February 10, 1999

A Black Private School Prepares for a New Home

By DAVID J. DENT

When her eldest son was ready for kindergarten, Ora Abdur-Razzaq, a homemaker with a degree in English, decided that the best classroom would be their apartment in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. A year later, she was on a new career track. ''I needed a school for my children,'' she said. ''I couldn't continue at home like that. And then there were other people who wanted me to do with their children what I did with mine. So we started a school.'' Ms. Abdur-Razzaq's Cush Campus Schools has quietly provided a low-tuition alternative for inner-city youth since 1971. Now, with 125 students and 16 teachers, it has grown far beyond the parameters of the three-story building it leases from a Crown Heights church. On Friday, with a benefit auction at B. Smith's restaurant in Manhattan, Cush embarks on a campaign to raise $5 million toward a new home: an abandoned day-care center to be renovated by the Pratt Planning and Architectural Collaborative, a nonprofit architectural firm based at the Pratt Institute. There are about 150 private secular schools founded by African-Americans across the country, including 21 in the New York metropolitan region, according to the Institute for Independent Education. Many of the schools were founded like Cush: Veterans of the 1960's Black Power movement, frustrated with public schools, transformed living rooms, basements and brownstones into small schools with a pan-African focus. Many now have growing enrollments and waiting lists. That, and the high costs of providing education, from teacher salaries to new technology, are nudging these modest schools into larger arenas. ''Black private schools are at a crossroads because there are many more demands on them with the explosion of information and technology,'' said Joan Ratteray, executive director of the Institute for Independent Education. ''Many of these schools have had low tuition and they have kept it that way for many, many years so they could help families in the communities keep coming to the schools. Funding is crucial.'' Politically charged issues like school choice and vouchers are creating delicate new alliances. Some schools have signed on with business groups and conservative foundations that provide scholarships for inner-city students to attend private schools, although traditional black leadership has waged legal battles against vouchers. ''Right now in our district, less than 50 percent of students are reading on grade level,'' said Krim AbdurRazzaq, 27, Cush's development coordinator (and its founder's youngest son). ''Vouchers would give us a chance to serve some of these students.'' Cush is on the list of eligible schools for School Choice Partnerships in New York, which provide $1,400 a year each for 1,000 students toward private tuition for the next three years. The Marcus Garvey School, a private school founded by blacks in Los Angeles, is part of a similar program financed by Wall Street investors and celebrities. It offers $8 million in scholarships for low-income children to attend private schools in Los Angeles. Cush, with its first graduates in the work force and a second wave in college, cannot rely heavily on rich alumni and parents, as do many established independent schools. Malik Abdur-Razzaq, 33, Cush's first graduate, who is now an assistant vice president of the New York

City Health and Hospitals Corporation and chairman of the school's board of trustees, says the school's budget has relied largely on tuition. ''In the 70's,'' he said, ''it was not easy, but much easier, to start a school with little or no money. Nowadays, you can't have a school and expect your students to learn without the latest technology.'' At Cush, which is divided into three schools covering all grades, tuition has risen from $1,000 that first year to $5,700 -- more than twice the average of $2,480 for black private schools, Ms. Ratteray said. Although still considerably lower than the $14,150 median cost of an established independent school in New York City, that puts Cush out of reach of many low-income students. Ms. Abdur-Razzaq says the school has tried to retain a familylike atmosphere as it has grown. Students address teachers by prefixing their first names with ''brother'' and ''sister.'' Classes have fewer than 15 students. Most combine students of two grade levels, and instruction is largely individualized with students working at their own pace. In 1997-98, 100 percent of Cush third graders scored at or above grade level in reading and math on Stanford Achievement Tests, while 13 of 15 sixth graders scored above level. Leroy Campbell said his son, Damany, 13, did not receive enough attention in the public school he attended before Cush. ''The teachers had 30 or more students and there were so many students, teachers couldn't teach,'' he said. ''At Cush, there are fewer students and you don't have the disruptions from students that keep teachers from teaching.'' Khalid Rahman, 21, a Cush graduate who is now a senior at Boston University, recalls catching the conversations of peers on his block as he walked to Cush and they traveled to the neighborhood school. ''They would talk about fights in class and laugh about arguments with teachers, things that never happened at my school,'' he said. In a Thursday ritual, students in their uniforms -- kente-design vests, blue ties, white shirts and dark pants or skirts -- file into the gymnasium for the weekly assembly, a presentation of one of the classes. On this day, a class of combined fourth and fifth graders takes the stage to present two versions of ''Little Red Riding Hood,'' one to appeal to the lower school and one to engage students in upper grades. Lower graders roar with laughter when Little Red Riding Hood discovers the Big Bad Wolf is in Grandma's bed. There are no cheers during the second version, ''Little Red in the Hood,'' when Wolf, a gang member, tries to use peer pressure to woo Little Red into a gang and to use and sell drugs. ''We wanted to send a message not to go with strangers, and to upper schools not to take drugs,'' said Damany Campbell, ''so we actually combined it all together.'' Photo: Students at the Cush School in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, a private school covering all grades. Cush, with about 125 students and 16 teachers, has offered a low-tuition alternative for inner-city youth since 1971. (Alan Chin for The New York Times)
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