PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER

Set in BROOKLYN, New York, PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER is a cozy elementary-level community, operated by NEW YORK CITY GEOGRAPHIC DISTRICT #13. It works with 178 students across grades pre-K through 5. That puts it 60% below the typical public school in New York, which averages around 443 students.

Within NEW YORK CITY GEOGRAPHIC DISTRICT #13, which oversees 42 schools and 19,151 students, PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER is one campus in the system.

On demographics, PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER logs that Black students make up the majority at 57%. Beyond that, the school reports 33% Hispanic, 4% Asian, 3% White. That is considerably more Black than the county at large, where the share is closer to 28%.

On the resource side, Staff filings list 28 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 6.3:1 students per teacher. Statewide, the average ratio sits near 12.8:1, putting PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER tighter than the state norm the norm. Around 95% of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price meals, a number frequently used as a low-income enrollment indicator. That share is north of Kings County's rate of about 79%.

After controlling for student poverty, PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER performs roughly as the BeatsExpectations model predicts for a school with this FRL share. The predicted value is around 40.1%, the actual is 25.2%, a residual of -14.9 points.

Zooming out to the county, census data for Kings County shows median household income runs about $80,263, about 42% of the adult population holds a bachelor's degree or above, and census figures put the poverty rate at about 15%. In all, Kings County runs 583 public schools (combined enrollment of about 291,697 students), of which PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER is one.

The closest other public school is PS 54 DETECTIVE RAFAEL RAMOS, roughly 0.2 miles away. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER. Ranking that nearby cluster on reported proficiency puts PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER at 8th of 8; the average score across the group is 59.2%.

The campus sits in a city-core setting.

Five-year trend. PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER's enrollment has fell 20% since 2018, when it stood at 223 (now 178). The Black share of enrollment shrank from 69% to 57% over that span. Class-load math has tightened: from 12.4:1 in 2018 to 6.3:1 in 2025.

Inside the community feed, members of the PS 256 BENJAMIN BANNEKER community share and discuss sports schedules, lunch menu changes, and school spirit week. Anyone with firsthand experience at this school can post or comment.