PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL

PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL, a small K-5 school in BRONX, New York, overseen by NEW YORK CITY GEOGRAPHIC DISTRICT # 7, educates 303 students, covering grades pre-K through 5. By comparison, New York's public schools average about 443 students each, so PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL sits 32% smaller than that benchmark.

NEW YORK CITY GEOGRAPHIC DISTRICT # 7 runs 41 schools in total, collectively educating 13,625 students. PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL is one of those campuses.

Looking at the student body, PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL records that the largest single group is Hispanic, at 78% of enrollment. Other groups include 20% Black. By comparison, Bronx County as a whole is about 55% Hispanic, so the school skews visibly more Hispanic than its surroundings.

On the income-and-resources front, Staff filings list 25 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 12.0:1 students per teacher. Statewide, the average ratio sits near 12.8:1, putting PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL tighter than the state norm the norm. Roughly 93% of students at PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, often used as a Title I proxy.

After controlling for student poverty, PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 40.8%, the actual is 29.4%, a residual of -11.3 points.

Across the wider county, census data for Bronx County shows median household income runs about $48,676, roughly 22% of adults have completed at least a four-year degree, and roughly 23% of residents live below the federal poverty line. PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL is one of 472 public schools in Bronx County (combined enrollment of about 202,028 students).

The closest other public school is URBAN DOVE TEAM CHARTER SCHOOL II, roughly 0.1 miles away. 8 of the 8 nearest public schools sit inside a five-mile radius. Among the 8 schools in that immediate cluster with test data (this one included), PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL ranks 8th on composite proficiency, below the local average of 43.4%.

The campus sits in an inner-city setting.

Looking at the recent track record. Over the past 7-year window, the student count fell 42%: 519 students in 2018 compared to 303 in 2025. Class-load math has tightened: from 13.0:1 in 2018 to 12.0:1 in 2025.

Within the allk12 community for this school, members of the PS 161 JUAN PONCE DE LEON SCHOOL community share and discuss school events, parent volunteer needs, and clubs. Parents, students, alumni, and staff are welcome to weigh in.