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Postcard from the Field

February 3, 2009

Shrugs, sadness as Brandeis High School learns it will be closed

by Philissa Cramer, at 6:01 pm
Brandeis High School will phase out beginning this year.

Brandeis High School will phase out beginning this year.

Few were surprised today when Department of Education officials descended on the Upper West Side’s Louis Brandeis High School to inform staff that the long-struggling school has been slated to close.

For years, the school has been among the lowest-performing in the city, with a four-year graduation rate of just 33 percent. This year Brandeis received a D on its DOE progress report, used to evaluate how much students are improving.

By the time teachers and staff gathered today in the school’s basement auditorium for a 3 p.m. meeting, most appeared to know why they were there. One teacher told me that rumors had spread through the building all afternoon. “There’s been talking ever since we had gotten our progress report,” said another teacher, Tara Bernard, a speech pathologist who has worked at the school for four years.

“We’ve been waiting for the other shoe to drop for years,” said another teacher as he left the building.

But some students said they thought the school was improving. A ninth-grader told me he heard the school had problems, but he hadn’t experienced them. And an older student said the school had fewer fights than in the past. Bernard, the speech pathologist, said the school had been relatively stable in her four years working there.

“The school has made some incremental improvements, particularly around safety,” Melody Meyer, a schools spokeswoman, said. But ultimately the chancellor determined that the building “needs a real structural change,” she said.

Meyer said the DOE waited until after last week’s Regents exams to announce the “potentially distracting” news. The school will not be permitted to accept any ninth-graders this fall and will close its doors for good when it graduates its last class in 2012.

Small schools will open in place of Brandeis, starting with three this fall. Two high schools, the Urban Assembly School for Green Careers and the Global Learning Collaborative, will open with ninth grades. The third school, Innovation Diploma Plus, will be a transfer school for students who have fallen behind and are at risk of dropping out.

Meyer said officials selected the new schools to appeal to current Brandeis students, rather than the demands of the Upper West Side. Brandeis has many students who are not on track to graduate, and a large portion of its students travel from the Bronx, Washington Heights, and Brooklyn. As Brandeis phases out of existence, more schools are likely to open in the building. Meyer said the local community on the Upper West Side might get a say in conceiving those schools.

Brandeis is the latest in a string of District 3 schools to be slated for closure this year. It’s across the street from another building that has played a role in the district’s space drama this year: PS 9, which also houses the Anderson School, a citywide gifted program. This summer, Anderson is set to move several blocks south, to the building that currently houses another school whose closure was announced this year. Another school, the Center School, will relocate into its space across the street from Brandeis; last fall, the Center School protested against the planned move.

Several Anderson parents and a third-grader said having Brandeis across the street had not affected them.

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  • Karen Kennedy

    I would like to know why this high school building, in the heart of the Upper West Side, cannot house a high school that is designed for the needs of the community? According to the schools spokeswoman quoted, the new high schools the DOE plan for the building are designed to appeal to the current Brandeis students, who come from the Bronx, Washington Heights, and Brooklyn. Meanwhile, here on the Upper West Side, we have one sought-after high school, Beacon, that can accommodate only a small fraction of our kids who apply, so they are also travelling around the city. Why not reopen Brandeis as a neighborhood high school? What am I missing?

  • http://sinksalive.blogspot.com KitchenSink

    Try (a) no seats available in Washington Heights and (b) a paucity of good high school options in all these locations.

  • old school

    A lot more schools will close and a push to make campuses and charter schools will continue. Todays students have all the rights and teachers have none. Dicipline a student and a complaint is made against you. The learning process can not take place unless teachers take back the class room. Cathloic schools had 1 Dean of Dicipline. Today public schools have an army of deans to control the school. WHY? Get rid of the students who are the proplem. Stop being so politically correct and careing for the students who disrupt the learning process. Get rid of the problem and schools won’t have to CLOSE.

  • anni

    I agree with Karen Kennedy. Why can’t this/these schools serve the community, which needs them, rather than bused-in children? Does anyone know if these 3 new high schools are charter schools? That would be appalling.

    I can’t imagine that there was any community input. While I have seen the DOE reach out for input on phasing in new schools at MS44 and PS241, I have seen nothing about high schools. I would be curious to hear from Brandeis parents on this.

