Obesity data for East and Central Harlem. (Chart by Lina Zeldovich. Data provided by the New York City Department of Health )

Eating carrot cake is not the same as eating carrots, Malika Harrison told a group of Harlem children at the recent Fit for Life Obesity Program’s workshop at the James Varick Community Center. “Carrot cake would have added sugar in it so you’d have to be careful,” she said while her workshop partner held up a laptop showing a heap of vegetables on its screen.

The children discussed the importance of eating veggies of every color. They played a detective game to understand how media influences their food choices. They learned who sponsors advertisements, what messages ads deliver and how to spot information they hide.

While the kids learned about fat and sugar data on products’ labels in the gym, their parents received similar training upstairs. They learned how to find reduced-fat substitutes for cheeses and to balance calories by reducing TV and computer use and exercising more. They also shared lean recipes that use soy substitutes.

“Kids talk more when their parents are not around,” said program coordinator Sara Dennis  of the National Council of Negro Women’s Manhattan Section, which implemented the program with the National Institute of Child Health. Dennis explained that both groups learn the same concepts to understand how to stay fit and healthy as a family.

Uzo Ejogu came to the Fit for Life obesity workshop because her overweight daughter, Malika, gets tired after they take a 30-minute walk together. “We don’t eat fast food at home and we don’t have a TV,” said Ejogu, who wanted to know what else she could do to help Malika lose weight. “I told her she’s big, but she says, ‘No, I’m beautiful.’ But then all her friends are like that. And my husband says we shouldn’t tell her she’s fat because it would hurt her self-esteem.”

Ejogu didn’t bring her daughter to the workshop, but she left with a plan to sign up both of them for Zumba classes.  “It will help me lose weight, too,” she said. “I’m very glad I came. I learned a great deal.”

Cheryl Moody did bring her children, Anthony and Brianna Hatchett. “My doctor told me that my 5-year-old daughter was the same weight as my 6-year-old son,” she said.  “He said he didn’t want her to gain any more weight.” Moody heard about the event from her father who learned about it at his church.

Some parents dropped their children off but didn’t participate. Throughout the afternoon more people trickled in, but the turnout was lower than the organizers expected.

“It’s not an easy subject for many people,” said Dennis. “It means a commitment to making a lifestyle change.”  The National Council of Negro Women had reached out to community centers and churches to spread the word and will continue doing workshops, she said.

Cheryl Moody with her children, Anthony and Brianna Hatchett, at the Fit for Life workshop in Harlem. (Photo by Lina Zeldovich)

The program was motivated, in part, by Michelle Obama’s initiative to reduce obesity in children. Kim Hernandez, a workshop organizer, said that 12.6 million children over 6 are overweight, according to federal data. “Two million of them are African-American,” she said.

According to the National Institute of Child Health, 16 percent of American children are overweight, but the proportion in Harlem is higher. According to a recent neighborhood report from the East and Central Harlem District Public Health Office, 27 percent of public school students are obese and an additional 19 percent are overweight. Nearly 1 in 3 high school students has a weight problem – 14 percent are obese and an additional 18 percent are overweight. So are 6 of 10 adults. Obesity rates are higher in adolescents and adults in Harlem than in the rest of the city, the report says.

More Fit for Life workshops will take place next year, said Dennis.

Courtney Orr wears her finisher's cape with pride after running her first New York City Marathon and raising $2,500 for Harlem RBI. (Photo by Nat Rudarakanchana)

Courtney Orr woke up at 6 a.m. ready to run 26.2 miles. She put on her red and black spandex outfit, had a big bowl of cinnamon oatmeal and said goodbye to her roommate.

“I’m kind of in a fog. It’s weird to think about what’s going to be happening in a couple hours,” said Orr, 21, a Manhattan Marymount College senior running her first marathon.

As a record 47,000 runners pounded the pavement through all five boroughs in the 41^st annual New York City Marathon on golden fall day, Harlem RBI, an organization devoted to the success of East Harlem children, fielded seven runners who collectively raised more than $54,000.

