The Jewel in the Crown

By Continued

New York

It's the third week of June in New York City, and, as the temperature rises, many schools begin coasting toward summer. Classes and homework give way to desultory test preparation, loosely justified field trips, and vaguely "academic" games. Teachers plan vacations or lock in summer jobs, and students' thoughts converge on Jones Beach, basketball, and snow cones.

But not at P.S. 161 in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn. Here, they are even getting a jump on the next school year. At 9 a.m., more than 80 parents and their children sit in the school's auditorium, their minds very much on the first day of kindergarten, still three months away. Principal Irwin Kurz welcomes them. A trim figure with dark hair, an oval face, and hooded eyes, his speech is neither a sermon nor a harangue. It's more a...