Going the Distance

Stuyvesant welcomes students from all five boroughs, many of whom often travel great distances and sacrifice time and money just to get to school. According to this year’s freshman survey, slightly more than 10 percent of the freshman class lives in the Bronx or Staten Island. An additional 40 percent lives in Queens, of which some parts are practically in greater Long Island, and another 31.5 percent of students in Brooklyn, some of whom live in further out neighborhoods such as Canarsie or Coney Island. A typical Stuyvesant student might wake up around 6 a.m. to take the train or the Long Island Railroad (LIRR) to get to school on time, partake in extracurriculars after school, make the hour-long commute to get home around or after 7 p.m., and then spend the rest of the night completing homework and studying for upcoming tests. Though we tend to focus on the academic pressures of life at Stuyvesant, some of us spend up to three hours solely on our commutes, making them a significant aspect of our day-to-day lives.

Because of Stuyvesant’s location in Tribeca and the fact that more time-efficient commuting methods, such as express buses and the LIRR, are far more expensive, the time spent on commutes is a major burden for a large segment of the student population. This burden is especially taxing for students interested in participating in extracurriculars, many of which meet after-school and on weekends at Stuyvesant. Furthermore, the unreliability of the Metropolitan Transport Authority (MTA) and the frequency of train delays exacerbate the difficulties students face when commuting to and from school.

The administration has already begun implementing changes to address such issues; Principal Eric Contreras has expanded the locations where he holds parent meetings to encourage attendance from families that live far away. Nonetheless, it is clear that more needs to be done if we hope to accommodate for student commutes. A potential solution is to switch to a daily schedule that starts later, which would not only provide students with more time to plan for unexpected transportation delays, but also enable those with long commutes to dedicate a portion of their travel time to catch up on sleep. It is important to note, though, that a later day would mean a later dismissal time, which could negatively interfere with schedules for extracurriculars like PSAL sports. A slight modification, in this case, would be for the program office to grant a free first period to those who live a reasonably long distance from the school.

There are also policy changes that should be implemented above the school level; for instance, it should not be the case that the only students for whom transit is free are those who live within a reasonable commuting distance by subway or standard bus. Students living in Staten Island or in the further reaches of Queens should not have to choose between losing sleep to a longer commute and losing money to the high price of transit. To that end, the MTA should make LIRR passes free for New York City public students, and student MetroCards should cover Express Buses.

The MTA should also consider expanding public school student transit passes to work on weekends. Getting students to school is not the only value of having students able to get around. Enabling students, particularly those who might not otherwise be able to afford it, to get around the city on weekends would serve to enrich the cultural lives of the city’s youth. Give students the ability to go to museums, performances, and concerts in other boroughs for free, and you’ll get more students going to museums, performances, and concerts. Don’t, and more students—particularly those who live on the (frequently less well-off) margins of the city—will stay at home.

Now, these reforms might cost a fair deal of money. The MTA already has more than enough problems—a mountain of debt and broken and outdated equipment, for two—, and these reforms might seem like they would cost too much. And indeed, maybe they would. In fact, the MTA could make weekend student fares reduced, but not free—something that might actually increase revenue, by encouraging students who might not otherwise use transit on the weekends to use it; it might also consider not spending $250 million on new police officers.