Research Report

Teaching the Way Students Learn Best: Lessons from Bronxdale High School

Collage of teachers and students at Bronxdale High School
Jacqueline Ancess, Bethany L. Rogers, DeAnna Duncan Grand, and Linda Darling-Hammond
October 2019 | Learning Policy Institute
Collage of teachers and students at Bronxdale High School

This case study from the Learning Policy Institute provides an in-depth look at how Bronxdale High School in New York City successfully serves diverse learners by organizing its structures and practices to be consistent with knowledge rooted in the sciences of learning and development. The school is one of five small high schools co-located in an imposing five-story building in the northeast section of the Bronx. Although most of its 445 students enter Bronxdale performing well below proficiency levels on standardized tests, they outperform their peers in credit accrual, 4- and 6-year graduation rates, and enrollment in postsecondary education. Bronxdale aims to create a safe, caring, and collaborative community in which staff, students, and families have voice, agency, and responsibility. This vision sets the foundation for the school’s mission: to develop students as “self-reliant, independent learners who are curious and know how to be thinkers” and are “creative problem-solvers.”