New York parents are so hungry to get their kids into good public schools, they bend residency rules with increasing blatancy, blaming crummy schools for their lawlessness. “My kids are entitled to the same education as a kid two subway stops away,” insists a mom who lives in the Elliott-Chelsea Houses in Chelsea. She gives the Department of Education a false address so that her youngest son can attend a better school. “The difference between one school and another school in the same damn neighborhood is so clear. So parents are taking things into their own hands.”
Some parents take berserker measures.
A Brooklyn parent rents a one-bedroom basement apartment for $620 a month so that her child can attend Park Slope’s tony PS 321, where more than 85 percent of the kids meet reading and math requirements. “It’s cheaper than private school,” shrugged the mom, an attorney who actually lives in Williamsburg. “None of the schools near me are up to par. So I did what I needed to do.” The ghost apartment--which she uses as a proof of the address--is furnished with a single lamp to generate an electric bill.
Compared to our hovel, sounds like the Trump Tower.
-- Aleksandr Shusterman