UWS HS For At-Risk Students Relocating To East Harlem Despite Pushback (2024)

Schools

The relocation vote followed a seven-hour meeting with the majority of speakers strongly protesting the UWS school moving.

Posted Wed, May 3, 2023 at 12:03 pm ET|Updated Wed, May 3, 2023 at 12:10 pm ET

The Edward A. Reynolds High School at 140 W. 102nd St. will swap buildings with the Young Women's Leadership School at 105 E. 106th St. due to the respective school's student population sizes.

The Young Women's Leadership School was founded by Ann Tisch, who is a member of the incredibly wealthy Tisch family.

The Edwards A. Reynolds High School is not a standard institution, though.

It's a transfer school that helps students at a greater risk of not graduating get back on track after they have fallen behind on credits for whatever reason, but is has seen a drop-off in its student population in recent years.

The Upper West Side school was custom built in the 1980s to fit the need of the community, and has a state-of-the-art gym, a health clinic, a cafeteria that contains a student-run catering program, and a child care center — as a number of the students are teenager mothers.

The East Harlem building it is now set to move to has none of those amenities.

The vote to approve the relocation was a tight one, with 12 in favor, nine against, and one person abstaining.

“You’re saying you’re not going to close down the school, but you might as well, because a lot of people are going to drop out of school,” said Alyssa Cartagena, 19, a student whose child attends the day care, reported the New York Daily News.

Chancellor David Banks said that the city would make "the necessary adjustments" to provide the "loss of support to those at West Side."

The Department of Education also issued a longer statement Tuesday evening regarding the vote.

"The recent PEP meeting allowed us the opportunity to hear personal anecdotes on safety and resources that will be taken into account as planning begins to make this change successful for everyone," it reads. "We are grateful to the PEP for seeing the vision that we have for West Side High School and The Young Women’s Leadership Academy, and for standing alongside us as we work to provide more [of] our city’s children with the education and supports best tailored to their needs.”

Deputy Council Speaker Diana Ayala called it the "coldest plan I could have ever imagined."

“I don’t know how any of us can allow a situation like this to happen, and still be able to get up tomorrow and look any of those kids in the face," she said during the meeting.

Safety concerns regarding students traveling to a new neighborhood was also a worry brought up repeatedly during the seven-hour meeting.

Other speakers, including Upper West Side Council Member Gale Brewer, suggested that the Edward A. Reynolds High School instead move into the closer-by Harlem Hebrew Language Academy Charter School, which was set to close at the end of this school year.

The Harlem Hebrew Academy building is possibly in the need of upgrades, though, making it impossible for the relocation to take place at the beginning of next school year, a DOE source indicated to PIX11.

As of now, the relocation school swap is expected to take place at the start of the 2023-24 school year.