Veronica Najjar, the much-loved principal known as “Ronnie,” who opened the P.S. 89 Liberty School (intersection of Warren and West Streets) in 1998, has finished her final year of service. At a Wednesday evening ceremony in the packed school auditorium, Rebecca Thomas, former president of P.S. 89’s PTA, recalled, “what began as a small, grassroots school grew into one of the most respected elementary schools in New York City, earning a reputation for academic excellence and a culture of community.”
Indeed, during her decades at the helm of P.S. 89, Ms. Najjar built a record of unalloyed success: In the most recent year for which statistics are available, 94 percent of P.S. 89 students scored 3 or 4 on the State math exam (indicating “Proficient” or “Exceeds Proficiency”), while 97 percent scored in this range on the reading exam. U.S. News & World Report ranks P.S. 89 as the 38th-best public elementary school in New York City (among more than 1,000), and the 46th-best in New York State (out of more than 4,000).
“Early in her tenure, Ronnie decided she would make the arts central to every P.S. 89 student’s experience,” Ms. Thomas continued. “This was long before research confirmed what we know today: that the arts lead to social emotional development and long-term academic success. Today, every student at P.S. 89 gets dance, music, and art.”
She added that under Ms. Najjar’s leadership, P.S. 89 became also one of the first New York City public schools to establish an integrated co-teaching (ICT) program—an inclusive classroom model that pairs a general education teacher with a special education teacher, allowing them to collaborate, while offering instruction to a mix of general-education and special-education students to ensure all learners have access to the curriculum.
“Since the program’s founding in 1999,” Ms. Thomas noted, “Ronnie has shown an unwavering commitment to educating students across learning styles, and she understands that profound growth occurs when students with different strengths learn from each other. Our school is now seen as a model for inclusion, and we are visited by educators from around the city and from other countries around the world.”
When Ms. Najjar ascended to the podium, she recalled her decade as a teacher at the nearby P.S. 234 in Tribeca, saying, “I never wanted to leave the classroom, until an opportunity arose that absolutely terrified me.” This was based on the surging residential population in Lower Manhattan, which had prompted the City’s Department of Education to begin planning for a new elementary school in the fledgling neighborhood of Battery Park City. As a highly regarded teacher at a nearby school, Ms. Najjar was invited to serve as its principal.
“Generally, I’m not a huge risk taker,” she recounted. “But I was convinced to try it for just one year. ‘Hmm,’ I thought: ‘Okay maybe I can see if I like it after a year.’ The following year, another voice said, ‘one year isn’t a good indicator. So give it another year, and maybe another, and then try a decade or two and see how you like it then.’”
“Well, clearly during my 28 years of trying it out, I grew to love it,” Ms. Najjar acknowledged. “Starting a school from scratch is not for the faint of heart. But when you’re clueless like I was, you just take it in stride and hope that nobody notices. In 1998, our very small staff of 12, along with families willing to take the risk, blindly joined me on this journey. Everyone poured their hearts into P.S. 89. They trusted me and each other, and together we lifted this school off the ground.”
Ms. Najjar has sometimes been told that she possesses a superpower: remembering the names of every student who attends P.S. 89, as well as graduates of the school even decades later. “It seems natural that if you want to build positive relationships with people, it should start with knowing their name,” she said, adding, “what fuels me is to lead a school that always puts children first, period. It is as simple as that: children first. Period.”
Looking around the room, she recalled, “this is where we sheltered our teachers and students on September 11, 2001, while we waited anxiously for word on when we should evacuate the building, not knowing that we would not return for five months.”
In 2020, at the height of the Covid pandemic, she continued, “this was the room where I stood completely alone on this stage, in an empty building, and spoke to my graduates in their homes, wishing that we could have the simple joy of joining together in person as a community.”
Midway through Wednesday’s farewell ceremony, a chorus of children walked onstage and, joined by many more students and parents in the audience, sang a modified version of “Lean on Me.” The altered lyrics included the lines:
“You just might have a problem
that she’d understand
Ronnie’s somebody to lean on…”
At the conclusion of her remarks, Ms. Najjar said, “I want to end with a quote by Jane Goodall: ‘What you do makes a difference and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.’” Her voice catching, she added, “I hope I have made a difference in your lives and in the lives of your children. It has been my privilege and honor to be the leader of this remarkable school.”