 338 at 510 Coney Island Avenue to middle school grades only.

The petition is addressed to NYC Schools Chancellor Carmen Farina, and details an urgent need for more middle schools in District 22.

The petition states:

“We fear that zoning the new school as a PS/IS will further deplete enrollment at 139 and 217, both of which lost funding at the beginning of the 2015-2016 school year due to unexpected under-enrollment. Our elementary schools serve a population that urgently needs every penny of their funding to help with ESL programs and other programs that serve the entire community, but particularly the immigrant community that is our base.

We also feel strongly that our kids need more choices for middle school in District 22. Parents of fifth graders were crushed at the beginning of this school year to learn that a new and exciting middle school right on the border of our district, MS 839, would be open to District 15 students only. This was a huge disappointment to parents in our neighborhood, who long to be able to apply to such smaller, specialized programs for our kids.

We feel strongly that our district should have the same kinds of choices and options that are open to children in other districts of the city. And if this new school has only 90 slots available to incoming sixth grade students, as was reported in the meeting, it will not provide many options for the approximately 200 students graduating from PS 217 and the 170 kids graduating from PS 139 each year.

In short, we hope that the Department of Education will reconsider the new school’s zoning and make it exclusively a middle school. We feel this will be the best way to serve the strong students here in the northern end of District 22.

In the comments section, other parents echo the petition’s tenants. One parent writes:

“We badly need more neighborhood middle schools and the associated facilities so that so many of our middle-school-aged children aren’t forced to travel over an hour each way to and from school. Having to travel so far puts a huge burden on the students as well as their parents. As neighborhood resident and taxpayer, the parent of a young child and the spouse of a neighborhood elementary school teacher, I urge you to make the new school entirely a middle school.”

At Ditmas Park Corner, we’re going to be expanding our coverage of District 22 schools and the challenges faced by neighborhood parents and students. In the meantime, voice your concerns today. See the petition to learn more.

In addition, write to us at editor@ditmasparkcorner.com if you have a school story to tell.