Reports

School Building Aid is the second-largest state aid allocation to New York City. These funds have nearly tripled in the past 20 years, growing from $674 million in FY 2008 to $1.8 billion in FY 2027. It is expected to cover 44.6% of the Department of Education’s debt service costs.

High Cost Aid, also known as Public Excess Cost, is for public school districts to educate students with disabilities. In FY 2027, the state allocated $263 million in High-Cost Aid to New York City, making this the City’s ninth-largest stream of state aid.

The state provides additional aid for every charter school student, called “Supplemental Basic Tuition.” In the 2024-25 school year, there were 281 charter schools operating in New York City, serving 148,083 students in grades Pre-K through 12.

The $1.1 billion the state is expected to provide to support Pre-K in New York city is the third-largest funding stream the city receives annually from the state, serving approximately 67,000 children every year.

Foundation Aid is the state’s primary public school funding formula. New York City will receive nearly $11 billion in FY 2027, nearly double what it first received in FY 2008.

About 17% of the city’s total revenue for Fiscal Year 2027, totaling over $21 billion, comes from state aid, including substantial categorical grant funding for essential programs for children, families, and vulnerable residents. Major education and social service programs in New York City could be in jeopardy if federal funding cuts to the state occur.

Between 2018 to 2025, the 9/11 Memorial welcomed 57 million visitors and the museum hosted more than 16 million visitors. In 2025 alone, the Memorial welcomed 11.3 million visitors and the Museum saw 2.4 million visitors. Visitation to the Museum has been steady in recent years, although still lagging pre-pandemic levels of more than 3.1 million in 2019. Memorial attendance, however, now exceeds pre-pandemic levels.

New York’s "Big Five" school districts in New York City, Yonkers, Buffalo, Syracuse and Rochester received $8.6 billion in federal pandemic relief funds, but there are sizeable differences in how school districts are using the funds. New York City has directed a smaller share of its total allocation toward addressing the academic impacts of the pandemic. The City, and all districts, can improve reporting linking educational outcomes for all of its students with their use of these historic federal education funds.

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the face of education across the country and in New York City, the nation’s largest public school system. During the pandemic, the City had to develop and implement novel remote learning protocols to continue educating students. Extraordinary levels of federal aid allowed the City to overcome these obstacles and implement a number of new initiatives to help students and address learning losses.

Each year in New York City, more than 100,000 public and private school children between the ages of 5 and 21 are referred (by teachers or parents) to the New York City Department of Education (DOE) to be evaluated for their needs for continued or new special education services.