by NYC Private Schools on March 5, 2010
Many schools have unofficially closed out their waitlists, telling parents who call that the upcoming admissions are now complete and no more acceptances will be made. Other schools still have their waitlists open. There seems to have been less movement off the waitlists than there has been in previous years but there are still options and choices for many parents, even well past the usual timeline that is expected.
Waiting Against the Odds
There are many instances where a family has received an unexpected call very late to tell them that their child has been accepted to the NYC Private School of choice. In one case last year, the parent was called exactly 1 week before school was set to begin.
If your child was not accepted to any of the Private Schools that you applied to, you do have options. You can (and should) stay on available waitlists and contact the schools to talk to them about your desire to have your child attend.
Moving On, Not Changing Course
Another option that is not as widely discussed is the age-old custom of try, try, try again. Though less publicized, many parents with children who were not accepted into a Private School waited, enrolled their child in public and then reapplied with renewed dedication the next year. Some children simply need another year to mature into them before schools are ready to look at them with fresh eyes and decide if they are a good match. Some children are accepted into 1st grade Private School programs after attending public for Kindergarten.
The right education for your child is your first priority. If you believe that education should include a particular private school then remember that you do have options, and applying for first grade may be one those options.
by NYC Private Schools on March 3, 2010
New American Academy Principal Shimon Waronker plans to open a trilingual elementary school in Brooklyn this September and the news has the whole city talking. Some of the discussions are about Waronker’s past achievements in New York schools, while other talks focus on the model of school that is planned on.
In an article carried by the New York Post, education reporter Yoav Gonan, the story about Waronker’s new school emerges.
Waronker, a Spanish-speaking Hasidic Jew who earned his stripes turning around one of the city’s most violent middle schools in The Bronx, will open a trilingual elementary school in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, in September. The kids will all graduate fluent in Spanish and French, in addition to English.
The innovative public school will put 60 kids in a classroom with four teachers, who will stay with those same students from kindergarten all the way through fifth grade
Waronker, who hopes to open as many as 50 replications of the school by 2012 if the model takes off, believes the unusual set-up will help build deep relationships among teachers and students and will allow instructors to target their lessons to kids’ specific learning styles.
Many NYC residents are familiar with Rabbi Waronker’s work and his success in taking a failing school in a tough neighborhood, Junior High School 22, in the South Bronx, and turning it around. Waronker, a member of the Chabad-Lubavitch sect of Hasidic Judaism, is a former intelligence officer in the United State Army. The school he took over, Junior High School 22, was listed as one of the 12 most violent in New York, with active gangs, attacks, drug use and alcohol on campus.
The future of Waronker’s new school and its very progressive methods of group teaching to an essentially large student body with multiple teachers in open classrooms.
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