The O’Shea Campus on 77th Street, the former home of PS 452.
The city’s Panel for Educational Policy voted on Wednesday night to approve PS 452’s move from its current home at West 77th Street to the former home of PS 191 on West 61st Street and Amsterdam Avenue (PS 191, meanwhile, will be moving to 61st and West End Avenue). The move is part of a major rezoning plan for Upper West Side schools that was passed in November and will go into effect this coming September. While a local board approved the rezoning, the PEP has to approve school moves, so that’s why the 452 move wasn’t technically official until now.
Many parents at PS 452 fought the move, signing a petition and voicing opposition at meetings. Some parents have also formally challenged the rezoning, and could end up filing a lawsuit.
The principal and some other parents, however, supported it because the new location gives the school more space and amenities. Once application numbers are in, it will be more clear if PS 452 parents decided to travel with the school, or will apply to nearby schools like PS 87.
The new home of PS 452 on 61st Street.
Good Luck to everyone involved. I truly hope it all works out in the end, but logic tells me District 3 will be doing this dance all over again in a few years.
I hope this works out for the best and I think it will likely be fine in the end, but I still feel bad for all of the current PS 452 families who are being relocated for the next few years (or are scrambling for another alternative). Other people might be unhappy because the new zone lines moved them but that is life in the big city.
Has it been finalized what is being done with the open space that 452 used to occupy?
Carlos – Yes, the Dual Language Middle School that is currently housed at PS84 will be moving into the space vacated by by PS452.
Two hundred families publicly voiced their opposition to re-siting PS 452. Over 1,000 signed the petition not to move the school. Three people on CEC3, with self interest, wanted the school to move. Lazy, inept DOE abandoned their plans and let CEC3 dictate the terms. CEC3 submitted their plan to the DOE, and asked the DOE to return the CEC’s plan back to the CEC so the CEC can vote to approve it.
Love the way democracy works.
those 1000 signatures were bull shit- 452 does not have a 1000 families and having grandparents sign these petition does not make a strong case. The reality was fear of diversity.
You mean fear of diversity like Kim Watkins (chair of the CEC3 zoning committee) quoted in yesterday’s NYT article:
Ms. Watkins said of her daughter, “she would have, frankly, been the only white kid in the class — I was concerned about that.”
Kim Watkins should be forced to resign from the CEC3 effective immediately.
I almost jumped out of my seat as I read that comment. She was one of the engineers of the re-zoning plan in the southern portion of the district who screamed how it would end segregation even though other DOE plans would do the same thing.
Not only will she not resign, she will get voted back onto the CEC I’m sure.
JoannaGiveMeHope – “Fear of Diversity”. Give me a break. That was a nice tagline for all the pro-move families to use but the reality is the upper grades at the newly relocated 452 are going to be no more diverse than they are today.
Couldn’t have said it better myself. I am particularly saddened by the fact that our children became the pawns in this political mess
but what will become of the site?
When did this school stop being IS 44? I attended both PS 87 and IS 44 back in the 60s. Hadn’t realized it changed.