Who We Are

Our Belief

As an educational institution located in the South Bronx, we serve multi-racial and multi-lingual scholars. As such, we believe we must consistently and continuously build a liberatory environment that values and engages all scholars, parents, and staff members.  We believe that all scholars should have the freedom to design their own pathways and attain their post-secondary aspirations and become active  members of a diverse global community. We believe that all scholars– regardless of race, socio-economic status, place of birth, gender, (dis)ability, or identity– have the right to a supportive and responsive learning environment that promotes holistic excellence as well as social and emotional growth with an emphasis on critical thinking and problem solving.

Our Definition

At SBC, Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) systemically recognizes and celebrates the intersectional identities of all individuals. DEI provides a space for all individuals to be themselves, seen, heard and included in community building and learning experiences in order to dismantle our current systems of oppression in our day to day work with students, staff, and community members.

Our Commitment

We commit to empowering scholars and their communities to advocate for justice and for themselves as multi-faceted learners.   

We commit to seeing and hearing our young people and their supporting community, including staff and parents in order to create a safe, transparent and nurturing working and learning environment.   

We commit to equipping ourselves with the skills and resources to actualize our commitment. 

We commit to dismantle systems of oppression by embracing discomfort, ensuring equity of voice and leaving ego at the door.  We commit to regular, intentional reflection and accountability to these agreements in all spaces in order to fully serve our students and school community.

We know that this work is a continuous journey and that we all must actively participate in order to create a culture of equity and build trust within our community. 

In 2011, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced the launch of the Young Men’s Initiative (YMI), the nation’s largest public-private partnership aimed at reducing disparities for Black and Latino young men across a range of sectors: health, criminal justice, employment, and education. This had major implications for New York City schools and, with support from Open Society Foundations, the New York City Department of Education (DOE) launched the Expanded Success Initiative (ESI) to confront these problems at scale in a city where the college- and career-ready rate for Black and Latino young men was about 1 in 10.

The first phase of ESI consisted of direct investment in forty existing schools that had shown promise in graduating young men of color. The theory of action was simple: find the best ideas developed by those closest to students everyday and support them to develop replicable programming. But getting to 10 in 10 would take more ambitious effort involving all-new schools designed around radically different core principles, beliefs, and practices.

In 2013 the second phase of ESI, the ESI School Design Fellowship, began. Fellows representing cross-functional expertise spent a year designing schools that reimagined the high school experience to achieve the elusive 10 in 10 and improve prospects for young men and women of color alike.

In the fall of 2014, the DOE opened three schools based on this work: EPIC High School North, EPIC High School South, and The Nelson Mandela School for Social Justice. The leadership team of South Bronx Community supported the launch and start-up of the three district schools while applying to open a charter version of the school model. In November of 2015, the South Bronx Community Charter High School was approved by the State Education Department to open in District 7 in the fall of 2016.