  • Insider Knowlege

    If anyone thinks that the staff of Brandeis was to blame for this school they are sorely mistaken. About 7 years ago incoming 9th graders were programed to take a basic skills course that helped improved scholarship as well as help teachers identify at risk students and tackle problems before they were alowed to fester. This program was a product of teacher inovation and was mamaged by senior teachers on the staff. it is no coinciddence that the cohort for that class had the highest graduation rate in the school’s recent history… That program was sadly taken away by administration who for the most part disregarded any teacher imput at every turn. The administration got what they paid for today but sadl its the teachers some of whom are the best this city has that are paying the price. Way to to go DOE.

  • Dewie

    DO NOT BLAME THE TEACHERS it’s the easy scape goat.
    My spouse works at this school. Please lets stop blaming teachers. The problem is not them! They are an incebibly dedicated group of professionals who adore teaching children, why else work with the most difficult kids. All the teachers hold masters degrees in their subjects. With excellent work ethic and dedication. We live in a culture where the parents are not responsible for how they mess up their own child’s life, and blame it on the school. The parents own adult problems affect the children. Many of the kids come from the most disadvantaged homes in the city, and the kids commute long hours to get to the school. Lets look at the children who are suffering academically and have too many life problems to focus on school, from the parents life style, language barriers, poverty drug addiction. Too many kids go home to apartments that are filled with two or three families and no place to do school work, or support for their studies.

  • Upper Westside

    They need to continue to have a place for failing marginalized students? What should they do with all these kids. Brandies has been a school of last resort for all of the students. Only 130 out of 2,400 have made this a first choice.
    Rarely does a child choose this school. A Lot of the kids have no choice because they have so many problems that are unsolvable for a school, and parents not savvy or educated or uninvolved to get their children the type of help and services the family and child need.

  • Karen Kennedy

    To “Insider Knowledge” and “Dewie”: Who is blaming the teachers? I didn’t see anyone doing that. But Dewie’s post only reinforces my point in pointing out that “the kids commute long hours to get to the school.” Why should they have to do that, and why should the DOE be planning on continuing that? This building is in the heart of a residential community that needs good high school options. Why is it not being reopened as an academic high school for the community, and why can the commuting kids be given high school options in their own neighborhoods as well, so that they need not commute long hours?

  • add

    It seems you are asking why the students are commuting long hours. This stems from the fact that the high school admission process gives students complete choice to apply to any high school in the city and accept any high school that offers them admission. With such pararmeters, there are more students than you think commuting up to two hours each way. Just check out the Metrocard budget for the DOE.

    As Peter Kerr explained, ”Parents Perplexed by High School Admissions Rule” (news article, Oct. 24, 2003:

    For more than a generation, parents and students have been unhappy with the admissions process to New York City high schools. The new process is a vast improvement, as it provides greater choice, equity and efficiency. For example, for the first time, students will be able to list preferences as true preferences, limiting the need to game the system.

    This means that students will be able to rank schools without the risk that naming a competitive school as their first choice will adversely affect their ability to get into a school they rank lower. This process has been used with great success for more than 50 years in matching medical students to residency programs.

    Starting high school is an important step in every young person’s life. The new matching process is a means of giving voice to students’ choices about where they want to go to school.

    PETER KERR
    Director of Communications
    New York City Education Dept.
    New York, Oct. 24, 2003
    My question is since when does a fourteen year old minor have the same emotional maturity and legal standing as a 28 year old medical school graduate and how can the same admissions system be used with these two very different and distinct populations? Just from a practical standpoint. medical students can drive and the fourteen yer old can’t. It seems to me that this idea of students having more choice means students have really no choice at all.

  • Karen Kennedy

    You (or Peter Kerr of the DOE) attribute the students commuting to the “choice” offered by the DOE to apply to any high school in the city. But how does it help my child to have the “choice” to apply to distant high schools in other boroughs? Or to apply to high schools that graduate less than half of their students? It doesn’t. And it not make sense for my 8th grader to spend all fall touring and applying to high schools all around NYC, when the DOE now has the opportunity to open an academically challenging high school right here on the Upper West Side, that serves the neighborhood. The demand for such a school would be huge. But I see no indication that the DOE even considered the idea.