The kids from Harlem RBI, where Orr has interned since July, gave her lucky red bracelets for motivation. “So they’ll be with me in spirit,” she said, smiling down at her wrists.

Harlem RBI, one of more than 200 charities represented in the marathon, began 20 years ago with volunteers turning an abandoned lot on East 101^st Street into two baseball diamonds for East Harlem kids. Now each year, 1,000 kids play for Harlem RBI teams, join its summer reading program or take SAT prep classes. The organization aims to have participants grow up with the program, joining in kindergarten and continuing through high school.

“Our main goals are to get our kids into college and then for them to have a fulfilling life where they’re stable as adults,” said Harlem RBI spokeswoman Hannah Baek. “In East Harlem, 50 percent of kids drop out of high school, but this past year 100 percent of our seniors graduated from high school. So we’re very proud.”

Orr began training this summer while she was a Harlem RBI intern. She was never really a runner, and “when I first started training in July, I was like ‘no way,’” Orr said.

She tried to keep her expectations reasonable. “My goal is to not faint and just to cross the finish line,” Orr said. “If I finish, I know I’ll want to do marathons all the time.”

Orr did not faint, and finished in four hours, 44 minutes and 17 seconds, raising $2,500 for Harlem RBI.

The program’s success rates and athletic focus attracted runners like Elizabeth Bildner, who felt “a connection to the organization’s commitment to sports and education as a way to teach kids teamwork, perseverance and responsibility both on the field and in the classroom,” Bildner said. Asked to run for Harlem RBI, “I jumped at the chance.”

She raised $5,155 for Harlem RBI, and finished the marathon, her second, in four hours, six minutes and 47 seconds.

Sarah Haga, a Harlem RBI board member for almost three years, began planning to run the marathon in January. “There’s nobody I would want to run for more,” she said. “They garner team spirit, and I feel like a part of a great team.”

Haga also ran the marathon—her first—in celebration of her 50^th birthday on October 26. She finished in four hours, 27 minutes and 22 seconds and raised $6,635 for Harlem RBI.

Among the other RBI runners: Katherine Trahan, 28, competing for the first time this year. Her parents traveled all the way from Austin* to cheer her on as she crossed the finish line in five hours, 48 minutes and 20 seconds, raising $5,592.  And Brandon Abbs, a Bostonian and marathon runner since 2003, whose childhood friend from Harlem got him interested in raising money for the project. Abbs finished in four hours and eight minutes and raised $5,047 for Harlem RBI.

The RBI cadre—and everyone else, including an estimated two million spectators—was in luck. The sun shone through a nearly cloudless blue sky throughout the day and the crowds were enthusiastic. In East Harlem, spectators of all stripes turned out to cheer for the racers.

Paul Riley stood applauding on Fifth Avenue near 127^th Street with his wife and daughter, who was cheering for her schoolteacher.

“It’s a great thing; you have to have strong willpower to run through all the different boroughs,” said Riley, a marathon watcher for 11 years. “I wanted to give my daughter a chance to see that you can basically accomplish anything if you put your mind to it.”

Riley likes the way the marathon unites New Yorkers. “It brings the city together for one day,“ he said.

A small group of traditional African drummers, called a Djembe orchestra, was out playing for marathoners as it has since 2006. Dubaka Leigh, of West African descent, lives on Fifth Avenue and organizes the musicians to play on his front steps.

“We started it for the Africans because they’re always the first ones running through,” Leigh said. “They turn their heads when they hear their drums.”

Adolphus Stewart stood on Fifth Avenue and 125^th Street cheering for no one in particular. He lives nearby and wanted to support the runners who were struggling. As one man limped forward, Stewart started clapping and yelled, “Come on, just four miles to glory! Whatcha gonna say on Monday? Let’s goooo!”

The marathon is one of his favorite New York events. “It’s a really wonderful, beautiful day in Harlem,” he said.

