Parents Group Says NYC Schools ‘More DangerousThan Ever’

By PRISCILLA PEREZ

It took three hours for Lower East Side parent Samantha Silva to learn that her son Christopher, 9, had been a victim of bullying and violence by an 8th grader during breakfast at P.S. 140. Now she is speaking out with fellow parents and community leaders to halt the rise of violence in New York City Public Schools.

“I feel like something really bad has to happen before it actually starts being addressed and that’s unfortunate because we bring our children to school every day and we don’t think that these types of things are going to happen in their school,” Silva, 26, said. “But the matter of the fact is that it is happening.”

Silva voiced her concerns and call to action at the steps of City Hall Thursday with Families for Excellent Schools, an activist group that released a report calling the school more dangerous than ever.

The report, Safety Last: New York City’s Public Schools Are More Dangerous Than Ever finds that the New York City’s School Violence Index (SVI) increased by 22 percent in 2014-15, a record high. The report also states that a violent episode in city schools take place every 4.5 minutes.

“The state’s data immediately calls into question the Mayor’s credibility on school safety, and should trigger a review of his school discipline reforms,” said Jeremiah Kittredge, CEO of Families for Excellent Schools in a press release. “The Mayor is deceiving parents by touting statistics that hide how dangerous city schools really are.”

But Department of Education spokeswoman Toya Holness disputed the findings.

“This data is misleading,” Holness said. “The total number of incidents at New York City public schools decreased nearly 8 percent last school year to historic lows, and crime, arrests and summonses are down across the board. Our top priority is to provide a safe and supportive environment for every student, and we are committed to doing whatever it takes to keep our students safe.”

Still, Silva insisted there was a lack of communication between parents and their children’s schools when violence occurs. Following the incident, Silva began speaking to other parents in her neighborhood; soon finding out that her son was not the only recent victim of school violence.

“As I started telling people what had happened to him,” she added, “I started finding out more about the school. Kids were bringing weapons to school and as a parent, I didn’t know what was going on in my child’s school.”

She said that schools need to reach out to parents in order to make change both locally and citywide. She still waits to see if her son’s bully will return to the school following suspension.

“The parents, you get them together and you make a difference,” she said. “You don’t hold this valuable information from the parents because we can’t move forward if we don’t know what’s going on.”