Harlem’s Brightest Set Sights on Top Private Schools

It’s 7 a.m. on a Saturday.  Eighth-graders Chris, Kyle, Ardella, and Malik pile into Vinny Dotoli’s car, parked at 111th and Fifth Avenue in Harlem to travel to the Peddie School in New Jersey.  Vinny is the head of school at Harlem Academy, a rigorous independent school for high-potential students in first through eighth grade.  And this is what a lot of Vinny’s mornings have come to look like over the past two months, because he is personally taking students to visit prospective high schools.
 
For many families in Manhattan, November visits to private schools are a rite passed down from one generation to the next.  But for the students at Harlem Academy – and for the school itself – this is a new experience. 
 
Over the past eight years, Harlem Academy has prepared these students – the school’s first graduating class – for this moment.  The school is open from 7:30 a.m. to 6 p.m., offers a rigorous curriculum, emphasizes character development, and requires parental involvement.  The program is working: last year, 96% of students scored above the national average on standardized tests.
 
In the current private school admissions landscape, a striking number of seats (more than 25% at Trinity as the New York Times reported) are taken by siblings and children of alumni, leaving those without family ties in an applicant pool more competitive than Harvard’s.  Then there are the application fees.  While $50 per school might not deter wealthy families from applying to a long list of schools, most children from more modest means have to take their chances on just a few. 
 
Harlem Academy is doing everything it can to make sure the best and the brightest from Harlem earn spots at top private schools.  Students and parents get an early introduction to secondary school choices, starting with an initial meeting in the spring of sixth grade.  The dean of students and a committee of advisors offer personal guidance to identify potential matches for each student.  Admissions officers visit Harlem Academy to meet students and answer questions.  And Vinny, along with Dean of Students Kahdeidra Martin, have traveled throughout the region to take the school’s first 12 graduating eighth-graders to private schools as far away as Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and Vermont.