By Gabriela Resto-Montero
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
UPPER EAST SIDE — Months away from the first day of classes, three schools on the Upper East Side still have students on wait-lists.
P.S. 290 recently made offers to seven students to cut it's wait-list down to 75 as of July 15. P.S. 59 has 29 students remaining on their list and P.S. 183 has 49.
Although the DOE has guaranteed a seat at an area school to every incoming kindergartner who wants one, the process has left families disillusioned.
"Parents are just devastated," said Judy Schneider, a member of Community Board 8, of the enrollment situation during the Community Education Council's meeting Wednesday.
All of the students on the wait-list have received alternate school offers, and many others have either moved out of the district or accepted placement in gifted and talented programs, said Jack Zarin-Rosenfeld, a spokesman for the Department of Education.
In the worst case scenario, students who have rejected the alternate offer and not been placed in either a gifted and talented program or a charter school can choose to stay on the wait-list until October for the next wave of enrollment, Zarin-Rosenfeld said.
After this spring's difficult enrollment period, parents on the Upper East Side clamored for more input into the zoning process in order to ensure students' access to neighborhood schools.
Part of that involvement included having more of a voice in the CEC's zoning committee, which was supposed to gather information from parents and look at birth rates and pre-K enrollment for Upper East Side rezoning for the 2011 school year.
In an effort to include parents in the zoning process from the beginning and not just at the public hearing stage, Community Board 8 voted to include a parent representative into the CEC zoning committee as a public member in June.
However, the zoning committee was disbanded June 30.
"We never voted on that and, frankly, it was news to me," said Beth Cirone, a CEC councilwoman of the decision during the public meeting.
Elzora Cleveland, president of the District 2 CEC, said the decision was made based on the understanding that all ad hoc committees for the council break apart June 30.
Other members of the CEC expressed concern that the issue of zoning is so important that the responsibility shouldn't fall entirely on a committee but should rather be dealt with as a council.
Ultimately, the CEC is responsible for approving the Department of Education's zoning proposals, meaning that the District 2 CEC will vote on the Upper East Side's new zones in early 2011.
