Letters to the Editor

Jamaica HS still breathing

May 8, 2008 4:43 PM

Jamaica HS still breathing

To the Editor:

Jamaica HS is not closing. The New York Teacher [April 24] erroneously printed that the Department of Education has decided “to close the school.” The DOE is downsizing Jamaica HS by opening a College Board School with funding from Bill Gates and Michael Dell within our building, but Jamaica is getting a new grade 9 class in the fall. We are open.

We showed up en masse to protest at the Panel for Education Policy meeting on April 14 primarily because our students will be treated as second-class citizens in their own building when the College Board School opens. We call it “academic apartheid.”

It is a sad day indeed when the Daily News writes a story about Jamaica HS that is more accurate than what is printed in our own union’s newspaper.

James Eterno, Jamaica HS
EDITOR’S NOTE: The New York Teacher regrets the error.