After nine years, Zeta Charter School’s inaugural class is entering ninth grade, and on Tuesday, families and their students christened a new high school in Washington Heights with a ribbon-cutting ceremony and orientation.
The newly minted “Zeta Wolves” and their parents entered the building’s assembly room, with brightly painted blue and purple walls through a gauntlet of cheering faculty and staff, waving pompoms in the school’s colors and tooting whistles.
The 35,000-square-foot space leased for two years from St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church, will serve as an interim school until Zeta High School’s permanent location at West 181st Street and Broadway can be completed. The charter school network, which operates 14 schools across Upper Manhattan, the Bronx, and Queens also acquired a site in Mott Haven for a future Zeta Bronx High School.
Zeta’s founder and CEO, Emily Kim, told the freshman that she, the Zeta Charter School team and their parents had all been dreaming and planning for the students’ entry into high school since they started Zeta in 2017.
“ Inside this place, this is your moment, this is your home, this is your place,” Kim said to the students. “It belongs to you. I am so excited, Zeta freshmen, [for] what you’re about to experience, not just today, but throughout this year.”
Kim founded Zeta in 2017, following a stint as an attorney for the city’s largest and most storied charter school network, Success Academy. Kim has been active in multiple educational roles, she’s a mother, a former educator, a school attorney and now an administrator.
Kim founded Zeta on the principle that a free, high-quality education is a child’s right, regardless of their skin color, zip code, or economic status. She said that at Zeta, the goal is to take a “whole-child” approach to education, which combines academic rigor with social-emotional learning to equip students with tools for success in adulthood.
In a way, Kim told amNewYork, Zeta has been preparing its students for high school since its inception, and now, it’s “go time.”
“ I think of elementary school as children learning to learn—learning to fall in love with learning,” Kim said. “Then middle school is really about independence, so kids start taking hold of their own educational pathways, discovering themselves, finding their interests and passions. And then high school is when we see all of that blossoming, so they begin to realize their purpose, their passion and power, which is our theme in high school.”
It’s an environment that parents and students told amNewYork is fostering academic success and social development.
Arrissa Moreno said that her son was born in NYC, but their family moved to Tennessee when he started school. Then she said, when they returned to the city, he wasn’t thriving in public school and ultimately told her that he needed a different learning environment.
“ He was already too far advanced,” Moreno said. “So I looked for a school that was going to be on par with how he was already learning, and Zeta fit all the matches.”
She praised the academic rigor, saying that she and her son, who is very interested in STEM subjects, were particularly excited about the robotics program.
“ That’s all he’s been talking about this whole summer: getting into robotics and building stuff,” Moreno said.
But the true transformation in Moreno’s son since attending Zeta Charter School wasn’t academic; he’s always been a gifted and dedicated student. Moreno told amNewYork that she saw her typically introverted son open up socially with a little help from teachers with Zeta.
“ He went from giving three-word answers to a few sentences and really speaking his mind,” she said. “He was not like that at all. And my son would have never been able to do that if Zeta didn’t push him.”
Following an initial welcome and introduction, students were separated into their various homerooms via a house-style system similar to the Harry Potter novel series, and then dismissed to begin their own programming. Zeta High School Principal Kendall Quan stayed behind to speak with parents about transitioning their kids into a new chapter.
Quan described Zeta High School’s philosophy as one of independence and personal accountability with the goal of teaching students good judgment, without using punitive punishments in the process.
For example, disciplinary actions will operate on a demerit-based system, allowing students a certain number of demerits before incurring a disciplinary action such as detention. Quan said the approach allows students to make their own decisions, knowing that each one will have a cost and potential consequences.
“ We’re teaching them how to be independent, we’re using these logical consequences [and] we’re really transparent about what constitutes a demerit or not,” Quan said. “So, having that clarity and really firm boundaries that the kids are aware of, parents are aware of, we’re all aligned on what the boundaries are, it allows them to operate freely within those boundaries.”
That freedom extends beyond classroom and coursework decisions as for the first time in Zeta history, students will be allowed to leave campus for lunch. It’s a freedom that Quan assured parents the school did not take lightly. She said that in the weeks leading up to orientation, Zeta High School staff had been speaking with business owners in the surrounding area, making sure they can identify students by their uniforms and backpacks and exchanging contact information to open up a dialogue with the community.
The increased independence is a major milestone for Zeta’s inaugural high school class, and one that parents are experiencing, or sometimes grappling with, alongside their teens.
Deborah Regalado, whose son has been with Zeta Charter Schools since second grade, told amNewYork that as a parent, even though she trusts her child, she’s still nervous about the increased independence of high school in NYC and all the unknowns that come along with it.
“ I am so scared—terrified,” Regalado said. “Not because of the school, but just school in the city. It’s a lot going on.”
Like any parent, Regalado also said she’s excited for her son and wants to see the ways he grows from the experience.
“ He’s an excellent student,” she said. “He likes math, he likes science, so I’m excited for the AP courses. I want to know how far he can go.”
Students at Zeta Charter Schools have been getting great grades throughout the network’s history, with schools in the network placing close to or above the 90th percentile in both English language arts (ELA) and math test scores statewide, according to the New York City Public Schools Quality Reports Dashboard.
Founder Kim told amNewYork that at a time when the way academic success is measured by the state is in flux, Zeta is ahead of the curve.
“ When you take the bare minimum requirements that the state requires, that’s not college readiness,” Kim said. “Our program is more rigorous; we know our kids are ready. So we’re not so focused on the state standards because our standards exceed those.”
