New York parents talk about how charter schools have changed their children’s lives

Reading proved elusive for Violetta Volpe until she got into Bridge Preparatory Charter School.

Staten Island’s traditional public schools didn’t help Violetta, who was diagnosed with dyslexia in first grade. In desperation, her mother enrolled her in a preparatory school, where what had previously puzzled the girl became crystal clear within a year.

“She can read,” Violetta’s mother, Azalea López Volpe, told The Post. “She can read. Like, she can read!”

Proud Big Apple moms and dads shared inspirational stories of victory with The Post amid Governor Kathy Hochul’s record-breaking $227 billion budget proposal for fiscal year 2024, which will lift the government’s cap on charters in New York City, where approximately 15 % of public school students are studying. Currently enrolled.

If approved, the Khokul budget, due April 1, would allow up to 106 more charter schools to open in the country’s largest school system, which now has 275 schools.

Critics of publicly funded private institutions, including influential teacher unions and left-wing lawmakers, have vehemently dismissed the Hohul plan, arguing that it would divert major resources from traditional public schools amid falling enrollment.

Here’s what parents told The Post about the looming standoff in the legislature and how the bylaws have changed their kids.

More focus on learning disorders

Bridge Preparatory Charter School on Staten Island, New York City’s first public school specifically for students with literacy disabilities, was a natural choice for Volpe’s daughter, Violetta, who has dyslexia and other learning disabilities related to speech.

“Their entire curriculum is based on the Orton-Gillingham method,” Wolpe said, referring to the multisensory, phonetics-based teaching method used at the school of about 150 students in the Sunnyside area of ​​Staten Island.

Since joining Bridge Prep in 2019, Violetta has “turned into a leader,” Volpe said, and has become a staunch defender of herself—qualities she didn’t have before. The 11-year-old boy’s literacy skills also increased dramatically.

“She used to write ‘north’ and ‘south’ for lack of a better term,” said Wolpe, 55, from the Grasmere section of Staten Island. “She only wrote vertically.”

Wolpe says instructors at Bridge Prep, which opened in 2019, soon helped Violetta start writing “normally.” “It’s incredible, especially considering the first year [at Bridge] was during the pandemic.

Wolpe said her daughter “never” would have received a comparable dyslexia program in the city’s public schools, citing Bridge Prep’s low student-teacher ratio and individualized instruction. Mayor Adams acknowledged that New York City needed a more comprehensive approach, pledging in May that all public school students would be screened for learning disabilities starting in the fall.

“The Ministry of Education is already tired of having a monopoly on the education system,” Wolpe said. “They mistakenly think their way is the best. To be honest, there should be a certain level of competition in the free education system.”

Rescue of children who could fall through the cracks

Jennifer Ochoa said her 14-year-old son Oliver is doing well at charter school Central Queens Academy in Elmhurst after years of struggles with district instructors.

“CQA, like most charter schools, has a lower student-to-teacher ratio,” she said. “This allows faculty and support staff to meet the needs of all students and maintain personal relationships with them, parents and guardians.”

The result is a “general effort” to build malleable minds and a stark contrast to urban public schools plagued by overcrowded classrooms and a shortage of specialists, Ochoa, a physician assistant and lifelong New Yorker, told The Post.

“Charter schools have given opportunities to students who would most likely fall through the cracks,” said the 50-year-old mother from Queens. “At the height of the pandemic, Oliver received virtual instruction from the CQA and I am grateful. Many public school students fell far behind, but Oliver and his comrades did well.”

About 20% of CQA students go to specialized or elite high schools, his website boasts. Oliver’s accelerated curriculum and small classes helped shape an eighth grader who is now more confident and reads four years above his level.

“Charter schools are communities that will work with you to help build a solid foundation and ensure continued growth,” Ochoa said. “Charters are a great starting point, but parents also need to be active participants in the educational process.”

Providing Educational Choices in Disadvantaged Areas

For Ephraim Barrito, a single father of three, Governor Hole’s bylaw expansion to remove New York State’s geographic barriers just makes sense.

