SEPTEMBER 2008 UPDATE: There is a new co-principal for the school, Megan Adams. Gary Eisinger, the former co-principal, is now the principal of IS 246 Crossroads.

NOVEMBER 2006 REVIEW: New York City Lab School for Collaborative Studies is based on the notion that kids learn best in groups hence the name collaborative studies. This combined middle and high school is a pioneer in special education inclusion, and many of the classes include students who have special needs in general education classes.

Lab is one of the most sought-after schools in the city, and its consistently high test scores and graduation rates attest to its success. It has an informal feel teachers don't make a fuss about kids wearing hats, for example, and students are permitted to leave the building for lunch. There is pleasant give and take between the teachers and students. Most classes are taught in a seminar style, with lots of class discussion.

The school encourages students to delve deeply into a subject, "cultivating intellectual curiosity" rather than "accumulating more and more advanced credits," said Brooke Jackson, a long-time teacher at Lab who was named co-director in 2006 with Gary Eisinger, formerly assistant principal of the High School for Environmental Studies in Manhattan. ""If you are looking to move ahead faster and faster, this is not the place for you," she said. However, the school offers a number of advanced placement (AP) classes, and able students may take college courses at New York University, Baruch College, and the Borough of Manhattan Community College.

The middle school attracts some of the best students in District 2, and imaginative projects led by seasoned teachers keep the kids engaged. In a 6th grade math-science class, students worked in groups of four to draw "flow charts" of where New York City tap water comes from. Some gathered at tables, some worked on the floor. In a 6th grade humanities class, kids demonstrated their knowledge of Hammurabi's code, the ancient law of Babylon, with a mock-game show called "Wheel of Torture: Live from Mesopotamia."

Teaching in the high school is also based on projects, and the classrooms have more of a middle-school feel than is typical for high school. A physics class had a plastic ferris wheel made from K'nex plastic construction toys, for example. A number of classrooms we visited had bins of color markers, and students made a poster of scenes from Paradise Lost for one lesson and colored drawings of Apollo and Aphrodite for another project called "Who's Who in the Odyssey." Ninth grader's watercolor drawings of neighborhood scenes line the corridor walls. Class discussions are lively: A 12th grade AP English class compared the character of Stephen Daedalus in Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man to Telemachus in the Odyssey. A 12th grade sociology class discussed the African-American boycott of the Mexico City Olympics in 1968.

The homework load, once oppressive, appears to have eased in recent years. Students we interviewed on our recent visit said the work load was manageable, perhaps an hour or two a night in the middle school and two to three hours a night in the high school.

Some students leave after middle school to attend specialized high schools such as Stuyvesant and Bronx High School of Science. But one 11th grade girl we met turned down a seat at Bronx Science because she preferred the small size of Lab and the chance to take part in student government, the school newspaper, and model United Nations without competing against huge numbers of other students.

Classrooms feel cramped with 33 in a typical class. The school shares a drab building with the Museum School, the two schools have joint sports teams. Teams include basketball, tennis, soccer, golf, volleyball and baseball. The school has no athletic fields of its own, but takes advantage of various fields in Manhattan.

College admission: Jackson said that 86 percent of all 2006 graduates were accepted at their first choice of college. Graduates have been admitted to highly selective schools such as Stanford, Columbia and Dartmouth. Most graduates go on to four year colleges and universities.

Special education: About half of the classes are CTT or "collaborative team teaching" classes with 10 students with special needs and 24 general education pupils. These classes have two teachers, one a specialist in the subject area, the other a specialist in special education. The special education students assigned to these classes are screened for academic ability and are high-functioning. Their disabilities include Asperger's syndrome, dyslexia, dysgraphia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, Jackson said.

Admissions: In the 2006-2007 year the school had 600 students in the middle school and 400 students in the high school. There were plans to admit fewer sixth graders four classes rather than six so that the middle and high school would eventually be roughly the same size. Most students enter Lab in 6th grade. However, there are generally between 30 and 60 seats open in the 9th grade. Preference is given to children living in District 2. Lab gives its own entrance exam to incoming 6th graders. There is no cut-off score on standardized tests to be considered for admission, but most successful applicants have scored in the highest level (level 4) in reading and math on the 4th-grade standardized tests. The school typically admits 5 to 10 out-of-district students in the middle schools and a few more in the high school. This school is featured in NYC's Best Public High Schools: A Parent's Guide and New York City's Best Public Middle Schools. (Clara Hemphill, November 2006)

Does anyone know if they are admitting out of district or out of Borough students this year? The big high school DOE book says district 2 priority, then Manhattan residents, without mention to others. Their website, meanwhile, says open to NYC residents and doesn't even mention district 2 priority. Has anyone been to the open house? Do they require anything other than writing their name on the list of 12 schools?

"The parents of this year's 8th grade class were told this week that their children would be considered "on equal footing" with all District 2 8th Graders for admission to Lab High School. We were told that this directive came from the DOE. We are consequently scrambling to tour other high schools, well into the tour season."

For the 2006-07 school year, Lab is newly identified by the State Education Department as "in good standing." The school had been on the list because it had failed to make "adequate yearly progress" in English scores for the two preceding years. (January 2007)

A parent complains about problems with class scheduling: "A long time class scheduler decided to retire. He was replaced but by someone with little training. Many 11th graders are sitting around the school for up to 4 periods per day with nothing to do! Due to schedule problems, no art, no foreign language, no music, no journalism, no feminist studies for 11th graders -- parents revolted and the school threw them a bone -- 7:15 am philosophy class." (November 2005)

Director Sheila Breslaw acknowledged there were problems with scheduling at the beginning of the semester but said they had been resolved. (December 2005)

"The Lab School's high school program is overrated," writes a former student. "There is a lack of facilities for science classes. I was in accelerated Spanish. The teacher tried to get the class to repeat the next lower level Spanish course, so administration could combine everyone into one class. The math program was also dismal. The teacher let an NYU graduate student teach the class when he was supposed to be mentoring the student. The other math classes I took were focused on polyhedrons and making other figures when it was a Regents level class. I learned more about math during the summer at Stuyvesant than all the four years I was there. The only highlight was the humanities classes: history and English that were slightly better." (September 2005)

The principal did not offer a response to the above comment.

"I love the people at Lab!" writes a parent. "The work is hard, so it's a good choice for a serious student who wants things to be interesting and cozy." (March 2004)