By WINNIE HU
Published: February 1, 2012
When new research last week showed that students at New York City’s growing crop of small public high schools had outperformed their counterparts at more traditional schools, shudders ran through some of the larger institutions.
And when Schools Chancellor Dennis M. Walcott embraced the study, financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, some principals and teachers at large high schools said they felt there was a target on their backs. Mr. Walcott vowed to continue pursuing the Education Department’s focus on creating small schools, which have about 100 students per grade.
“There’s unfortunately a fear that the D.O.E. has created that the only solution is these small schools,” said James Vasquez, the teachers’ union representative for the Queens high schools.
Mr. Vasquez added that even some of the better-performing schools had wondered if they were next to be closed.
Bernard Gassaway, principal of the 1,650-student Boys and Girls High School in Brooklyn, said, “It definitely puts pressure on us, but I think we in many ways epitomize the diversity of urban education.”
Yet even as the city moves to close more large high schools — 3 are on a list of 25 institutions that may close or lose their middle-school classes — many of them are likely to survive, at least for now. Among the remaining 67 schools with at least 1,000 students are some of most coveted in the city: Stuyvesant High School (3,200 students), Brooklyn Technical High School (5,100), Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School (2,500), Bronx High School of Science (3,000) and Townsend Harris High School (1,000) in Queens.
“As a graduate of a large New York City high school, I know we have some wonderful large schools and some wonderful small schools,” said Mr. Walcott, an alumni of Francis Lewis High School in Queens (4,156 students). “The key indicator for us is whether the school performs at a rigorous academic level and offers students a nurturing learning environment.”
Under the Bloomberg administration, dozens of large failing high schools have been closed or broken apart into smaller schools since 2002. Of the 67 remaining large high schools, 37 have received A’s or B’s on their progress reports. Twelve have C’s, and 18 have D’s or F’s.
The schools that have received F’s and are not yet on a path to be closed include High School of Graphic Communication Arts (1,700 students), in Manhattan; Herbert H. Lehman High School (4,000) and DeWitt Clinton High School (4,400), in the Bronx; andBoys and Girls High School, in Brooklyn.
But because school closings are not based on school progress reports alone — politics, community support and alumni connections all matter — even failing schools may be given time to turn around, often with a new principal in charge. Since 2009, new principals have been appointed at 10 of the 18 schools with D’s and F’s.
Mr. Gassaway arrived at Boys and Girls High School, long perceived as one of the worst high schools in the city, in 2009, and he is deep into an improvement plan that he hopes will turn the school around. He has already replaced eight assistant principals for poor performance and is in the process of overhauling the teaching staff.
Mr. Gassaway said instructional weaknesses had been compounded by the difficulty of working with large numbers of disadvantaged children. Nearly a quarter of the student body requires special education services, including 150 students in self-contained classes.
“When you have the most challenged students with the most challenged teachers, you’re going to have poor results,” he said.
Peter McNally, executive vice president of the Council of School Supervisors and Administrators, which represents 1,700 city principals, contends that it is unfair to compare graduation rates for large schools and small schools when large schools generally have higher student turnover and serve more disadvantaged children.
“It is stacking the deck against them,” he said. “They’re very frustrated. It doesn’t look at all the factors that make a successful school.”
Principals and teachers of large high schools say they offer a wider range of classes and extracurricular and sports programs and are more cost-effective to run because they operate with one principal instead of, say, three for the same number of students spread out in small schools. Increasingly, large schools also strive to give students more attention through small group instruction and mentoring, among other things, the principals said.
“There’s nothing that we don’t do better than a small school,” said Musa Ali Shama, principal of Francis Lewis, which received an A on its progress report.
Brendan Lyons, the new principal of the High School of Graphic Communication Arts in Manhattan, which is among 33 city schools that could have as many as half of its teachers replaced at the end of this school year and be reopened with a new name, said large schools and small schools were not mutually exclusive; there is a place for each, he said.
“What gets lost in the conversation is all the things you lose when you go to a small school,” he said.
But Mr. Lyons acknowledged that the challenges of running a large high school are also greater. That became clear this fall when he and his staff undertook 5- to 10-minute observations of classroom teachers — a task that had to be repeated 500 times.
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