John Jay High School, and some hard truths

The NYC Department of Education is proposing changes to the John Jay High School campus in Park Slope (which currently houses the Secondary Schools of Law, Journalism, and Research). DOE’s proposal is to bring in a new, fourth school – Millennium Brooklyn, a selective high school, with priority given to students who reside in Brooklyn, as well as an inclusion program for students with autism – and to phase out the middle school programs at the Secondary Schools of Law and Journalism (they would continue as high schools).

The proposed changes raise a series of challenging issues. I believe it is important to be honest about the hard truths of race, class, inequality, and education that the situation at John Jay highlights. My testimony tonight will seek to address these truths, and to make recommendations to the DOE.

In recent weeks, I have spoken with many students, parents, and educators at the schools currently in the John Jay building. Many of them are angry about the proposals, and about deeper educational inequalities. These schools predominantly serve African-American and Latino students, with the vast majority from low-income families, yet the campus sits in the middle of Park Slope, a primarily white, upper-middle class community. These school communities rightly feel they have been neglected – by the DOE, and by the Park Slope community – for the past decade.

The disparity between the schools and the community highlights deep racial, economic, and educational inequalities that plague our city and society. From housing, to employment, to health care, to policing and public safety, the data is clear. If you are white, and if you are middle class, you are far more likely to do well than if you are African-American or Latino, and if you are low-income. Despite our values and action towards racial and economic justice, we live in one of the most unequal places in the country. And of course, this is true in our public schools as well. If you are white and middle class in Brooklyn, your children are more likely to attend a school that meets educational standards, that has arts and cultural programs, that has sufficient resources to provide high quality education. Most days, we look away from these haunting truths. But the situation at John Jay calls us to look at them. So I understand the anger and frustration being expressed.

At the same time, families with 8th-grade students have repeatedly reached out to my office, frustrated that students in Manhattan have several small, selective high-schools that give priority to Manhattan students, while students in Brooklyn do not. Many have expressed a desire for an option like this in Brooklyn. And students with autism spectrum disorders face overwhelming difficulty finding a high-school that can meet their needs, and in particular one that integrates them into mainstream education. These two problems are the root of the proposal for the new Millennium Brooklyn school, and they are very real problems as well.

There are no simple answers to these problems. But that does not absolve us of responsibility – to confront these issues honestly, to commit more strongly to address broader education inequality, and to do our very best to help all students, in all schools, to succeed on the John Jay campus.

So this evening I will be presenting some recommendations, which I believe are critical to the success of the John Jay campus moving forward:

• Insure safety with respect for all students by removing the metal detectors for the entire John Jay campus and developing a strong building-wide safety plan.


• Commit to diversity at the John Jay campus by ensuring that the John Jay campus includes an ongoing mix of non-selective and selective options, and that the new school – and all schools there – work to reflect Brooklyn’s diversity, and serve English language learners and students with special needs.


• Provide equitable and adequate resource investments across schools by implementing long-overdue building-wide improvements, and making sure that investments tied to these changes serve all the schools equally.


• Conduct space planning in an equitable, transparent, inclusive manner, in consultation with all the principals.


• Establish a “John Jay Campus Council” to build community among the schools, and partnerships with the broader community to help the schools succeed together, create shared spaces and institutions, fundraise, and connect to resources.

You can read my more detailed testimony here.

Whatever the outcome of this process, I am deeply committed to helping the schools in the building succeed – individually and together – and to confronting the educational inequalities that continue to score our city.

If you would like to contribute to the conversation, I encourage you to join me at one of the two hearings, tonight and tomorrow night starting at 6 pm at the John Jay campus, 237 7th Avenue.

Brad Lander - Statement on John Jay HS