“People all around the world get to see Harlem—not the Harlem from TV, but the real Harlem. People out here are supportive and it’s beautiful,” he said.

He pointed to an open window in a brownstone across the street. “Just now there was a little girl in the window, jumping and all excited. It’s just a really beautiful day.”

See more about Orr and Trahan’s race in an Uptowner slideshow here.

*Correction: Trahan’s parents did not travel from Houston, as originally reported.

Promoting her 'Let's Move' campaign, Michelle Obama played games with students. (Photo by Krishn Kaushik)

Michelle Obama visited the Police Athletic League on Manhattan Avenue in West Harlem today as part of her “Let’s Move” campaign, encouraging children to exercise daily and eat right.

“You guys are learning a lot and you’re moving,” said the First Lady. “Kids like you need this. You’ve got to eat healthy, you’ve got to eat nutritious foods and you have to get exercise. It’s just as important as learning to read and do math.”

About 60 kids got to listen to and play with the First Lady as she praised institutions like the PAL and urged that young people keep active at least 60 minutes a day.

“You were on the Disney Channel,” screamed one participant.

Obama encouraged the children to shout out answers to questions about what to eat and what sports to play. Resounding “yay”s were the most common response, until she asked them to switch off their game consoles at home.

“No!” the boys groaned, but the girls managed to outscream their male counterparts.

Michelle Obama played with Harlem children Thursday. (Photo by Krishn Kaushik)

The First Lady then joined in the activities, including jumping jacks, push-ups and general running around.

Nine-year-old Alex Rodriguez got a hug from Obama and spent a couple of minutes with her. “It was a very exciting day and it was very good to meet her,” he said afterwards.

Harlem PAL director Kobla Moats said he learned less than a week ago that Obama wanted to drop by. Police commissioner Ray Kelly, former Manhattan D.A. Robert Morgenthau, New York State First Lady Michelle Paterson and State Sen. Bill Perkins showed up today as well. Moats hopes the exposure will bring his organization more money for expanded programs.

“It’s a big day for Harlem,” he said. “Only good can come out of this.”

More than 50,000 New York kids participate in the Police Athletic League program.

According to the American Diabetes Association, more than 23 million children have diabetes, a disease linked to obesity and a sedentary lifestyle.

Tiffany Denise, facilitator of Hip Hop H.E.A.L.S., leads a health session at Thurgood Marshall Academy in Harlem. (Photo by Dewi Cooke)

They know the ingredients of a bottle of Coke and can describe the difference between empty calories and nourishing ones. But it’s Chris Brown who really speaks to them.

When MC Easy AD plays Brown’s bass-heavy “Transform Ya”, the fourth graders of Thurgood Marshall Academy Lower School on West 151^st street can’t contain themselves.

That’s just what AD – Adrian Harris, half of the pioneering hip-hop duo the Cold Crush Brothers – and his partner Tiffany Denise hope for. “Do you know dancing is great exercise?” Denise tells the group of 50 wriggling students seated on the floor of their school’s cafeteria. “When we dance, we burn calories.”

Hip-hop is the key to engaging students, she says. “They love the latest stuff, as long as it’s hot and fly and they can move to it.”

It’s a routine the pair run in schools around New York every week. Since starting in Harlem 18 months ago, the city-funded Hip Hop H.E.A.L.S (Healthy Eating and Living in Schools) project has taught 12,000 local schoolchildren about nutrition and health.

But it’s more than another anti-obesity program for kids. The brainchild of Harlem Hospital’s Dr. Olajide Williams, the project’s lesser-known aim is to use children as a way to funnel information on nutrition, diabetes and heart disease to at-risk parents.

And its sister program – Hip Hop Stroke, which laid the ground work for Hip Hop H.E.A.L.S. when it started in 2007 – just landed a $3.7 million grant from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke to test that strategy. The five-year project,  led by Williams, will look at how well parents and grandparents grasp the messages children and grandchildren bring home, about stroke awareness and prevention.

