Q&A
NYC Public Schools' approach to under-enrolled sites
1:06:22
ยท
91 sec
Council Member Rita Joseph inquires about the New York City Public Schools' position on sites that are not meeting full enrollment standards. Deputy Chancellor Simone Hawkins explains the approach to addressing under-enrollment and the factors considered in decision-making.
- Providers are encouraged to reach out if they are under-enrolled to discuss possible modifications to their seat configurations
- The DOE considers procurement rules, original applications, and existing saturation levels in communities when making decisions
- The recent closures were primarily motivated by lease termination dates, not just enrollment levels
- Enrollment levels were looked at for three years before making decisions
Rita Joseph
1:06:22
You mentioned that the providers did not meet your threshold 95% just to piggy off of council member Hudson having a full enrollment but as you also testify there are 30,000 vacancies in the system.
1:06:32
This would imply that many programs are not meeting the full enrollment standard.
1:06:37
Can you clarify what New York City Public Schools position on what should happen with sites that are not full enrollment?
1:06:43
That's a piggyback off of council member Hudson's question.
Simone Hawkins
1:06:46
Yeah.
1:06:46
So I would encourage that if folks are under enrolled significantly or even slightly, they know why the most and the best.
1:06:54
And so if they know it's because their current seat configurations are not meeting the needs of families in their communities, I encourage them to reach out to us so we can have some real honest conversations about what we can do to support a modification of their slots.
1:07:08
Now I want to say this very clearly, it is not a blanket yes in which we can do that.
1:07:13
We have to follow procurement rules, we have to look at what they applied for when they applied originally, and then we have to look at what the existing saturation levels are in community.
1:07:23
If we know that there's already under utilization in school day school year seats for four year olds, we're not going to add more school day school year seats for four year olds in that community.
1:07:31
It's not helping the other providers and it won't help them.
1:07:34
And so we really encourage them to reach out, but again I want to remind the council that the motivations behind this was not strictly around enrollment levels which we looked at for three years, was around the lease termination dates.
1:07:47
And so providers who have city leased properties that might be approaching termination, we will be reaching out to have conversations.