The Opportunity Charter School, New York | Fees, Rankings, Address, Admission, Vacancies, Reviews & More

The school has changed principles 3 times in a period of a year. Most of the teachers and staff members are rude and simply inconsiderate. The teachers simply don’t care about the children when most of them don’t understand the lessons taught to them. When a child has missed a class and they attempt to make up the work the teachers hardly ever have time to go over with the missed work or even provide the student with the work that needs to be made up. Teachers at OCS are quick to give a student a failing grade when they can’t understand the material taught to them. There are times where there is no teacher present to teach the children AT ALL and are expected to do work that wasn’t even taught to them to even begin with. The students grade are not updated periodically for the students to see what classes they are failing so that they could speak with the teacher to see how they can potentially bring up their grade before the marking period ends. The space is cramped up, the width of the hall way is 12ft wide and 200ft long. That’s short for a hallway that contains over 50 students trying to get to a class so they wouldn’t be late. Some student even leave the class early just so they wouldn’t have to be in that cramped up space, they’ve installed lockers back in 2015 and students are extremely limited to using the lockers, they only get to use it 3 times a day and can’t use it in between, so whatever you forgot in your locker stays in your locker until lunch time or dismissal. The lockers overall are useless if students continuously take their bags with them everywhere they go so they wouldn’t have to deal with forgetting something in their lockers. The average graduation rate for OCS is 45%. That is low, lower than any charter school out there. Over 5 principals in three years of working there. The management is so poor. Students are not held accountable for their learning or their behavior. There is very little support from admin when it is needed. Teachers are not given enough time to complete any tasks they are assigned. Tasks are assigned back to back and at times without a real reason. No discipline; parents and students run the school; released all teachers that were there over three years; the physical space is cramped- four hundred and fifty students middle through high on the third and forth floor of a former high school; stand in line to clock out, using their palm reading punch clock; long, unstructured hours for teachers; two and three teachers assigned to one classroom; inconsistent and poorly planned school events (often canceled at the last minute); poor communication between management, behavioral team and teaching staff; wrong behavior program in use; students disciplined according to social/status/favoritism; staff/student personal issues not heeded; admin supports student over staff; teacher evals done according to personal like/vendetta; not all eval decisions based from principal observations; reimbursement request needed for “buy box”/activities; forth floor walk up-need health note to request elevator key; ;One minute late- 5 times: write up 9 times: terminated; No curriculum maps; lack of books and resources; no library; no computer lab; overabundance of frustrated teachers at the end of each day.

This school in a matter of a year has lower their standards in order to help our children succeed let me explain:
1. The school has changed principles 3 times in a period of a year
2. Most of the teachers and staff members are rude and simply inconsiderate
3.The teachers simply don’t care about the children when most of the children don’t understand the lesson they don’t find an alternative route to stimulate the child to get the curriculum.
4. When a child has missed a class and they attempt to make up the work the teacher hardly ever have time to go over with the missed work or even provide the student with the work that needs to be made up .
5. Teachers at OCS are quick to give a student a failing grade when mind you have the time there is no teacher to teach the children this is the reason why my daughter has now give up her sleep time and summer time to make up a class that for over 5 months my child had no physical teacher in that classroom to teacher her , they finally hired a teacher sometime in February that did not give them enough time to prepare for the state exam in living environment.
and lastly the students grade are not update periodically for the students to see what classes they are failing so that they could speak with the teacher to see how they can potentially bring up their grade before the marking period ends.
Do you really want your child to go to this school ??????

I totally understand the school as a whole needs for improvement.
I had one son that attended OCS from grade 6 to grade 12 (graduate and attends college) and he managed to still do well despite of the changes in staff and teachers. Can’t always blame the school for one look at the area is in, some parents/students are disrespectful, and the school shares a building with other schools that can really place a restrained on how a school function. Maybe just maybe if parents get involved and contact their city council on getting a separate building for OCS maybe the school can redeemed themselves. I like the school for most part they have teacher-ease to tracked your child progress in most subjects. I currently, have my youngest son attending and he likes it and because of OCS he is currently in a science program at John Jay College. All schools even the best ones have some downfall it all depends on if a parent can tolerate.