“I call it child-mediated health communication,” Williams says. “It’s an approach that I think is innovative and I think it’s a potential vehicle for additional health communication in disadvantaged communities.

“It’s very hard to penetrate the home fabric of individuals in disadvantaged communities because there’s so many competing interests,” he continues. Survival is the primary objective for many of the families the program serves, mostly at public schools in low-income neighborhoods.

During each two-day Hip Hop H.E.A.L.S. session, children watch cartoons and hear songs created especially for the project. They go home with DVDs, comic books and t-shirts. The program covers different themes, including fitness, but the growing interest in child obesity makes nutrition the most requested, Denise says. Students use “beat boxes”, electronic remote controls allowing them to answer on-screen quizzes such as “Where do calories come from?” and “Do you have a grown up at home who looks after you who smokes cigarettes?”.

At Thurgood Marshall this month, one student raises her hand to respond to the cigarette question. She tells the group that her aunt smokes, and “sometimes I tell her not to, and she throws the cigarettes away and now she stopped”. The class cheered. Then they danced to Aretha Franklin’s “Respect”.

“See, that’s the power of children I’m telling you about,” Williams says.

Opus 118's founder Roberta Guaspari at the school on 125th Street and Park Avenue. (Photo by Ksenia Galouchko)

This fall the hallways of Opus 118, Harlem’s most famous music school, remain quieter than usual. Located on the 7^th floor of an office building at 125^th Street and Park Avenue, the school’s three studios and performance room no longer fill with 250 students during its after-school program.

Instead of teaching its usual total of 700 students, Opus 118 enrolled only about 75 in its after-school program, with reduced scholarships compared to past years, and 200 in the in-school program when it opened earlier this month.

The school needs $1 million—its annual budget— to resume operating at full capacity, says administrative principal Karen Geer.

“I don’t think right now we have the funds to continue past winter,” says co-founder and creative director Roberta Guaspari.

Dependent on donations, Opus has seen its budget shrink over the past two years.  The recession has taken a toll: board chairman Nathaniel Sutton say that donors have scaled back contributions and one foundation, formerly a significant supporter, has dissolved.

But internal conflict has also played a role, including the departure of influential board members who’d served for over 10 years, says a person active in the school’s founding.

The board members who resigned included major donors and people linked to them, like Dorothea von Haeften, the wife of prominent violinist Arnold Steinhardt. The couple’s friendships with investor Walter Scheuer and internationally-known violinist Isaac Stern, helped raise Opus’s initial funding and drew media attention.

The new board of trustees, according to this source, has been less effective at fundraising. Shortfalls led to the school’s abrupt closure last April; it usually runs through May.

“I handed the school over to the executive director Alexander Small with enough money in the bank,” Van Haeften says. She charges that the new board hasn’t maintained a relationship with the school’s donors. “When I left, the new board members didn’t get in touch with the donors; not enough personal effort was made,” says Van Haeften. “We had many donors among board members and they weren’t contacted, as they should’ve been.”

Guaspari remembers the days when budget shortfalls could be resolved with one donation. “Dorothea and I would go over to Wally’s,” she said, referring to Scheuer. “And he would just give us $300,000.”

Sutton says the small staff and loss of a development director more than six months ago has prevented fundraising from being “where we want it to be.” He adds that Opus cannot now afford to hire a development professional but that remains a high priority.

Opus’ financial and media supporters include Congressman Charles Rangel, actress Meryl Streep, who put Opus 118 on the map by playing Guaspari in the film “Music of the Heart,” and well-known violinists Mark O’Connor and Diane Monroe. The school has also received grants from the Department of Cultural Affairs, National Endowment of the Arts, New York State Council for the Arts, JP Morgan Chase, New York Community Trust, says Sutton via e-mail.

But the most effective fundraising strategy, Geer says, has been to invite charities, such as members of the Cruise Industry Charitable Foundation, to school concerts.

