City weighs closing a Harlem high school with 112 students. The Council has no vote, and a bid to change that is stalled

The Education Department is considering closing the Urban Assembly School for Global Commerce, a small high school in Harlem, THE CITY reported. It is the first proposed closure of this school year.

In a letter to families and staff, the superintendent overseeing Urban Assembly high schools, Fred Walsh, wrote that the school has 112 students, down 39% over five years. That presents "significant programmatic and budgetary challenges," he wrote, according to THE CITY. In 2025, 74% of the school's students graduated in four years, compared with 81% citywide.

The proposal is not final. If the department moves ahead, it must post closure documents online, hold public hearings and send the plan to the Panel for Educational Policy for a vote. Plans must be posted by Oct. 30 to be considered at the panel's December meeting. An Education Department spokesperson, Nicole Brownstein, said the department must respond "in ways that support the long-term sustainability of our schools."

The closure question is bigger than one building. THE CITY reports that public school enrollment has fallen by about 170,000 over the past decade, to about 790,000, and that the city now has 224 schools with 200 or fewer students, up from 165 in 2016. Chancellor Kamar Samuels has not released a citywide plan; he has said local superintendents should develop any plans with families and educators.

What our records add

The Council does not vote on school closures. The final decision belongs to the Panel for Educational Policy, as THE CITY notes. Res. 548, from Council Member Eric Dinowitz with Frank Morano, asks Albany to give the Council the power to appoint one panel member. It was introduced July 16 and has waited 102 days in the Education Committee without a hearing.

Members have questioned the panel's role. Opening the Education Committee's Feb. 10 hearing on mayoral control, Dinowitz noted that a 2024 State Education Department review and public testimony raised questions about whether the panel had at times acted as a "rubber stamp" for mayoral priorities. He named school closures and co-locations as examples of decisions where centralized power can limit public input. At a March 23 Education Committee hearing, Speaker Julie Menin said the Council had concerns about the process and transparency of the contracts that flow through the panel for approval.

How to follow it. The Education Committee has 54 pending items, according to our records, and no hearing on school closures is scheduled.

What's next

Watch for closure documents to be posted by Oct. 30. If they are, public hearings at the school would follow before the December panel vote. Families can find the school's page on the Education Department's site.