  • add

    I agree with you completely, Karen. None of this makes sense. We should have comprehensive academic high school of about one thousand students so we can offer speciality classes. sports teams, a theater group, a music program, AP classes, art classes, etc. We have to have schools that have a critical mass of students to be able to have programs. It would be great to have school have a diverse population so that students with different talents would be attending. Yet remember that the DOE has been steering low performing and disruptive students into the large high schools and this is one of the large factors that has lead to their eventual closing. When the small schools open, they will get a grace period to choose the students they wish to have attend this new boutique high school. Something has to be done with the students who will not be accepted so they will get pushed onto another large school usually miles from their home. This will continue until there are no large high schools left in the city. And by large I mean schools with more than 500 students.

  • Insider Knowlege

    ToKaren kennedy and others.. I am by no mean accusing any of you of blaming the teachers but I think it needed to be said because often thats the easy target when the term “failing school” gets tossed around. The way the educational system is set up it makes it hard for a school like Brandeis to be labled as anything but a failing school but its almost through no fault of its own except for the part where administration in this case purposely hindered the teachers from making improvements that would have helped to improve scholarship. When a school take an incoming class of 9th graders whose reading level is either a 1 or a 2 you are already behind the 8 ball. When teachers put their best foot forward and ar turned away wouldn’t it make sense to hear both sided before shuttering a school and tossing a hard working staff out? The 10 year and under teachers in that school worked very hard as well as a selct group of its most senior members. the 33% graduation rate is also misleading. A class that starts with about 900 freshmen by the tme they are seniors numbers around 400 or so. Of that 400 over 200 will graduate.. When you compute those numbers they fall directly in line with the average for the city. Why are we holding a school responsible for kids that no longer attend? There are no more pushouts anymore.. One can hardley hold the school which as a dept of gov’t responsible for personal choice and personal responsibility. Enough of the nanny state politics.

  • http://edintheapple peter

    Walk into a first period class in a small high school at the opening bell … I bet half, 2/3 of the kids aren’t there … they dribble in … long bus rides, long train rides … failing grades in first period classes are astronomical … aren’t 400 HS choices wonderful …

  • Insider Knowlege

    actaully kids just write off their first period class.. they don’t even bother to come in and the same goes for the last period too. i guess not having better teachers was clearly the reason they come late and leave early. there is zero accountability amongst the student body anymore.

  • Anonymous Blogger

    I live a block away from this school and I could not be more pleased to see it go. Tired of seeing these punk-ass kids loitering all over the neighborhood. Good riddance.

  • Richard F

    The closing of schools and conversion to small academies has been well covered by Sam Freedman in The Times. Even after the Gates Foundation, which had funded and spurred such conversions over the past decade with over $2 billion of funding, declared this particular reform to be unsuccessful, the NYCDOE continues to find ways to close and convert, under the leadership of Garth Harries, another Tweed staffer brought over from McKinsey.

    So, they find money to convert the schools, then dump kids who cannot get into the new smaller schools into these large high schools, then they declare them failing, and convert those schools.

    End result, and most important part of this: it allows the Mayor and Chancellor to score points by saying they were tough and closed another failing school. That’s what this is all about. Political points they can list for the mayor’s reelection, legacy, and Campaign to ensure that schools are controlled by politicians.

    Take a good look at Tilden, where the school was rated proficient on the Quality Review. They want that placed closed, and close it will. Sometime Tweed never even steps foot in a school before making such a decision.

  • http://BRANDEISTHOUGHTS ANAMARIA CORREA

    IT SADDENS ME TO KNOW THAT GRADES ARE THE ONLY THING THAT CONTRIBUTE TO THE VIABILITY OF A SCHOOL. THESE DOE ASSESORS SHOULD IMPLEMENT DIFFERENTIATED ASSESSMENT FOR SCHOOLS — REALLY LOOKING AT THE “WHOLE” SCHOOL. I THINK SCHOOLS NEED HELP TO BECOME BETTER, DOE COULD OFFER PARTNERING/MENTORING; SCHOOL CLOSINGS SHOULD BE THE “VERY LAST ALTERNATIVE.” OR NOT ONE AT ALL. I HAD THE PRIVELEGE OF BEING AN ARTS PARTNER AT THIS SCHOOL AND I COULDN’T HAVE ASKED FOR A MORE DEDICATED, SPIRITED, COMMITTED TEAM OF EDUCATORS. THE STUDENTS NEED THIS SCHOOL, AT THIS LOCATION WITH THIS TEAM OF TEACHERS. I AM SORRY THIS IS HAPPENING, PARTICULARLY AS I BELIEVE THAT 85 STREET, BEING CHOICE REAL ESTATE, PERHAPS CONTRIBUTED TO THIS DECISION. KIDS FROM ALL OVER THE CITY SHOULD HAVE AN OPPORTUNITY TO BE IN THE “UPPER WEST SIDE” NEAR CULTURALS AND IN A GOOD NEIGHBORHOOD — NOT JUST BE SEGREGATED NORTH OF 100 STREET OR SOUTH OF 14TH STREET.

