Students in an art space looking at a salon-style wall hung edge to edge with paintings, prints and framed work, with graffiti-tagged vinyl records suspended from the ceiling above them

City as Classroom

Urban Academy students use New York City in many ways — both as a resource for many classes and as the location for Community Service sites. By treating the city as an extension of the school, students engage with real-world environments in subjects such as:

Politics & Government
Trigonometry
Art & Art History
Science Research
Photo Documentary

Weekly Commitment

All Urban Academy students spend half a day a week working to fulfill a community service requirement. This immersive work takes place across a diverse range of New York City institutions:

Arts & Culture: Art galleries and museums
Health & Wellness: Hospitals and senior citizen centers
Education & Civic: Schools, offices, and not-for-profit agencies

A workshop leader working at a laptop while a student in a VR headset handles the physical model beside them, seen from above

Robotics classes visit Cornell's tech lab on Roosevelt Island.

A student taking a selfie with classmates and a teacher on the steps of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Forced Migrations class went to Seneca Village, Weeksville Heritage Center and also the Met.

Students sitting on rocks beside a pond on a park trip, watching goldfish in the water below

Animal Minds students observe animals throughout the semester at the Central Park Zoo and interview the zookeepers of the gorillas at the Bronx Zoo.

Students visiting a printmaking studio, listening to the printers beside a table of brushes and inks with a grid of finished prints on the wall behind

Art classes regularly visit exhibits at galleries and in museums.

Students and staff serving themselves from a long buffet table set up in a school corridor lined with framed photographs and student paintings

Monthly "Food Adventure" trips to try foods in food halls and restaurants in a variety of neighborhoods.

A student pinning her black-and-white prints to a dark studio wall already covered with photographs, beneath a row of exhibition posters

Photography class students choose subjects for a series of photos -- these might be in their neighborhood, in places like skate parks, political protests or food trucks around the city.

The All-School Project

Finally, students make extensive use of the city during the twice-a-year, all-school project — a 2-3 week intensive study revolving around a central inquiry. Recent questions have included:

What is the Impact of Architecture on People's Lives?

What Makes a Good Museum?

Is Technology Progress?

Do Elections Matter?

How Can We Reimagine NYC?

What is Good Play?

Three students in winter coats standing on East 67th Street, each with a 35mm film camera hung around their neck, ready for a photography assignment in the city