At a Glance
A small alternative high school in Coney Island where every family that responds feels heard and no student gets suspended.
Best suited for
Older teens or credit-deficient students who need a small, forgiving setting with strong adult relationships to finally cross the graduation finish line — not families shopping for a college-prep track.
What stands out
- Zero suspensions — a genuinely rare outcome for any NYC public school, and striking for one serving this population.
- 41% IEP students, far above typical high schools, signaling real expertise with special education.
- Small enrollment (194 students) with an average class size of about 25, so teachers can know every kid by name.
- Unusual extracurricular slate for a school this size, including Junior Citizens Police Academy, Liberated Leaders, and a school newspaper.
- 100% offer rate on admissions — effectively no screening, which families should weigh as they think about fit.
Things to consider
- Teacher-reported instruction quality at 75% is well below the district average of 93% — staff themselves signal the academic work is harder here.
- Survey response rates are tiny (12 families, 8 teachers), so the glowing climate numbers reflect a sliver of the community, not the whole picture.
- This is a transfer/alternative-style program, not a college-prep pipeline — families expecting a traditional comprehensive high school experience should look elsewhere.
- The surrounding neighborhood has a 27.8% poverty rate and limited family-household density compared to other parts of Brooklyn.
- Only 13 applicants for 25 seats means fewer peer connections and extracurricular rosters than a fuller school would offer.
Based on 2023-24 data
School SummaryDistrict 21
District 21's most prominent peer schools — Success Academy Bensonhurst, Brooklyn School of Inquiry, Mark Twain for the Gifted & Talented, Bay Academy — are selective or charter programs serving families seeking accelerated academics; Liberation Diploma Plus occupies the opposite niche, serving students who need a smaller, more flexible path to a diploma.
Academics
State proficiency data isn't reported for this school in the figures provided, which is itself worth noting — it often means the student population is too small or too transient for stable accountability reporting. The district as a whole posts around 60% ELA proficiency and 63% math proficiency, and District 21's peer schools skew toward gifted and selective programs; Liberation Diploma Plus sits on the other end of that spectrum, serving students who typically need credit recovery and a smaller, more personalized setting to reach graduation.
Culture
The climate story is genuinely unusual: zero suspensions across the whole school, and parent trust scores near 97–100% on both teacher and principal dimensions. That said, only 12 families responded to the survey (a 7% response rate) and only 8 teachers did, so those near-perfect numbers describe a very small slice of the community. Teacher-reported instruction quality sits at 75% — meaningfully below the district average of about 93% — which hints that staff feel the work is harder here than at a typical school, even if they trust each other and feel safe.
Community
The student body is 48% Black, 37% Hispanic, 11% White, and 3% Asian — a mix that tracks closely with the broader Coney Island-Sea Gate neighborhood, where the median household income sits around $43,800 and over a quarter of households live below the poverty line. With 41% of students classified as having IEPs and an economic need index of 90.8, this is very much a school serving young people who arrive with significant academic and life challenges, not a destination school for college-prep families.
Neighborhood
Coney Island-Sea Gate is a working-class, family-rooted stretch of southern Brooklyn where homeownership is lower than the city average (around 29%) and the median home value still reflects the post-Sandy rebuilding. About 10% of households here have children, and a third of adults hold a bachelor's degree — modest but not unusual for a coastal Brooklyn neighborhood. The subway is genuinely convenient, with Coney Island-Stillwell Avenue just a short walk away, which is rare for southern Brooklyn.
Coney Island-Stillwell Av (D, F, N, Q) is about a 5-minute walk; W 8 St-NY Aquarium (F, Q) is about 11 minutes; Neptune Av (F) is about 13 minutes.
Survey Results
NYC School Survey (2025) · 12 families responded (7% rate)
Programs & Activities
Admissions Demand
Racial & Ethnic Diversity
NYC DOE InfoHub · 2022-23
Discipline
NYSED Student & Educator Database
Economic Need & Special Populations
How to get in, step by step
High school (9th grade)
High school is one citywide application, made in 8th grade. We don't have Liberation Diploma Plus's program list, so read how each of its programs admits on MySchools before you rank it.
High school application
- Opened
- Tue, Oct 6
- Closes
- Fri, Dec 4
- Offers
- Wed, Mar 3
The DOE’s published dates.
- 1Apply on MySchools during the high school application, in 8th grade.
- 2Rank programs in true preference order — the match places your child in the highest-ranked one that offers a seat.
Open houses and tours
We haven’t seen open-house dates for this school yet.
From the MySchools admissions calendar, checked weekly.
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Frequently Asked Questions
- Is Liberation Diploma Plus a good school?
- Published quality ratings aren't available for Liberation Diploma Plus yet on Motley. It's a public school serving grades 9 to 12 in Coney Island-Sea Gate.
- What grades does Liberation Diploma Plus serve?
- Liberation Diploma Plus serves grades 9 to 12.
- Is Liberation Diploma Plus public, charter, or private?
- Liberation Diploma Plus is a public school in NYC Community School District 21.
- What neighborhood is Liberation Diploma Plus in?
- Liberation Diploma Plus is in Coney Island-Sea Gate, Brooklyn.