  • Susan Klein

    Of course this came as a surprise. Our principal has done an amazing job to increase the quality of enrollment, as well as the output and academic growth of our students. Our administrators work very hard and I know for a fact that the principal and some of the APs spend their weekends at the school, working to improve the system. Yearly reports of Brandeis do show an increase in test scores throughout the last 6/7 years! So why the closure? The DOE could care less of the actual progress being made.
    As for the D rating- it’s unwarranted. It is a great school and 95% of the staff is sad to see it go. That calculation was made because a small percentage didn’t return their school surveys. Right. Sounds a little shady to me. WHy doesn’t someone investigate that aspect? A school board meeting should have been held between, Staff, parents, students and the DOE.
    The icing on the cake is that excessed teachers will now need to find their own jobs, when the closure is nothing caused by them to begin with.

  • Anonymous Blogger

    Why do they put a school for the worst kids in the city in an otherwise wonderful neighborhood. The tax payers of the UWS are already going to have to subsidize every aspect of these kids lives, from their single mother’s welfare checks, to their food stamps, to the public transportation that brings them to school, to their “education”, to their future incarceration, BUT we also have to tolerate them bringing their “thug-life” mindset to the stroller packed streets of the UWS. Why not sell that prize piece of real estate for a large sum and use the proceeds to build 2 better schools that are actually near where these kids live? They don’t want to spend an hour on a train every day getting to school any more than the neighborhood residents want to see them playing dice games on the street everyday. The teachers in this school don’t have a chance. When the parents don’t care, the kids don’t care TIMES 10. Unless the parents take an interest, everything else is just a waste of time. Whatever they want to do, let them do it in their own neighborhoods.

  • Nyashantty

    I am a bilingual student attending Brandeis, and i could not feel any more hurt than this. In my school, we have build a family, our teachers don’t look at us like students, but as friends. We are all one big family learning, and struggling in this world. I have been going through depression ever since eighth grade, and i’ve never felt any more better ever since i’ve been in Brandeis. I am currently recovering from my depression, without any medication and any of the sort, and I personally feel it is because of the attention, and love i receive from my teachers/friends. This is WRONG. Sure, perhaps our students cause disturbance in the community, but if the security tried a little more harder, maybe those students won’t be a disturbance. If instead of taking away, my whole school, they just increased security and kicked out/transferred the problem students, we won’t be dealing with this NOW. I LOVE BRANDEIS. There won’t be any other school like Brandeis, like the PEOPLE, the FAMILY in Brandeis. I have never felt so angry and hurt all at once. This is my family they are destroying. For the most dumbest reasons. It is not fair that because of students disrespecting the community, us students who DO respect it, must also pay.

  • Susan Klein

    @Anonymous: These kids need to be educated and as a staff, we truly do care about our children. We set great examples for them. The mistakes their parents made are not their fault, but your so quick to just let them stand by the wayside, simply expecting and almost wanting them to follow in their parent’s footsteps! Additionally, there are many people in the beautiful neighborhood of the UWS that can’t seem to pay their bills and live off credit cards, as they compete with their neighbors. It is ignorance such as yours that causes hatred and anger amongst the races. Try to be more tolerant and understanding. “It takes a village to raise a child”. You also must have forgotten the trouble you caused when you were young.
    Maybe you need to leave Manhattan. I’m sure the old ladies with canes and the homeless that eat out of your garbage are a sore sight for you as well. Stop being so angry and try volunteering at our school. Maybe you’d realize how anal and closed-minded you really are!

  • STUDENT

    WE ARE GOING ON TO PROTEST!!! MEET IN GREESONS 9TH PERIOD!

