Island Park Students at LBHS Three Years Later

The Island Park community was once divided over whether parents should have the choice to send their children to high schools in either Long Beach or West Hempstead. Today marks three years since they came to a cordial agreement over the volatile issue.

On March 18, 2008, Island Park resident voted and passed a resolution that allowed families there —whose children had attended West Hempstead High School since the 1960s — to choose between the town’s surrogate alma mater or Long Beach.

Now, with the original 2008-09 class to become seniors in September, parents and school officials involved believe the decision was prudent.

“It’s been a terrific resolution because it allows parents to have the choice,” said Dr. Rosemary Bovino, superintendent of Island Park School District.

Others note that parents participate more when deciding on their children’s educations.

“Parents are clearly much more involved and engaged, looking harder at the high schools,” said Peter Zarba, whose children will likely attend Long Beach or a parochial school, although he hasn’t ruled out West Hempstead.

Michael Hastava, who was on the Island Park Board of Education when the resolution passed and now serves as vice president, said: “What it did, which is a good by-product, is it now forces them to study [the curricula] through the high school selection process, which is what we like.”

In addition to tours and meetings with representatives from Long Beach and West Hempstead high schools, families attend events at both schools, including plays and extramural vocational activities, according to Bovino. Moreover, Arnold Epstein, the athletic director at Long Beach School District, meets with students to introduce them to sports programs.

At a Jan. 6 meeting, the Island Park school board gave a power-point presentation to parents, comparing statistics of test scores, college placement, demographics and lists of advanced courses, clubs and sports, before they submitted their choices the next day.

“It’s a very collegial working relationship,” Bovino summarized.

Bovino added that she, the Island Park’s director of curriculum and the board of education were invited last year to take part in the selection of a new principal at LBHS.

“It’s been a good relationship and it’s worked,” said Dr. Robert Greenberg, Long Beach’s superintendent.

According to Long Beach School District, 33 Island Park students have chosen to attend LBHS next year. They will join the current 122 students to bring the number to 155, which will be about even with that of West Hempstead in September. Of that total, 53 are currently in ninth grade, 31 in tenth, 27 in eleventh, and 11 in twelfth.

Next school year will represent the first decrease in size of the proportion of Island Park residents to overall incoming freshmen at LBHS, which had, up until now, increased at a steady rate.

Dr. Bovino doesn’t draw any conclusions from these numbers. “I can’t say now that there’s a trend,” she said. “Maybe in a few years we can start to see trends.”

Island Park resident Sally Young sent her son to LBHS, where he is a freshman. While listing her reasons for her decision, she said: “I felt they had a strong athletics department. I have family in Long Beach. I thought that brings in a strong friendship. And being able to travel across a bridge as opposed to a twenty minute ride.”

Fernanda Armijo, a senior at Long Beach who missed the chance to choose schools by one year but transferred from West Hempstead as a junior, said she found a niche that suited her better at LBHS, with a student body that is more congenial to the activities that interest her, such as theater.

LBHS Vice Principal Cheriese Pemberton described the assimilation of students from Island Park as smooth.

“In some schools you go to you’ll see a division of students, like the Island Park kids sit here or the Long Beach kids sit there,” Pemberton said. “You would not be able to see that in our cafeteria. All the kids are just blending.”

Greenberg said that the transition has been seamless. “From the get-go, it has never been an issue of any kind of separation,” he said.

Young echoed similar sentiments. “As far as friendship and integration, [Island Park kids] are doing amazing,” she said.

Meanwhile, the school-choice resolution in Island Park will be reviewed in two years, at the end of its five-year legislated permit.

“I hope that the resolution continues,” said Richard Shurin, an alumnus of LBHS with children in Hegarty Elementary School in Island Park. 

Shurin’s one lament is that the price of tuition at LBHS, approximately $14,000 a year per student, does not include transportation, for which there are supplementary expenses.