At a Glance
A pint-sized civics school where Brooklyn's youngest learners and their parents feel deeply heard
Best suited for
Families with kindergarteners or first-graders in Dyker Heights who want a small, relationship-driven school with engaged teachers and a distinct civics identity, and who are comfortable navigating a transition out for upper elementary.
What stands out
- One of the few Brooklyn schools with a civics-and-entrepreneurship theme at the K-1 level — an unusual curricular identity for early childhood
- 99% parent-teacher trust is exceptional, even for a small school
- 94% family survey response rate suggests parents are unusually engaged, not just satisfied
- The intimate K-1 setting means most families know each other and the staff by name
- Co-located special education (SE) classes can mean stronger day-to-day inclusion for students with disabilities
Things to consider
- Very small school serving only K, first grade, and SE — families will need to navigate a transition to a different campus for grades 2 through 5
- PTA fundraising totals just $3,260 across the year, modest compared to the district's roughly $61 per student, which may limit enrichment programming and classroom extras
- Only 3 teacher survey responses means staff morale data is too thin to draw firm conclusions from
- No state proficiency scores are available, so families who track academic data closely won't have longitudinal evidence here until later grades
- Mixed-income neighborhood with a 19.1% poverty rate — expect real economic diversity among classmates
Based on 2024-25 data
School SummaryDistrict 20
Within District 20 — home to well-known elementary campuses like P.S. 185, P.S. 163, and P.S. 127 — this school carves out a different niche: a very small, civics-themed early-childhood option rather than a typical K-5 school.
Academics
Standardized proficiency scores aren't reported here because the school only serves kindergarten, first grade, and special education — New York State ELA and math tests don't begin until grade 3, so there's nothing to benchmark yet. For a K-1 setting, the data we do have — parent trust, satisfaction, and engagement — are the academic proxies that matter most at this age.
Culture
Parent satisfaction sits at 94%, essentially matching the district average of 94.3%, but the trust numbers are the real story: 99% of parents trust their child's teacher and 97% trust the principal — both well above what you'd typically see. A 94% family survey response rate signals a deeply engaged parent body. The honest caveat: only 3 teachers responded to the staff survey, so the picture of staff culture is thin, and school-specific attendance and discipline figures weren't provided.
Community
School-level demographic data wasn't provided, so we're reading the community through the neighborhood: Dyker Heights is roughly middle-income, with a median household income around $77,000, a 19.1% poverty rate, and a 34.4% bachelor's-or-higher rate among adults — a working- and middle-class mix rather than uniformly affluent. About a quarter of neighborhood households include children, and the 51.7% homeownership rate points to a stable, rooted population.
Neighborhood
Dyker Heights is a family-dense, predominantly homeowner neighborhood in southwest Brooklyn, with roughly one in four households including children and a median home value above $1 million that reflects long-tenured residents. The adult population is mixed in education and income, with a meaningful share of college graduates alongside a non-trivial poverty rate that speaks to real economic diversity within the same blocks.
Three subway stations are within an 8-minute walk: the D at 62 St (about 5 minutes), the N at New Utrecht Av (about 6 minutes), and the N at Fort Hamilton Pkwy (about 8 minutes) — solid transit access for a southwest Brooklyn school.
Survey Results
NYC School Survey (2025) · 29 families responded (94% rate)
PTA Fundraising
Source: DOE Local Law 171 disclosure
How to get in, step by step
Kindergarten
The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship has an attendance zone. At elementary level, in-zone students get a guaranteed seat. Every family still applies on MySchools: the application confirms the zoned seat, and ranking other schools doesn't cost you it.
Kindergarten application
- Opens
- Wed, Dec 9
- Closes
- Fri, Jan 22
- Offers
- Tue, Mar 30
The DOE’s published dates.
- 1Check that your address is inside the zone — zones change, so confirm it before you sign a lease.
- 2Apply during the kindergarten application, even with a zoned seat.
- 3Rank this school along with any others you'd take, in true preference order.
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 The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship a good school?
- Published quality ratings aren't available for The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship yet on Motley. It's a public school serving grades K to 1 in Dyker Heights.
- What grades does The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship serve?
- The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship serves grades K to 1.
- How do students get into The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship?
- The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship admits by zone — children who live in its attendance zone get a guaranteed seat.
- Is The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship public, charter, or private?
- The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship is a public school in NYC Community School District 20.
- What neighborhood is The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship in?
- The Detective WenJian Liu School of Civics and Entrepreneurship is in Dyker Heights, Brooklyn.