Bringing open houses in-house: How one middle school took high school admissions into its own hands

Jennifer Cuervo, the guidance counselor at New Heights Middle School in Brooklyn, noticed a glaring problem for her eighth-grade students applying to high school.

When she asked them if they attended high school open houses — a crucial step in gaining priority status at many schools — the answer was too often, “Oh no, Miss, I didn’t have a way to get there,” she said.

Sometimes they didn’t have a ride, she said, or the MTA fare was too steep. And the open houses and high school fairs often took place outside of school hours, so if families were unavailable, Cuervo had no way to help her students.

So she brought these problems to her staff, and together they came up with an idea.

A middle school student talks to a high school counselor at New Heights Middle School. (Monica Disare)

For the first time this year, Cuervo’s school hosted a high school fair for students in her district, held during the school day. She invited more than 20 high schools, most of which are “limited unscreened,” meaning they do not look at test scores, grades or attendance, but do give students a leg up for signing in at an open house or a high school fair.

The New Heights fair, attended by students from that school and six others, allowed students to sign in at tables belonging to a wide array of high schools, earning the admissions benefit without the complications of cost and travel.

The bottom line for Cuervo was, “Our kids aren’t going to these [citywide] fairs, so why not bring it in-house?” she said.

Kyle Pierre, an eighth-grader at New Heights, missed the citywide fair and said he has not attended any open houses. Pierre likes technology and is interested in P-TECH, a popular school that allows students to earn college credit and has a partnership with IBM.

A high school representative talks about his school to prospective students. (Monica Disare)

Since 95 percent of students admitted to P-TECH last year received priority by attending a fair or open house, missing them meant Pierre could have been out of luck. Instead, this middle school fair gave him a second chance.

Many students encounter problems when trying to attend open houses at high schools, Chalkbeat has reported. Often the open house dates are hard to find or at inconvenient times, forcing students to miss school and parents to take time off work. It’s also difficult to know if schools are giving students priority for signing in the high school fair. Some schools don’t know or follow the rules, and the education department does little to police them. (All schools interviewed by Chalkbeat at the New Heights fair said they were giving students priority.)

Creating a fair at New Heights Middle School helps students in the district, but students citywide don’t have that support. The school’s principal, Ativia Sandusky, said the system has pushed the burden of helping students toward school officials like her and her staff.

“It has to be on the individual middle schools,” she said.