QUEENS — As the Department of Education seeks to eliminate trailers from schools, frustrated Forest Hills parents are asking the city to install them.
The trailers, parents say, would serve as a short-term solution to the kindergarten crisis in the neighborhood, where dozens of families were told that there is not enough space for their children at their zoned schools.
On Wednesday, families zoned for P.S. 144, where roughly 70 kids were waitlisted for kindergarten, started circulating a petition asking the DOE to install trailers at the school to provide four temporary classrooms until a permanent solution is found.
In the petition, the group said that they are “aware that there is a mayoral priority to remove trailers by 2018.”
But they noted that their “point is direct: We need space.”
“If I had the choice between sending my son to a portable at P.S. 206 for kindergarten or a portable at P.S. 144, my preference would be 144 for sure,” said Pam Chowayou, whose son, zoned for P.S. 144, had been waitlisted and offered a seat at P.S. 206 in Rego Park instead, 1.3 miles from their home.
“It’s a school in my community,” Chowayou said.
Among the long-term solution parents listed building an extension to the existing school or renting or purchasing an annex.
P.S. 144, which currently has 100 kindergarten seats, declined to comment, but parents said the school backed the petition.
In April, dozens of families in Forest Hills received letters from the Department of Education that their kids zoned for P.S. 144 were waitlisted and could be sent to other District 28 schools, sometimes outside of Forest Hills, including P.S. 117 in Briarwood and P.S. 99 in Kew Gardens, parents said.
Another Forest Hills school, P.S. 196, which offers 150 kindergarten seats, struggles with the same problem. In April, more then 52 kids were waitlisted there.
Last week, more than two dozen Forest Hills parents attended a School District 28 Community Education Council meeting, where they discussed the problem with city officials, who said they had no immediate solution.
Chris Mangiero, director of space planning, said at the meeting that installing new trailers can also take several years.
“We are engaged in continuing dialogue with school communities in Forest Hills and throughout the city in an effort to provide every child with a seat at a high quality school," Jason Fink, a spokesman for the DOE, said in a statement.
"We recognize that additional capacity is needed in this area, which is why our current capital plan includes over 1,000 new school seats for this community,” Fink added.
Officials recently announced that the city will soon start building a 396-seat addition for elementary students at P.S. 303 in Forest Hills.
