Cruel school
Violence surges since ’14 at Bowne in Qns.
A FRIGHTENING SPIKE IN violence has struck troubled John Bowne High School in Queens, state Education Department statistics show.
Bowne grabbed headlines last week with a number of incidents, including a student being stabbed, a police officer assaulted and multiple teens arrested with weapons and drugs.
Now a Daily News analysis of state Education data shows weapons busts at the Flushing school are up eight-fold over the past three years, rising from three in 2014 to 24 in 2016. Likewise, assaults with injuries rose, jumping from five to 16 in the same period. Overall violent incidents increased from 14 in 2013 to 53 in 2016.
New York City Parents Union president Mona Davids called on the Education Department to step in and save the school — and the kids.
“It’s a mess. The city should’ve intervened a long time ago,” Davids said. “I guess they are waiting for someone to actually die before they do something to help.”
John Bowne is a diverse school in a middle-class neighborhood. Enrollment has held steady and, despite the spike in incidents, its overall safety by some metrics is about average.
But Bowne’s embattled principal, Howard Kwait, has been the subject of multiple suits for alleged inappropriate conduct and retaliation against whistleblowers who have forced the city to pay out hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Some students said they were upset by the violence.
“We don’t feel safe because we don’t have protection,” said a sophomore who asked that her name not be used. “Security guards try to protect the kids and the kids just go crazy.”
Another student also said she feared for her safety.
“Anything can happen now,” said the student, also a sophomore who requested anonymity. “We could be right behind someone getting stabbed. It’s scary.”
Education spokeswoman Toya Holness said the statistics on which The News analysis is based come from a troubled violence-reporting system that is being overhauled.
“The data is flat-out misleading,” Holness said. “The incidents that took place last week were swiftly addressed and we are providing the school with ongoing support.”
Holness said the school had issued 120 student suspensions in the current year, compared with 211 suspensions by the same time last year.
But city stats also show 76% of kids said they felt safe in the school hallways in 2016, below the city average of 83%. Likewise, 87% of John Bowne students said they felt safe in class, below the city average of 91%.
John Bowne principal Kwait didn’t respond to a request for comment on the safety issues at his school. Kwait has held onto his $156,671-job despite a history of trouble.
The city paid a $275,000 settlement in 2015 to two former assistant principals of Kwait’s after they alleged bullying, sexual harassment and retaliation for reporting cheating. The city also settled a discrimination suit in 2012 in which another assistant principal claimed Kwait discriminated against her while she was pregnant.
On April 4 Kwait was slapped with a fresh suit by Assistant Principal Marc Einsohn that charges he retaliated against Einsohn for being a whistleblower.
Kwait paid a $4,500 fine and received a disciplinary letter in 2013 following a finding that he was involved in an personal and financial relationship with a subordinate and made inappropriate comments. He was cleared of grade-fixing in a 2016 investigation.