She is optimistic. “We are hoping for a steady cash flow,” Geer says. “Certain grants are going to be coming in over the course of the year, so every month we’ll be able to reinstate more kids and programs.” Not only does the school intend to return to full after-school enrollment in January, but to reinstate specialized private programs, like choir and guitar lessons.

But the school’s co-founders, Guaspari and Ellen Weiss, remain troubled by the financial situation. “I hope we can get someone who can get us back on our feet again,” Guaspari says. Weiss called the school’s situation “perilous.”

Over the summer, Opus alumnae and parents formed an alumnae and parent board to help the board fundraise.

“We are more hopeful because parents and alumnae have become actively involved,” Weiss says. “Alumnae have a fierce loyalty to Roberta, so when she reached out to them when the board asked her to, they started connecting with each other and working with the current head of the board Nat Sutton.”

But parent board member Stacey Willoughby cautioned, “There isn’t a solid fundraising program in place; the issues remain. Funding can become an issue once again soon,” she says. “We need a specially designated person who’ll make a fundraising plan.”

For Guaspari, who continues to head the school’s curriculum, financial problems aren’t new. In 1991, when public schools slashed Guaspari’s violin program, she managed to raise money, with support from parents and students, with a Carnegie Hall concert. Guaspari used the concert’s $1 million profit to make her music program more independent, forming the current separate center in 2002, says Geer.

Opus 118 currently hosts in-school music programs at three public elementary schools: Central Park East 1, Central Park East 2 and River East. The in-school classes started on schedule in mid-September and are taught by Guaspari, who is paid by the schools.

But there were significant differences this year. In addition to the in-school program, Opus 118’s after-school music program offers three performance groups according to children’s skill levels: preparatory, junior ensemble and advanced performance group.

To enter the performance group, students must first take small-group private lessons from Opus teachers, which require a fee. Until this year fees for the students in the lower two performance groups were cut in half, and waived entirely for advanced students. Students in other groups who needed financial support also received full scholarships.

But this year, Guaspari says, Opus can’t take beginners who can’t pay for private lessons, and only about 10 after-school students are fully subsidized by the school.  Sutton says that students who need financial aid will get scheduled depending on how many slots are open at the time.

The advanced performance group was the only after-school group to resume full classes this September, rehearsing twice a week. The other two groups started rehearsing a month later, with rehearsals cut from twice to once a week.

Weiss says Opus always gave scholarships to whoever needed them. “Opus is not about being selective, it’s about giving everyone a chance. Sadly, now they have to ask parents to pay for the after-school programs.”

Four violin teachers left Opus for other jobs after the school closed in April, and one new teacher got hired, says Guaspari. Nelson Ojeda, an Opus piano teacher for three years, says the school closed so abruptly he had to continue private lessons for Opus kids outside of school, so they could finish the semester.

“It’s a sign that we need stable funding,” says Ojeda, who also works at the Harbor Conservatory for the Performing Arts. “We can’t go into the semester without knowing whether we’ll be able to continue.”

The advanced group, the school’s key fundraisers, Geer says, perform 10 public concerts each year. Over the years its young musicians have played at Carnegie Hall and at the Children’s Inaugural Ball in Washington DC.

When the school closed in April, the performance group concerts continued as part of fundraising, says Loi Kail, whose son plays in the group. The children will play in honor of the jazz lounge Louis 649 on Oct 28, with proceeds from the $160 tickets going to Opus.

A woman walks next to a playground and parking lot, which will be eliminated by the proposed extension of West 129th Street. (Photo by Andrew Seaman)

A plan to build a charter school inside the St. Nicholas Houses has triggered heated debate among residents. The proposed Harlem Children’s Zone school will occupy 93,000 square feet of open space between the complex’s 13 buildings in central Harlem.

Opponents fear the building’s long-term effects such as pollution, lack of parking space and higher crime. Proponents say the complex’s own children will benefit from the school, which will also make the community safer.