  • Love Brandeis

    Brandeis is a great school. I have excellent teachers that have numerous college degrees and have set great examples for me and many of my friends. They push us to do our best and it’s sad that the school is closing. It’s too bad that we have students that cause disruption in the neighborhood. However, it is this neighborhood which has opened my eyes to bigger and better things and has helped me to realize that I can achieve and I’ve set goals for myself to not have a sad future like that of my neighbors. How else can we grow if not through exposure and experience? I love Brandeis and would do anything to keep it as it is.

  • peter

    Most of these kids don’t want to be educated that’s why their attendance is poor. The same is true for there parents who don’t care because when you try to set up an appointmrnt to discuss their childs problems they don’t respond or deny a problem. Before it has to take a village it has to take a parent.

  • disagree with peter

    The child needs the village because no parent is perfect. We all learn from those that touch our lives in some way. Many of our parents work very hard, often two jobs to make ends meet.
    This school was in its place since 1965. It wasn’t given a fair chance. It has been improving. Look at the numbers. Its all about our unfair political system, ignoring the people this action will affect. The neighborhood complainers are just angry and bitter and are concerned because the economy is down, they can’t sell their apartments and they’re blaming school for apt prices dropping. 10 years ago I wouldn’t go past 82nd street!! Kick everyone out, why don’t you?

  • Mariela

    Its very sad to see Brandeis about to close down! It really brakes my heart… I was a student at Brandeis and I just graduated last year! I am very proud of myself for this accomplishment! Brandeis changed my life. I live in Brooklyn and traveling to Deis everyday was a change in my life that helped me grow as a young lady. As a child, I attended my zone elementary school and junior high, never really seeing anything beyond my neighborhood. Taking the train, I encountered many different sites, people. I made new friends at school from all over the city. Brandeis was like a home to many of us…we build a family there. teachers were great…no complains about them..yeah sure we have our ups and downs as many teenagers but its normal. being an honor student for 4 years straight, graduating with an advanced regents diploma and getting accepted to Baruch College was all part of my hard work and dedication and that of the teachers and staff at Deis. Those were the best four years of my life and i would hate to see Deis go down so easily, based off some dumb ratings. When I got accepted everyone told me good luck in graduating… All I have to say to those attending Deis Now, keep your head up high and when you know you can achieve something try your best and do it! be proud of Deis no matter what because I can asssure you one thing I SURE AM!! i really wanted to go back in a few years when I became someone rich and famous and tell people my experiences at brandeis but I guess it will be too late!

  • Insider Knowlege

    I can attest to Mariela as having been one of her teachers.. Outside of maybe two dozen students in a school of 2100 there plenty of students like her. The problems of this school can be solved but it takes a concentrated effort by the administration to tap into the vast talent of its teachers. IF they reached out to the teachers and collaborated with us we could move mountains together.. Unfortunatley if the decision is not reversed we won’t get the chance.

  • Ariel

    As a graduate of Brandeis Class of 2008, it saddens me to hear of Brandeis closing it’s doors. Thorughout my four years there, i experienced so many things, I had oppurtunitues that I would not have come by had I went to my zone H.S. Students who attended Brandeis travel 2 hours a day, just so that they can get away from their zone High School. Personally my zone H.S in the bronx is Evander Childs, four years ago Evander was a mess, fights, stabbings…the list goes on and on. Zone H.S simply don’t work for kids who do not want to be apart of such violence. Attending Brandeis was one of the best choices I made in my life, I had various oppurtunies at Brandeis. I worked at the New York Historical Society for twp years, whose internshop was open only for Brandeis students. The teachers at brandeis teach their students with all they’ve got, the become almost second parents to us. Some of the best experiences of my life have come from Brandeis. Being a memeber of Student Government 08′ opened my eyes to the unbelieveable actions of the schools administration. It’s not fair that because the administration at Brandeis decided to blind themselves to the needs of the teachers and students; that the students and faculty must now suffer. As for why the school should’nt be opened ONLY for the children of the upper west side community, where will Brandeis kids go? What will happen to them? How many High Schools have the amout of Bilingual and Special Ed. students as Brandeis? Will the BOE open a special school for kids who come to this country seeking education but simply do not know the language yet? No, ofcourse they wont. Whats the Big deal of sending your child to Brandeis as is? Are you aware of the schools that Deis’ students have gotten into? Obviously not. Sweeping disadvantaged kids under the rug will solve nothing. It will create a bigger problem, such that these kids will have nowhere else to go. Becuase of the over-crowding in their “zone” high schools. I love Brandeis, and know that with help it could be something great. How can we learn, with no books? Or over crowded class rooms? Does that make sense? For those who support Brandeis, lets keep fighting….i’m sure we can make a differnce.

