ACADEMIC PROGRAMS College implications have New York school bulging at seams

The Queens school has earned a solid reputation.
By KATHLEEN LUCADAMO
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
NEW YORK -- Constantine Caviris would rather sit on a windowsill in his jam-packed honors class at Benjamin Cardozo High School in Queens than have his own seat at a spacious, but mediocre, school.
It's a sad reality, but Constantine's mother accepts it.
"Class size is important to me, but he's happy here," Mary Caviris said with a shrug.
More than 4,000 kids are crammed into Cardozo's building, which was designed to hold 3,000 students.
Fighting to get in
But despite the significant overcrowding, students are still fighting to squeeze inside.
Cardozo was the second most sought-after school in the city this school year, with 3,889 students competing for just 1,000 seats in freshman class.
And the school's law program attracted nearly 6,000 applications for 55 spots last year -- a rejection rate significantly higher than Harvard University's.
Obvious reasoning
The reason the young academics want to go Cardozo is obvious: "If I go to another public school, I might not get into a good college," said freshman Maria Psoras.
Cardozo's impressive 84 percent graduation rate and state test scores have earned the school a solid reputation. Almost 90 percent of students pass state math and English exams.
And the school's popularity has only grown even as the city continues to open dozens of small high schools each year.
The new schools cannot compete with Cardozo's long list of perks -- honors classes that rival those of elite private schools, fencing and lacrosse teams, yoga and guitar lessons, a chorus and language classes in Greek, Latin and German.
But there are sacrifices.
The hallways are so cramped that students dubbed a bustling corner near the cafeteria "42nd Street."
"You can barely walk and sometimes you have to push," said Shazan Rizvi, a junior.
Scuffles common
Students said scuffles are common, but they are usually petty and easy to control. For example, it's not unusual for girls to trade blows for stepping on each other's new sneakers. Full-fledged fights are rare, the kids said.
"The hallway is like a subway platform at rush hour," conceded Principal Rick Hallman. "It's New York City."
Tension runs high in the halls in large part because students have just four minutes to get from one classroom to another -- and up to two of those precious minutes can be lost in standstill traffic at "42nd Street," they said.
"If you don't like crowds, this isn't the school for you," Rizvi said.
Students can be disciplined for being late, and even if they avoid punishment, they may not get a seat in the classroom.
It's common for up to 40 students to jam into a math or English class even though the teachers' contract limits class size to 34, students said.
This fall the teachers union slapped the city with a grievance because Cardozo had 520 oversized classes.
Education Department officials said they shuffled students to different classes and that number has been reduced to 41.
Schools Chancellor Joel Klein recently acknowledged citywide school overcrowding, but insisted students are still well served.
"I haven't met a human being who has ever said to me I would prefer to have my child in a class of 20 with a poor teacher rather than in a class of 30 with a good teacher," Klein told a group of business leaders.
But educators worry that the quality of education at Cardozo will suffer if enrollment continues to swell.
The school already operates on triple schedule, meaning many seniors start instruction at 7:30 a.m. and finish their day early, while younger students attend classes later in the day and don't go home till nearly 4 p.m.
Difficulty scheduling
Some kids eat lunch at 9:30 a.m., and it's difficult to arrange times for sports and clubs.
The ballooning enrollment could get even worse because of the city's new high school admissions policy. The rules allow any student in any neighborhood to apply to Cardozo -- and they do.
"The nature and tone of the school is very good," said Hallman. "Overcrowding is the result of the quality of the school."label