Community Board 10 will organize a town hall meeting to air opinions about the school, Chairman W. Franc Perry announced at the board’s most recent meeting.

The Children’s Zone has been seeking a site on which to build for several years. “The Housing Authority asked if we would partner with them to build our school at and bring services to one of their housing developments,” says Lauren Scopaz, director of strategic initiatives at the Children’s Zone. “They did an internal study of where in central Harlem we could build the school. St. Nick’s, they decided, had the most space.”

Scopaz adds that the Authority initially approached the Children’s Zone with the idea of using the open space, part of an effort to meet President Obama’s challenge to integrate housing and schools with other social services.

Residents contend, however, that the proposed extension of West 129th Street from Adam Clayton Powell and Frederick Douglass Boulevards, which will cut through a cul-de-sac in the middle of the complex, will pose unwelcome risks.

“Where are the children going to play?” asks Carolyn Anderson, who has lived in the complex for eight years. “There’s traffic on the street. Where are they going to ride their scooters?”

“All cars will be going through and we have children going around,” agrees Cynthia Barr, a St. Nicholas resident. She says the city and the school could have done a better job of involving residents before making a decision.

According to the project overview from the Children’s Zone, “the new street will facilitate access to the school and open the development to the community.” Its safety features include a one-way westbound street with curb extensions at the intersections and two midblock speed humps, the overview says.

But Barr argues, “There are many vacant lots they could have chosen. They didn’t ask the residents. They held the meetings only after they decided. We don’t want it here.” She admits, however, that because of her work schedule she was unable to attend the community input meetings.

Scopaz responds that residents have had many opportunities to voice their concerns. “Starting from January, we have been at every St. Nicholas Tenant Association meeting,” says Scopaz. “The first big meeting we did for the residents was the beginning of May – it was open to the public – to give information and receive feedback about the project.” She adds that the Children’s Zone also held a meeting on a June Saturday to accommodate workday schedules.

Security within the school and the complex has been a concern on both sides of the debate. The Children’s Zone promises 24-hour security within the building, but neighbors worry that the students may bring additional crime. “Kids always fight outside of schools,” Anderson says.

Community Board 10’s land use committee devoted an hour of discussion to the project at its September meeting. Children’s Zone Chief Executive Geoffrey Canada, Housing Authority Chairman Michael Kelly and dozens of local residents turned out for a passionate debate.

Tyrone Ball, vice president of St. Nicholas’ Tenants Association, announced that an architect has been working on an alternative design that does not include extending West 129th Street. Canada offered to look at the plan.

Tenant association president Willie Mae Lewis, a vocal proponent, argued that the school would benefit children living in the complex.

However, some residents object to their children having to participate in a lottery to gain admission.

“Since there are only 33 three-year-old applicants from St. Nicholas this year, they all got in, since the number was less than 100 available slots,” says Scopaz. “We do the lottery early so we can give them access to the early development program for three-and four-year-olds.” She adds, “Due to the demographics at St. Nicholas, we anticipate that every St. Nicholas three-year-old will get into the school in future years.”

State law requires the Children’s Zone and other public charter schools to hold admission lotteries, Scopaz explains. The school will bring additional benefits for the complex, she adds, notably jobs. “We’ll give St. Nicholas residents priority for employment in the new school and construction jobs,” she says.

The school will be built with $60 million from the city government and $40 million from the Children’s Zone, including $20 million from Goldman Sachs Gives, the investment company’s charitable arm. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development must still approve the use of the land for the project, says Scopaz.

Certain parts of the facility – such as the gym, cafeteria, library and computer lab – will be available to the community after school hours, Scopaz says, allowing the building to serve as a community center, as well as a school.

Canada admitted at the land use committee meeting that his organization could have done a better outreach job. He has offered to help accommodate anyone affected by the project, adding, “We’re trying to make this work for everybody.”