  • Shatasia Allen

    I am a student who attends Brandeis high school.. For one it saddens me to Know that the school i will graduate from June 2009 will be practically closed. Believe it or not I enjoyed attending Brandeis for four years..Ive experienced alot while there.. I have accomplished so many things that i would not have seen myself doing 4 years ago, and i am proud of myself.. Im so thankful for every teacher who helped contribute to my education.. For those who are excited to see the school close just know that theres still going to be a high school.. Theres really no getting around it..R.I.P Brandeis

  • nelssy henriquez

    just like my friend shatasia i also attend Brandeis. what makes me up set is the fact that the music programs that we have in the school will be gone next year. Did the DOE ever think the domino affect this was goin to have, I guess they didn’t. Also, for those people that think we’re just a bunch of hoodlums there are kids out there who are just as smart as the kids that live in that area. Just because a chart says that 33 per cent graduate in 4 years. doesn’t mean that we don’t try to graduate. Saddest part of all the DOE isn’t giving us a chance to contuine our education. Good byr Brandeis!! :(

  • Neighbor 30 years

    I know some very dedicated, young teachers who have tried to make a difference at this school. I applaud their efforts. However, as a 30 year resident of the area, I am not at all unhappy to see the school go. I don’t have a problem with kids hanging out. Even the pricey independent schools have that problem. It’s part of being a teenager. It’s just that, until a few years ago, I would not walk down either the W 84 or W85 side of the building. It was so dangerous that neighborhood residents complained continuosly. Residents fought for years to improve the quality of the elementary schools for our children. Why can’t we get a decent, academically strong, neighborhood high school for them? Residents pray to get their children into Stuyvesant, Bronx Science, or an independent school. No one prays to get them into the neighborhood high school.

  • annoyed teacher

    Seriously??? 84th st was scary 10 years ago before this was happening. Now that the neighborhood has improved (because people 10 years ago finally were able to afford the lower rents than on 79th st) people want the school to go. Get real and be realistic. If the neighborhood folks hadn’t moved in less than 10 years ago, my colleagues and our stadd wouldn’t have this ridiculously unfair situation. Let’s call a spade a spade.

  • annoyed teacher

    And to use the word ‘dangerous’? Quite pathetic. I think you need to attend some classes to educate yourself. Our school is, by no means, dangerous! If is was, most of us wouldn’t work there! Wake up.

  • Mariela

    This goes to the neighbor of 30 years…WAKE UP and be realistic!! This school has been just like any specialized high school to many of us and for one I feel very proud!

  • Gina

    First of all, I was raised on the Upper West Side and attended Brandeis Annex and Brandeis High School. First to go was the annex, as Lincoln Center expanded, with three high schools in that area, someone had to go. Now the main building too? Come on, give us a break. It certainly must be that the now higher income bracket of the Upper West Side is what is really behind Brandeis High Schools’ closing. But do you even consider the history of this borough, this city, of the Upper West Side? Where are these children (yes, I said children) supposed to go? Why should they travel in from other neighborhoods? Because there are no High Schools in their neighborhoods, maybe? The DOE and the mayor both need to change policies with regard to teachers and the boroughs. Manhattan is the only borough where you see this type of division, division which as we all know is detrimental to the growth of this entire city. But the Upper West Side has become so out of touch with the rest of the city. The rents have always been a little higher here. Co-op and condo boards have always been tight here. You have big names on Columbus, Broadway and Amsterdam Avenues. But people have worked hard not just here, but everywhere in this city, to have a safe neighborhood. There are precints, loitering and tresspassing laws, drug laws which protect every area of the Upper West Side. They should be utilized & the schools should remain opened. This city is for everybody! What? You think that by doing away with the school you will live in a paradise? Think again my friend. Wake up people of the Upper West Side! The future is and will always be in the hands of our youth. Take care of them and you will take care of our city.

