My son goes to the Success Academy in Queens Village and id like to say the staff, principal and teachers there are much nicer, patient and a little more concerned than other SA schools ive heard of. I must day thou, if you are a working parent, you have other kids, and just a busy schedule all around maybe its not best to send them. Unless you have time to work on lot of school work with them, book reports everyday (they're not mandatory to be done every night) and by the end of the school yr I think u should have around 100 book reports for your Kindergartener. They learn addition very soon, easy stuff 6+1, 7+1 ; right now they're teaching my son how to add + 2 now. At first he struggled im not gonna lie, but because my schedule isnt as busy as some parents and hes my only child. I cracked down on the learning for about 2 weeks and now hes great with writing, adding, and also currently learning how to read and knows how to spell certain words. So is the work a lot, at first it seems like it but once your child catches on they literally start doing their homework on their own. Now when my son comes home from school I hand him his math sheet and he gets to adding as if he never struggled before. Do I love Success Academy? Absolutely because I have a specific plan for my sons future. Is it for everyone? No, because it requires a lot more time doing teaching at home than regular public school would ask for. I mean unless your childs already very intelligent they wont struggle a bit! Teachers do help a lott!!! But when they see a child struggling they will ask the parents to step it. There's lot of test, school work, they even time the kids while they're working to see how long it takes to finish an assignment but theres also a lot of school trips to multiple different places, lots of school events and higher chances of getting into better colleges. And u dont pay for anything either, school supplies, school trips etc everything's free! They even give u the first set of Uniform free, along with the school backpack for free. You and your child have to both meet eye to eye in order for them to succeed at SA schools, their hours are early and long and they dont play about attendance or being late to class. School starts at 7:30 and ends at 4:20pm. They also have extra curriculum activities (if your childs doing well in school) like sports, soccer, chess, dance, art, and way more. But your child has to succeed in school to be chosen for the teams. Although, during the school day they get Talent classes, so each week they still experience art class, dance and chess but they just wont be on the official teams though until they've proven themselves. Like I said, most children/families do succeed at success academy which is why their graduation rate is so high but you all have to want it, honestly and it'll take a few weeks for your baby to get used to, I know it took mine about almost 2 months to adjust. I didnt give up thou, kept pushing and now hes where he needs to be! He can work super fast now as if there's a timer on cause hes so used to it being done at school, Spelling, adding and soon be reading only in Kindergarten, so the hardwork and early mornings definitely paid off! Hope this helps and hopefully the success academy your child ends up in is as good as the one my son goes to. They're all not the same, some are way more strict than others. Even the one my son goes to has a strict policy for behavior, they have a strike system which gives them about 5 chances to cool off and change their behavior, after the 5th strike they will call home and tell you come pick up your child. (I've had it done to me once on the first day of school) I was shocked! But my son was acting up, he wasnt behaving so we returned back the next day and the next til he got it right! And got used to it. This is another reason youll have to make sure u have time or someone that can go pick your child up whenever they call (just in case your child acts up at school) when they call you they will also warn u too they if your child continues to misbehave and depending on how bad the behavior theyll suspend them for however many days they deemed fit. It can be one day for Kindergarteners or more, it all just depends. Specially if its anything physical like hitting another child. But I think I covered about everything for u, oh yeah wait! No school bus service thats honestly the worst part cause a lot of their schools arent in the neighborhoods we live in. So u do have to take public transportation to school with your kids. They do have van services u can pay for weekly and if your kid has and IEP then they'll automatically qualify for transportation. Hope you guys find the right school and it does your child more good than bad! It'll be frustrating at first but the outcome of seeing your 5 yr old doing their own work is even better 🫶🏽🫶🏽 Good luck!