Uncommon Charter High School

Located in a new building in Crown Heights, Uncommon Charter High School is technically not an independent school but the collection of high school grades for several schools in the Uncommon Schools charter network: Williamsburg Collegiate Uncommon Charter School, Excellence Boys Uncommon Charter School, Excellence Girls Uncommon Charter School and Kings Collegiate Uncommon Charter School. According to the organization’s website, the schools in the Uncommon network focus on maintaining high standards and on getting students, many of them low-income, into and through four-year colleges. The Uncommon schools employ what has come to be called the “no excuses” approach, where learning is highly structured, children wear uniforms and students are expected to be orderly even during lunch, which is centered on “fueling up for the afternoon's lessons.”

On most statistical measures, the schools in the network perform as well as and often better than district schools in similar neighborhoods. For example, about 90 percent of students at Uncommon Charter High School graduated on time in 2016, compared to about 70 percent for the city as a whole.

The school uses a curriculum developed by Uncommon. It features 100 minutes of in-class literacy instruction for 9th- and 10th-graders. Students receive homework help and after-school tutoring, with struggling students required to attend classes on Saturday.

Uncommon Charter High School shares its building with Achievement First Brooklyn High School, also a charter school.

ADMISSION: The school has a very limited number of places available for 9th-graders who did not attend an Uncommon middle school. Those students are selected from a waiting list created when the children applied to 5th grade. No new students are admitted after 9th grade. (Gail Robinson, school website and web reports, February 2018)