  • Bre

    Some people are so ignorant, the community wants to our school to go? Why? Because the kids hang out after school, this is occuring in every school. For some people to be so rude it’s crazy i am apalled by the attitude of the residents of the UWS. Remember when you were children? All the students that attend Brandeis are not (slackers) students actually try hard to achieve their goals and for the DOE to just step in and report the closing of our school in 2010 is sad. Also the resident are exaggerating every kid that attends Brandeis is not a hoodlum. Brandeis is not a dangerous school trust me….and for the local residents to say that they wouldn’t send their kids here that’s ridiculous. So basically what the local residents are saying is that they want the hoodlums “us” to get out their perfect neighborhood. Wake up this neighborhood was never perfect and crime free & for the record this school has been here for many years. The residents are impyling to just close the school and make it better for their children but what about the kids that want to attend a school where they feel like they make a difference. By closing the school that proves nothing and it solves nothing. I’m gonna go out on the limb and say the new schools that will make up Brandeis in 2010 will not be academically strong either and the kids will chill afterschool. Then what will the residents do…………..

  • Sad student

    I’m a student at Brandeis Highschool and i’m sad that it has to go. Using the word ‘dangerous’ to describe our school is unbelievably pathetic and untrue. Hello…. none of us would be there if it was ‘dangerous’. Kids hanging out? Wake up….that happens everywhere, even in the so called specialized highschools. I can’t believe someone actually dared to say that we bring a “thug-life” to the community. Thug-life? Pleeeaase…thats is soo pathetic. Neighbors actually dared to say that they wouldn’t walk down 84th st because it was too dangerous. If the teachers, staff and students manage to make it down 84th st alive everyday, why can’t the residents? They just want to see our school go.

  • Karen Kennedy

    As an UWS resident and the first commenter on this post, I would like to clarify that the residents of the neighborhood had absolutely nothing to do with the DOE closing Brandeis. The DOE did not close Brandeis at our request — we were as surprised as the Brandeis teachers and students. And the DOE did not do it to benefit neighborhood residents either — it is not planning to use the building for a neighborhood school, even though the UWS has no neighborhood high school and could certainly use one. On the contrary, the schools spokeswoman quoted in the Times article said that the new high schools the DOE plans for the building are designed to appeal to the current Brandeis students, who come from the Bronx, Washington Heights, and Brooklyn. Finally, the comments criticizing the Brandeis students and claiming that 84th Street is dangerous are ridiculous — many of us are on that block of 84th street daily, because our kids attend the elementary school across the street, and we have never had any problem with the Brandeis kids.

  • annoyed teacher

    @Karen:
    Read the descriptions for the new schools: first priority goes to students in Manhattan/neighborhood!

  • Karen Kennedy

    I was going by what the DOE spokeswoman said in the Times article, but I just read the descriptions in the new high schools catalog. One of the schools is a transfer school with no geographic preference, and the other two do give preference to Manhattan residents, but not to residents of the neighborhood. I do not consider that to be a neighborhood school, by which I mean a school that residents of the neighborhood could attend automatically. In any event, my main point is that it was the DOE’s decision to close Brandeis for reasons of its own — the neighborhood residents had nothing to do with it.

  • Davisa

    I agree with both Mariela and Ariel. I am so sad that the school is closing. This is my third year at Brandies. Brandeis is like a home to me. As a child I have attended a zone elementary school and my zone middle school. When I was filling out my high school application, in 8th grade, I wanted to go to a school that I would HAVE to commute to. I wanted to expand my knowledge of getting around the city and meet new people from all five boroughs. I am just so confused on why that is a problem. Everyone is bringing up how Brandeis students come from homes that are far away in the Bronx and Brooklyn. Why does it matter? The point is that we want to learn and we CHOOSE to go to Brandies. I have friends that love Brandeis so much that they come from places in Queens and Brooklyn that are more than 90 minutes away. So? I am also confused about how ‘dangerous’ Brandeis is. I have been here for three years and never have I once felt unsafe. I am at Brandeis some days from 7 in the morning until about 6 in the evening, because of TUTORING AND INTERNSHIPS. There is no danger! In my view, Brandeis is such a good school. We have AP classes, honor classes, student government, Model United Nations, a Newspaper, various sports teams, chorus, festivals, abroad trips, and a Science club (which this year we even competed against one of the best high schools in New York–Brooklyn Tech). But yet, the neighborhood residents claim that this is a bad school and that it is dangerous! Brandeis has opporunities that many of the top high schools also have. Many of the students who have graduated here have gone on to terrific and Ivy League schools such as Cornell and Syracuse University. Some of the teachers here are so educated, excellent, and have changed my life in many ways. It is not fair that there are so many good students that come here and they have to suffer because of the bad students. It is time that the DOE and neighborhood residents understand how the sudents feel and how there is also another side of Brandeis, not just how you picture it to be!