“If the data proves that charter school students are outperforming public school students, that’s not a problem,” said Barrito, whose 7-year-old daughter Olivia attends the school. Springfield Gardens of Success Academy in Queens.

In the 2018-19 school year, the last school year before COVID, 62% of students in city charter schools passed state math tests, compared to 45% in traditional schools. The gap was smaller in reading, but charter kids still outperformed their peers from 57% to 47%, the data shows.

“The charter school system is more organized,” said Barrito, 45, whose family lives in St. Albans, Queens. “You get the price of a public school and the family atmosphere of a private school.”

Without additional charter schools in New York City, underprivileged students would be “even more disadvantaged,” the retiree said. “The more options, the better. Please do not deprive your child of the opportunity to receive a higher level of education.”

Teach kids to love learning

For some parents, simply getting their kids to school in the morning can be a monumental task, but not for Nike Hughes, whose 13-year-old twins, Christopher and Michael, never need to be forced to go to school. KIPP Freedom High School in the Bronx.

“They just want to go to school,” Hughes told The Post. “You know, most kids in junior high school are a little bit reluctant. They want to go to school and that’s important.”

Mom, who works in wealth management, praised the holistic philosophy of Freedom, which is run by KIPP, the country’s largest charter network with 280 schools nationwide. She is impressed that students receive financial literacy lessons and daily art classes in addition to two-hour blocks of reading and math.

“They have more resources and better educational activities,” Hughes, 42, said of the charter schools her twins attended throughout their childhood. “It was just great.”

Despite being twins, Christopher and Michael are “completely opposite,” Hughes said, especially when it comes to scientists.

“I have one bookish child, just like, don’t hold back from it,” the Bronx mom continued. “And I have one that needs a push from time to time. But they both get an excellent education and the support they need.”

Hughes suggested that detractors learn more before condemning charter schools, saying that lifting the regional restriction would provide more important opportunities for minority students: “It benefits everyone.”

Smaller class sizes mean more individual attention

IN Zeta Inwood Charter School at West 187th Street in Manhattan, Denise Ramirez’s 8-year-old son, Achilles Liriano, is now enjoying the one-on-one attention he didn’t get at his old public school. As a result, she said, he became a happier and more outgoing child.

“What really caught my attention was the different learning strategies,” Ramirez, 33, told The Post of Zeta. “It was not just a path, that’s all. As we get older, we begin to realize that there are several ways [to learn]and Zeta provides this for Achilles.”

Ramirez, a catering manager, said she wants other New York City kids to have the same success and eclectic pursuits. She also wants the regional restriction to be lifted, arguing that it will lead to more choice of education needed in disadvantaged areas.

“They do yoga in the morning, they meditate,” Ramirez said of the Zeta students. “They have more extracurricular activities and it’s a more close-knit community. I just really like the options we have as parents.”

Zeta staff are extremely responsive to dynamic educational needs, she says, and are willing to tailor lessons to the needs of any student—a degree of personalization not achievable in community schools.

“They actually take the time to learn more about their students,” Ramirez said. “And so they ask them what extra activities they want. They give them the opportunity to choose and I appreciate that. And a lot of communication with parents – daily communication.

A push for the importance of college

According to Mauricio Plaza, a father of two whose son is in fourth grade, the unwavering focus on higher education is what separates charter schools from public schools. Success Academy Hudson Yards in Manhattan. “In a nutshell, [it’s] about providing the tools, skills and education needed to get into college and sending as many scientists as possible, regardless of their backgrounds,” he told The Post.

Each Success Academy class is named after the colleges the faculty attended, Plaza said, sending youth a clear message of their expected direction. “In young years, [staffers] provide good reading and organizational skills, and [students] grow, they give them critical thinking and analytical skills,” he said.

The senior software engineer, based in Murray Hill, also praised the school’s dedicated teaching staff.

“The staff is always so dedicated, arriving hours before they open the door to prepare classes and staying for hours to review lessons,” Plaza concluded. “You can really feel how each child is supported and my child is thriving.”

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