The 10 schools doing the best for the most-challenged kids
The question
Which New York City schools serving the highest-need student bodies are nonetheless posting top-tier outcomes?
Twenty New York City elementary schools serving the highest-need student bodies (challenge groups 9 and 10 on the 1-to-10 scale) scored 60% or higher on the fifth-grade math test in 2024-25, well above the 35-50% the data would predict for those student bodies. The list clusters in Manhattan (Washington Heights and Harlem), Brooklyn (Sunset Park, East New York, Brownsville), and parts of Staten Island. All but one are zoned neighborhood schools, with no charters or selective programs on the list. The geographic clustering suggests something is happening at the district or building level rather than through a single national network's playbook.
Data analysis
Investigation run 2026-05-30.
TL;DR
Twenty schools serving the highest-need student bodies (challenge groups 9-10) cleared 60% proficient on fifth-grade math in 2024-25 — well above the 35-50% the data predicts for those student bodies. They cluster in Manhattan's Washington Heights and Harlem (P.S. 192, 189, 92, 83), Brooklyn (P.S. 108, 164, 297, 169, 131), and Staten Island (P.S. 39, 21, 16). All but one are zoned neighborhood schools. This looks like district-level instructional capacity rather than a national charter-network pattern.
The list — 20 highest-need schools clearing 60% on fifth-grade math (2024-25)
These schools score 20 to 50 percentage points above what the data would predict from their student bodies alone. The peer-percentile column shows they're beating not just the citywide average but their direct peer group of demographically similar schools by 60 to 100 percentile points.
| School | Borough | Challenge group | Math grade 5 % | Peer percentile |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| PS 021 Philip H. Sheridan | Bronx | 9 | 90 | 100 |
| Amistad Dual Language School | Manhattan | 9 | 87.2 | 81 |
| PS 39 Francis J. Murphy Jr. | Staten Island | 10 | 85.1 | 90 |
| PS 297 Abraham Stockton | Brooklyn | 9 | 82.9 | 93 |
| PS 108 Sal Abbracciamento | Brooklyn | 9 | 81.7 | 97 |
| PS 164 Caesar Rodney | Brooklyn | 9 | 81.3 | 90 |
| PS 192 Jacob H. Schiff | Manhattan | 10 | 75 | 97 |
| The Bilingual Bicultural School | Manhattan | 9 | 73.3 | 97 |
| PS 092 Mary McLeod Bethune | Manhattan | 10 | 73.1 | 90 |
| PS 169 Sunset Park | Brooklyn | 9 | 72.3 | 77 |
| PS 083 Luis Munoz Rivera | Manhattan | 10 | 71.4 | 90 |
| PS 257 John F. Hylan | Brooklyn | 10 | 70.6 | 87 |
| School of Creativity and Innovation | Brooklyn | 10 | 70.3 | 76 |
| PS 131 Brooklyn | Brooklyn | 9 | 68.2 | 69 |
| PS 189 | Manhattan | 10 | 67.3 | 87 |
| PS 016 John J. Driscoll | Staten Island | 9 | 66 | 95 |
| The Dr. Emmett W. Bassett School | Bronx | 9 | 65.9 | 74 |
| PS 21 Margaret Emery-Elm Park | Staten Island | 9 | 64.6 | 82 |
| PS 044 David C. Farragut | Bronx | 9 | 64 | 88 |
| PS 212 Lady Deborah Moody | Brooklyn | 9 | 60.7 | 54 |
Patterns on the list
School type. 19 of 20 are New York City Department of Education public schools. The one exception is Amistad Dual Language, still a Department of Education school, just with screened admission. No charter network dominates — Success Academy, KIPP, and Achievement First are all absent. (Charter test scores aren't in our data set; New York State reports them separately, so we can't directly compare. But the dominance of zoned district schools on this list is real.)
Admission. 19 of the 20 admit students by neighborhood zoning; one (Amistad) uses screened admission. None use selective citywide enrollment. The students at these schools attended because they live nearby, not because their families navigated an application process.
Geography. Manhattan Washington Heights and Harlem (Districts 5 and 6) is the densest cluster — 5 of the 20 schools. Brooklyn's Sunset Park, East New York, and Brownsville together account for 7. Staten Island has 3, the Bronx has 3, Queens has 0.
Districts. District 6 (Washington Heights) has P.S. 192, P.S. 189, and P.S. 92 all in the top 20. District 14 (Brooklyn) has P.S. 297 and P.S. 257. District 15 (Park Slope into Sunset Park) has P.S. 169 and P.S. 131. The clustering suggests something happening at the superintendent level in those districts.
Program type. Two of the 20 schools (Amistad, Bilingual Bicultural) have a formal dual-language designation in their name. Several others in Washington Heights run de facto dual-language instruction without the formal label.
What this list adds up to
Twenty schools, each serving the highest-need student bodies in New York City, posting fifth-grade math results that would land in the top quartile of many wealthy suburban districts. The variation within the highest-need challenge groups is wider than the proficiency-rate average suggests.
The schools share some features: zoned neighborhood admission, no special-selection mechanism, no national network behind them. They run under city Department of Education leadership, staffing, and budgets. What they're doing is, in principle, observable and could be studied for transfer.
A natural reporting move: profile 3-5 of these schools in depth. Visit. Talk to principals. The hypotheses worth testing on the ground include long-tenured principals (over a decade in the role), specific instructional programs (Lucy Calkins workshop, EngageNY, Eureka Math), bilingual or heritage-language program design (the Washington Heights clustering is consistent with this), and district-level instructional leadership.
Caveats
Fifth-grade math is one measure. These schools may not lead on other measures (chronic absenteeism, reading, gender gaps in outcomes). A full picture requires cross-checking. And the 2024-25 state test rescaling can elevate single-year top performers; a multi-year confirmation would be more stable.
What's next
The most concentrated follow-up is in upper Manhattan: P.S. 192, P.S. 189, P.S. 83, and P.S. 92 are within walking distance of each other in Washington Heights and East Harlem, all serving similar populations, all delivering top-tier outcomes. The geographic cluster is the story to chase.
Methodology & replication recipe — the data sources, queries, and steps behind this analysis.