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Profile The Cypress Hills Community School Back to Main Article |
Brooklyn’s Cypress Hills Community School was founded by parents and community leaders in 1997, with support from the New York-based New Visions for Public Schools. It is a public elementary school based on an innovative, dual language (English-Spanish) model with strong parent leadership. The school’s mission, says co-director Maria Jaya-Vega, is to “create a place where our children would thrive: a nurturing, learning environment where the language and culture of the students is appreciated, where children and their families are respected and encouraged to develop and become active members of the community.” It has 150 students in kindergarten to sixth grade, with 20 students per classroom, with plans to expand to 400 students in pre-kindergarten to eighth grade. What it doesn’t have is a building. The Community School has operated within other school buildings since its inception. The children have no lunchroom or gym, and limited access to the auditorium. Not surprisingly, the lack of space has been a major challenge to the school’s ability to fulfill its mission. But the school does have one additional asset: the active involvement of a community development corporation, the Cypress Hills Local Development Corporation (CHLDC). CHLDC, one of the school’s co-founders, contributes significant staff and board resources by supporting parental involvement, building parent leadership, leveraging additional resources, and especially, developing a building to house it. Three years of intensive advocacy by parents, CHLDC, and its development team finally paid off when the City Council allocated CHLDC $20 million to purchase and renovate an underutilized warehouse into a school and community facility. The building is designed to support the Community School’s pedagogical approach, and to be a center for life-long learning for the children’s families and the entire community. It will also be a catalyst for community economic development. “Our project will demonstrate the tremendous potential for CDCs to produce desperately needed educational facilities that are responsive to educational program in high need areas, and to involve teachers and parents in advocating for and designing the school,” says CHLDC’s director, Michelle Neugebauer. “CBOs have demonstrated their capacity to rebuild neighborhoods. They have untapped capacity to develop school facilities in a timely, cost-effective, accountable, and sensitive fashion. The challenge is persuading educational authorities to think outside of the box.” Copyright 2001 |
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