The top reported proficiency rate is 37% in Math. The lowest is 10% in Science.
Original Research by School Decision on East New York Elementary School of Excellence
East New York Elementary School of Excellence sits on Shepherd Avenue in the East New York section of Brooklyn, serving children from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade. It belongs to New York City Geographic District 19, one of the city's historically under-resourced school districts, and it draws an almost entirely economically disadvantaged student body, with the vast majority of children qualifying for free or reduced-price lunch. The school is a regular public school, not a charter or magnet, and its enrollment is modest for an elementary school in a dense urban borough.
The student population is predominantly Hispanic and Black, reflecting the neighborhood's demographics. Demographic data on English learners and students with IEPs was not available in the data provided, so parents who need those services should ask the school directly about current program capacity and staffing.
State assessment results from the New York State Testing Program are available for grades three through five, and they present a mixed and in some areas concerning picture. Third-grade results are the strongest: roughly half of third-graders reached proficiency in math, and close to half did in ELA. Those are not high rates in absolute terms, but they stand noticeably above the school's own fourth- and fifth-grade numbers. By fourth grade, math and ELA proficiency rates drop to roughly the upper twenties, and fifth grade follows a similar pattern, with ELA proficiency in the mid-twenties. The fifth-grade science result is the most striking gap in the data: only a small fraction of students tested reached proficiency, a figure that sits well below the already-modest performance in other subjects and grades. A parent would reasonably want to ask the school what it is doing specifically on science instruction.
Placed among the districts in Kings County, the school's overall proficiency index lands in the bottom quartile of the comparison set. That is a straightforward fact worth naming, not a verdict on the school's effort or its staff. Context matters: the school serves a community with very high poverty concentration, in a district where publicly reported data shows a growing share of families choosing charter schools instead of district schools, which shifts who is sitting in classrooms like this one.
District 19 began using the Wit and Wisdom curriculum, a science-of-reading-aligned reading program, starting in the 2023-2024 school year as part of the citywide NYC Reads mandate. This is a direct change for families at this school: reading instruction shifted away from a principal-selected approach to a sequenced, research-grounded curriculum. Multi-year trend data was not available in the data provided, so it is not yet possible to see whether that curriculum shift is moving ELA scores.
One development relevant to families looking further ahead: Bard High School Early College-Brooklyn opened in East New York for the 2024-2025 school year, offering students in the community a path to an associate degree alongside a high school diploma. That is a meaningful addition to the post-elementary pathway for children currently in this school's early grades.
Brooklyn's broader housing market adds financial context for families making enrollment decisions alongside a housing search. Home values near this zip code are well above the state median and have been rising at a faster pace than the national average. Rents have also climbed meaningfully year over year. The neighborhood of East New York has traditionally been among Brooklyn's more affordable pockets, but borough-wide price pressure is real.
Brooklyn itself offers the civic infrastructure a family might want around an elementary school: extensive transit, a library system with dozens of branches, and dense walkable streets. East New York is on the eastern end of the borough, somewhat removed from the core of that walkability, though subway access connects residents to the rest of the city.
No information was available on the school's specific program offerings, staffing levels, attendance patterns, or discipline data. Those are meaningful gaps for a parent doing due diligence, and the school or the District 19 office would be the right places to ask.
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