Shortage Of Pre-K Seats At PS 58 In Carroll Gardens Leaves Parents Scrambling

PS 58 at Smith Street between Carroll and First Streets.

Union Street between Columbia and Hicks Streets

New Pre-K annex for PS58 at 131-133 Union Street

A few days ago, I received an email from Carroll Gardener Hope Korenstein, who expressed her dismay at the shortage of Pre-Kindergarten spaces at PS 58. She writes:

"I am one of the unlucky parents who did not receive a seat for my son in the pre-k at PS 58. I was denied a seat even though I live in the zone and my daughter attends PS 58. For the first time, zoned siblings were denied seats; supposedly there are 23 of us.

What I don't understand - and what the DOE has so far refused to explain - is why they are only putting 2 pre-k classrooms in the new annex space? The building, at 131 Union Street between Hicks and Columbia, is 42 feet wide and three stories tall. It appears to be completely empty. Carroll Gardens is a wildly underserved neighborhood for pre-k, so why on earth would the DOE not use all of that available space?

I intend to keep trying to reach someone in the DOE who is willing to at least give me an explanation."

For the past few years, PS 58, a.k.a. The Carroll School, located at Carroll Street and Smith Street, has had three pre-K classes that seat 18 children each. In October 2015, the school announced that it was "unlikely that PS 58 will be able to retain its three Pre-Kindergarten classrooms in the building for the 2016-2017 school year."

Principal Katie Dello Stritto told parents that the problem was overcrowding and that the pre-K program would either have to be eliminated or be moved out of the school building on Carroll Street.

Luckily,  the Department of Education has been able to secure space for two of the existing three classes in a former bank building on Union Street between Columbia  and Hicks Streets and construction work is underway to ready the space for this coming September. 

A third class would  continue to be housed at the school's main campus.

Despite the fact that the new annex was several blocks away from PS 58, it came as a relief to many parents. The school, however, reminded everyone that "as in previous years, we expect that most of our Pre-K seats will be filled with children who will have an older sibling attending PS 58 in September."

Obviously, as Hope Korenstein's email indicates, quite a number of younger siblings who should have qualified were not offered a seat.  This also means that despite being able to retain three pre-k classes next year, the need for additional seats is far greater in the neighborhood.

And we are not even talking about all the four-year olds in Carroll Gardens who don't have an older brother or sister already at the school and who don't stand any chance of getting a seat.

Hope reached out to Principal Dello Strito to ask why the DOE is limiting the number of pre-k classrooms at the newly leased Union Street building to only two, "when it could so obviously accommodate more pre-k classes in the annex space?  Especially when Carroll Gardens is so horribly underserved for pre-k?"

Principal Della Strito, in an email to Hope responded: "I understand your frustration in that the space looks larger than the capacity of having only two PreK classes. I can tell you that when we were first told that they would be leasing the space and we would be able to have two PreK classes there that this was what the School Construction Authority had deemed possible for the space that was leased."

She assured Hope that she had spoken to Superintenant Anita Skop, about these concerns.  The superintendent has reached out to the SCA on our behalf and will be looking further into the specifics of the space and what is possible," according to Della Strita.

Let us hope that it is possible to add one if not two more classrooms to the Union Street annex to accommodate more children.  

How ironic that one of New York Mayor DeBlasio's mandates when he was elected was to create more Pre-Kindergarden seats in the city.  The obvious shortage and the overall overcrowding in our classrooms here in Carroll Gardens was entirely predictable given the number of new residential developments that have been added to the neighborhood.

Is your child one of the ones that did not get a Pre-K seat offer depute having a sibling at PS 58 already?  What will you do?  What alternatives are you looking at?  let us hear what you think?

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