The most recent Community Board 10 meeting on October 6 was much more docile, but St. Nicholas residents still turned out.

“Open this process up for scrutiny, bring NYCHA in front of the Board,” urged resident Sandra Thomas.

Terran Delaney picks up her niece Toccara Chabos from P.S. 194. Had the school closed, Chabos would have started kindergarten elsewhere. (Photo by Tim Kiladze)

Students arriving at P.S. 194 in Harlem on the first day of school this year encountered an unusual banner hanging on the front fence: “Believe. Achieve. Succeed.”

Beside it, administrators welcomed eager students and spoke with parents who wondered what time the school day ended. Inside, newcomers and their parents gathered in the cafeteria to meet their teachers.

None of this was supposed to happen – not at P.S. 194. Last winter, the Department of Education announced the school’s closure, a result of failing grades on the previous two years’ progress reports: an F, then a D. The department told parents of incoming first graders to find new schools and advised students already enrolled that they would be transferred out over the next few years.

Plans were so advanced that Harlem Success Academy 2, a charter school, was poised to take over the lower-level floors P.S. 194 occupies in the expansive building they share on 144th Street, west of Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard.

Less than a year later, P.S. 194 is flourishing; it earned an A on its most recent progress report.

And its reputation has spread. Boubacar Dialo and his wife transferred their fourth and fifth grade daughters to P.S. 194 this fall. “My wife checked here and saw that this was the best school in Harlem,” he said after dropping the girls off.

Actions by families and by the United Federation of Teachers have kept the school alive. The union objected to the expected job cuts and filed a lawsuit in March in conjunction with the New York Civil Liberties Union, charging that the Department of Education was closing the school without proper approval from the community education council. The Department didn’t offer a “fair process to allow parental input into decision making,” said David Eisenberg, one of the Civil Liberties Union’s lead lawyers on the case.

The Department backed down in the spring. Had the lawsuit not been filed, Eisenberg firmly believes that P.S. 194 would not have gotten a second chance.

Parents were also outraged: they saw progress under principal Charyn Koppelson Cleary, who was only four months into the job, and thought she deserved more time. In protest, they wrote letters to Chancellor Joel Klein and turned out in droves for a public hearing in March.

“They brought the new principal and she was really running the school the way it is supposed to be,” said Samka Cekic, whose children are in the third and fifth grades at P.S. 194.

Cleary’s work was cut out for her – 13 percent of the school’s students were classified as English Language Learners last year, meaning English is not their native tongue, and P.S. 194 had four principals in five years – but she was intent on succeeding. “I didn’t come here to maintain status quo. I came here to turn a building upside down if necessary,” she said in an interview, adding, “If for whatever reason we just don’t get the job done, you ruin a kid’s life.”

Her plan started with staff training. So many teachers had come and gone over the past few years that she felt the staff lacked a cohesive vision and failed to follow curriculum guidelines.

For help, she hired Philomena Nortey from P.S. 111, whom Cleary describes as an expert in leadership and curriculum mapping. She also hired other teachers who have what she labeled “a level of tolerance and understanding.”

This staff started a mentoring program called the P.S. 194 Jewels, in which teachers provide help with homework after school; Cleary often contributes her time.

She also emphasized tracking student performance. Teachers and administrators have online access to student assessments going back to kindergarten, but parents rarely see the data. Cleary encouraged parents to follow their kids’ performance. To assist families without Internet access, P.S. 194’s parent coordinator, Clara Pena, sat outside the school with a laptop to catch parents walking by.

After a grueling year, Cleary was ecstatic at the results. “We let out such screams in this building when we saw that preliminary A that the people downstairs thought something had happened,” she said.

Parents noticed the changes. “Now you have teachers who go beyond the call of duty to do things for the kids,” said parent Shanequa Gadson, who attended P.S. 194 herself.

Dettering Hamilton, whose daughter transferred from P.S. 200 last January because he felt its teachers were ineffective, found that after a few weeks at P.S. 194, her attitude and performance turned around.

