Harlem School Shuttered By COVID; 48 Others Dealing With Cases

HARLEM, NY — An East Harlem elementary school has been shuttered due to an outbreak of COVID-19, while dozens of other neighborhood schools have also been swept up in the city's virus-prevention protocols, according to the Department of Education.

As of Wednesday evening, a whopping 48 public schools in Harlem had either closed a classroom or imposed a partial quarantine due to a coronavirus exposure, according to the interactive map from the Department of Education. Here's the breakdown.

Full closure

The Isaac Newton Middle School for Math & Science, on Pleasant Avenue near East 115th Street, began a 10-day closure on Dec. 24 due to an unspecified number of positive cases.

The closure may be more painless than most, since it happened to coincide with the start of winter break.

Classrooms closed

The following schools have one or more classrooms closed due to a positive case in a student, teacher or staff member:

• PS. 146 Ann M. Short (421 East 106th St.)
• PS. M811 Mickey Mantle School (34 West 118th St.)
• P.S. 180 Hugo Newman (370 West 120th St.)
• Echo Park Early Childhood Center (1841 Park Ave.)
• Citizens Care Day Care Center III - MAWZ (3240 Broadway)

Partial quarantines

• Central Park East II (433 East 100th St.)
• P.S. 38 Roberto Clemente (232 East 103rd St.)
• P.S. 171 Patrick Henry (19 East 103rd St.)
• The Lexington Academy (131 East 104th St.)
• Young Women's Leadership School (105 East 106th St.)
• Tag Young Scholars - M012 (240 East 109th St.)
• P.S. 083 Luis Munoz Rivera (219 East 109th St.)
• P.S. 108 Assemblyman Angelo Del Toro Educational Complex (1615 Madison Ave.)
• Mosaic Preparatory Academy (141 East 111th St.)
• P.S. M169 - Robert F. Kennedy (315 East 113th St.)
• James Weldon Johnson (176 East 115th St.)
• P.S. M226 (21 West 111th St.)
• Frederick Douglass Academy II Secondary School (215 West 114th St.)
• Renaissance School of the Arts (319 East 117th St.)
• P.S. 206 Jose Celso Barbosa (508 East 120th St.)
• P.S. 096 Joseph Lanzetta (216 East 120th St.)
• P.S. 007 Samuel Stern (160 East 120th St.)
• River East Elementary (2351 First Ave.)
• P.S. M079 - Horan School (55 East 120th St.)
• P.S. M226 (220 West 121st St.)
• Future Leaders Institute Charter School (134 West 122nd St.)
• P.S. 030 Hernandez/Hughes (176 East 128th St.)
• Harlem Renaissance High School (22 East 128th St.)
• P.S. 125 Ralph Bunche (425 West 123rd St.)
• P.S. 154 Harriet Tubman (250 West 127th St.)
• DYCD - Teachers College Community School (168 Morningside Ave.)
• School of Earth Exploration and Discovery Harlem (425 West 130th St.)
• Teachers College Community School (223-233 West 132nd St.)
• Thurgood Marshall Academy for Learning and Social Change (214 West 135th St.)
• The Mott Hall School (71-111 Convent Ave.)
• P.S. 161 Pedro Albizu Campos (499 West 133rd St.(
• Eagle Academy for Young Men of Harlem (6 Edgecombe Ave.)
• A. Philip Randolph Campus High School (443 West 135th St.)
• New Design Middle School (625 West 133rd St.)
• Hamilton Grange Middle School (500 West 138th St.)
• High School for Mathematics, Science and Engineering at City College (240 Convent Ave.)
• P.S. 123 Mahalia Jackson (301 West 140th St.)
• P.S. 194 Countee Cullen (244 West 144th St.)
• The William Lynch School (1750 Amsterdam Ave.)
• P.S. M811 - Mickey Mantle School/P.S. 200- The James McCune Smith School/Frederick Douglass Academy (2589 Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard)
• Thurgood Marshall Academy Lower School (276 West 151st St.)
• P.S./I.S. 210 - Twenty-first Century Academy for Community Leadership (503 West 152nd St.)
• P.S. 138 (508 West 153rd St.)

Once a common headache for parents, full school closures have become far less common this year thanks to a revised policy by the DOE.

Mayor Bill de Blasio has vowed to keep schools open despite the ongoing omicron surge. On Tuesday, he announced that in-school testing would double in the new year, while pledging to allow asymptomatic students who test negative at home to return to school the next day.

Two million at-home test kits will be sent starting Jan. 2 to students who had contact with the virus.

"These test kits are going to help us fight back yet another wave of COVID," de Blasio said. "This guarantees more consistency in their education."

But both the City Council's Education Committee chair and union officials contended Tuesday the amped up testing policy didn't come soon enough or address an underlying problem of parents not giving consent to test their kids in school.

While overall hospitalizations are still well below their all-time highs in the city, admissions among children have surged in recent weeks, according to the Health Department.