  • Marian

    I am devastated by the decision to close Louis D. Brandeis H.S. I grew up in the “tenement/slum” that was torn down so that the high school could be built-we were “evicted”/dispossessed in 1961 (133 W. 84th St.!). What a shame now that all those years are gone to naught. For the record, that block, 84th between Columbus & Amsterdam, always had the reputation of being the worst block in the city – when we moved to the Bronx, the Crazee Babee was on the Amsterdam corner, I forget now what was on Columbus. Anyway, it’s all so sad – as usual, the City gives up on our kids. And, all you kids, you are the greatest! Try to get all the pictures you can, and get extra copies of your high school yearbooks, and the high school ring, if you can afford it. Try to hold raffles and have a communal financial input so that all the students can get at least one yearbook and a ring. Remember, our common bond is we are New Yorkers (even me, after 32 years in Florida! HA!). God bless you all at this time. You are our hope, our future; remember, if not you, then who? If not now, then when? Godspeed! “Deis” power! Also, Gina, the best of luck to you and your endeavers. Grow, but don’t change. New York Power! Amen!

  • emilio sg

    Respose To Karen, We live in a diverse city that is intergrated only at street level. Our specialized high schools are more segregated today that they were 10 years ago, they currently have only single digit African American & Latino enrollment. Our response has been not to hold those schoools accountable but to create seperate but equal gifted schools in in poorer minority areas.

    The DOE has made it a point to offer opportunity to all children and choice to all parents by allowing them to attend schools all over NYC. Historically school segregation is a function of neighborhood segregation, while I can understand the need for community schools in the elementary level for travel reasons and age, we have an obligation to break this neigborhood/ school segregation pattern in the secondary level. If not in NYC then might as well give up any hope of some day fullfilling the mandate of the Brown ruling. Let the new schools be open to students from all over NYC they still will be open to more affluent white students in the upper west side, why can’t they just apply there and attend the schools with the rest of the students. Let’s move past our phobias and be better new yorkers.

  • Michael M.

    note to emilio sg,
    I dare say that “integration … at street level,” at least in Manhattan, is on the decline — a predictable byproduct of the plummeting stock of affordable housing and the boom in luxo towers.

    All part of Bloomberg’s vision for what New York City should look like. Our version of “Upstairs, Downstairs.”

  • http://facebook Kristina

    I was a student there thourght 05-09 it was my save house where i meet my best friends who are like sister and brother there teacher who like mother and father to me were i learn to love music to express myslef it sad to see it go it sucks beacause no one trying to stop it i will miss it but i will take my memories with me everyday and tell my kids about it someday

  • Leslie Vega

    This school was made for kids who were not accepted to any other school because of grades, behavioral problems etc. Basically a last resort. The school has been filled with losers and trouble makers since it opened in 1968. I grew up on west 84 Street and as a child going to the elementary acroos the street, not a day went by that there wasn’t a stabbing, fight or an arrest. Sadly, 40 years later, nothing has changed. Close the school and make a new one for kids who actually WANT to learn

  • matt

    I, for one, am not sad to see this school go. Let’s stop walking around the problem; the students, if you could even call them that, are the problem. Not the administration, not the new standards for school evaluation, and certainly not the teachers. These kids are leeches to society, they only cause harm. As commenter “anonymous blogger” said: punk ass kids. You know exactly what kind of kids I’m talking about. The gang and thug culture that permeates these kids’ lives is at the root of crime across the city. As for those who say: “oh gosh, I did sorta well and graduated from Brandeis, look at me I succeeded! Don’t close this school!” Well, you didn’t succeed. I graduated from the best public high school in the city (lower west side anyone?) and am currently at Columbia University. Brandeis adolescent space-occupiers will never know the first thing about success (and no, its not cash money, hoes, and bitches). I feel for the teachers. They deserve more.

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