He fought the school’s scheduled close, feeling that Harlem Success Academy 2 was “pushing in and pitting parents against one another,” and he took offense at what he thought was a disregard for the public school system.

Despite its recent success, P.S. 194 faces an uphill battle. Like principals throughout the city this fall, Cleary had to cut her budget – by $450,000, enough to have hired several teachers or to start a music program, she said.

She also knows test results must continue to improve. “You’re only as good as this year’s scores,” she said.

Samantha Gil, 3, rides the giraffe on the refurbished Totally Kid Carousel at Riverbank State Park with her 2-year-old sister Jasmine close behind. (Photo by Lisa Waananen)

Children who find their way to the whimsical carousel perched above the Hudson River at the northwest corner of Riverbank State Park can hop on the back of a camel, flamingo or kangaroo and ride to the beat of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” or Beyonce’s “Single Ladies.” The Totally Kid Carousel is not your standard horses-and-calliope operation.

Originally installed in 1997, its 36 colorful figures were drawn by elementary school students and transformed into three dimensions by Milo Mottola, a New York artist. The city’s Department of Cultural Affairs paid for the $688,000 renovation through the Percent for Art program, which commissions art for public spaces.

The city officially welcomed the carousel back with a ribbon-cutting ceremony Sept. 18, though it had already been operating on weekends – weather permitting – after it returned to the park in August. The Sunday before the ceremony, there was an anxious moment when the carousel got up to speed for a new ride, then decelerated to an abrupt halt. The pause turned out to be nothing – just an automatic stop because the weight wasn’t balanced well enough – but it momentarily revived worries about the carousel’s reliability. Mechanical problems plagued the carousel since its original unveiling, when the monkey figure fell loose at the ceremony and postponed actual operations for more than a year. For the past three years, it hadn’t run at all.

“It was not working well for a long time,” said Rachel Gordon, the state parks regional director who oversees Riverbank State Park. Those problems should be a thing of the past, she said, now that the carousel is turning with a completely new mechanical system. The whole menagerie was shipped off to Mansfield, Ohio, for a new frame and fresh paint from a company called Carousel Works .

The figures were in pretty bad shape when they arrived, said Kate Blakely, the director of marketing for Carousel Works. A decade of weather and thousands of young riders had cracked figures and faded colors far from their original hues. The company stripped the animals down to their fiberglass shells and tested their strength with X-rays and impact tests.

“Structurally they were still intact, it was just the finish that had eroded,” Blakely said.

The company repainted the carousel’s figures and decorative panels to match the original plans, with just a few tweaks. The animals once had crayoned lines over the base color to mimic the texture of the children’s drawings, but the waxy crayon caused the outer varnish to flake off. This time Carousel Works used watercolor pencils that look like crayon marks but won’t cause that problem. Mottola, the artist, was not involved in the restoration, but the company used his documents and photos.

Even professionals dedicated to carousels had never seen anything like the Totally Kid Carousel, Blakely said, and those who worked on it are glad to know local children are already wearing it down again.

“You don’t want a carousel sitting there that kids can’t enjoy,” she said.

Since the carousel’s return, that hasn’t been a problem. This past Sunday, kids pressed pressed jostled against the gate to point out their favorite animals, and parents leaned over the fence with cameras. Though the weather is getting chillier, the carousel will run its usual 1 to 6 p.m. schedule on weekends at least through October – and for the rest of this season rides are free.

Anny Farjado and her son Avery Lara, 9, were visiting the carousel for the first time since it returned to the park.

“We were just coming by to the park and we saw it open,” she said.

For a long time they’d only seen the metal gates down, with no idea when or if they’d see the carousel working again. Avery quickly made up for lost time. He took a ride on the octopus, spider and dragon before settling in on the yellow moose, sneakers propped up on the beast’s fiberglass head. The ride came to a stop and he turned to his mom watching from the gate.

“One more time?”