New York City set to open 24 new public schools on Thursday

NEW YORK — The new school year in New York City is about to have a milestone moment.
Two dozen new buildings will be open on Thursday when students arrive for the first day of classes.
It’s an important time for the city, which is under intense pressure to meet state guidelines for reducing class size. The 24 new schools not only mean state-of-the-art facilities but also will give principals the ability to have fewer kids in the classroom.
Nine of the new schools are in Brooklyn, eight are in the Bronx, six are in Queens, and one is ready for students in Manhattan.
“These 24 new buildings will add 11,000 new student seats, the most K-12 student seats we have added added in a single year since 2003,” Mayor Eric Adams said. “And this means that we can close all but 24 of those outdated trailer classrooms from our schools. That is our mission, to close them all, and we are closer and closer to getting there.”
“Thanks to Mayor Adams, the City Council and our other elected officials, our newly adopted 2025-2029 capital plan provides funding for another 33,417 seats. I would be remiss if I did not mention that the SCA has made huge advancements in removal of the transportable classroom units, as the mayor mentioned,” said Nina Kubota, CEO of the New York City School Construction Authority. “Work has been ongoing to remove these outdated facilities from our school grounds. Only 24 TCUs at six sites remain as of today citywide.”
The big question is whether New York City will meet the state’s class-size guidelines. Forty percent of city schools have to meet the guidelines a year from now.
Students at Intermediate School 145 in Jackson Heights, Queens, will be seeing smaller class sizes during their first day Thursday. It’s part of a larger push from the United Federation of Teachers and the city to enrich the student experience.
“To have the attention down to 23 kids per teacher is amazing. This is really about, as the principal said, investing in social and emotional welfare,” Queens Borough President Donovan Richards said. “Because it’s really about ensuring that you can have that one-on-one intervention with students who may need a little bit more TLC.”
Richards also said Jackson Heights is setting an example for the rest of the city to lower class sizes. More than 600 city schools have enough space to do so.