Teachers, parents sue to block charter school network from sharing NYC school buildings
As a debate over expanding charter schools heats up in Albany, a coalition of teachers and parents is suing to block the city’s largest charter network, Success Academy, from setting up shop in shared buildings with district public schools.
Three parents, a transfer school teacher, and the United Federation of Teachers filed a lawsuit in Manhattan Supreme Court alleging that officials violated state education law and local regulations when it moved to place two new Success Academy schools in Queens and Brooklyn, without a full analysis of how the plans would affect students already there.
The plans were approved by the Panel for Educational Policy at the end of last year, before the Education Department pulled another three similar proposals in January in response to parent and union backlash.
The Education Department “has misled parents, the public, and the [Panel for Educational Policy] itself regarding the actual impacts of its proposed co-locations, including both schools’ ability to comply with impending requirements of the new class size law,” read the lawsuit.
New York City is required by law to provide space for charter networks alongside existing schools or help pay the rent for a new facility, which can become costly. Success Academy has reportedly bought a $30 million development site in Jamaica, Queens, for a shelved co-location there.
“We work hard to provide parents, staff, the Panel for Educational Policy, and the community with thorough information on the proposals and the best information available to us on potential impact of any co-location,” said Nathaniel Styer, a spokesman for the public schools. “We provided all the information state law requires to both the public and the panel in advance of the vote.”
But the petition alleges that legally mandated materials provided to the panel were “perfunctory and generic” — without key details about how the proposals may affect access to space for intervention and special education services or science labs, and the ability to lower class size.
The analysis of available space in the buildings is based on a formula that assumes class sizes will remain at current levels, despite the recent state law that will limit the number of students to 25 or less, depending on grade level, according to the lawsuit. Class sizes at two of the existing district schools surpass the caps, court documents show.
“The UFT and their allies have tried to sue 20 times before to prevent Success Academy co-locations and have never been successful,” said Success Academy spokeswoman Ann Powell, “because they are without merit.”
A spokesman for the city Law Department said it will review the case when it is served.
In December, the Panel for Educational Policy approved plans to place a Success Academy elementary school in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, alongside three high schools, including Professional Pathways HS, whose oldest transfer students are 21.
The month before, members approved the co-location of a middle school with Waterside School for Leadership, a middle school in the Rockaways in Queens. Roughly a third of classes in the existing school surpass the state caps on size, documents show, and could require up to eight new classrooms.
Current families were also recently informed that a popular summer school and camp program will not return to the site this summer, due to a scheduling conflict with Success Academy’s earlier start to the school year than district public schools, the plaintiffs allege. They say that educational impact should have been raised in the original proposal.
The lawsuit comes as two state budget proposals in Albany are facing an uphill battle to increase the current number of 275 charter schools authorized to open in New York City.
Gov. Hochul is pushing to open up more than 80 charters available under the state cap to city operators, who were previously shut out by regional limits. Her plan would also throw back into play more than 20 “zombie” charters that closed since 2015, whether the schools did not renew their programs or had them revoked.
It remains a point of disagreement between Hochul and Democratic lawmakers in the final week leading up to the statutory April 1 budget deadline.
The Alliance for Quality Education and the NAACP’s New York chapter, and the Black, Latinx and Asian Charter Collaborative to promote charter schools led by founders and administrators of color, held dueling protests in Albany on Tuesday for and against charter school expansion.
