New York City’s free 2-K child care for 2-year-olds will expand to 22 of the city’s 32 school districts next year, Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Monday. Six more Brooklyn districts join the program:
District 16: Bedford-Stuyvesant, including Stuyvesant Heights, and parts of northern Crown Heights and Ocean Hill
District 17: Crown Heights, Prospect Lefferts Gardens, Wingate, Prospect Heights, Flatbush and East Flatbush, and parts of Erasmus, Farragut, Rugby, Remsen Village, Ocean Hill and Brownsville
District 19: East New York, New Lots, Cypress Hills, City Line, Spring Creek and Starrett City, and parts of Ocean Hill, Brownsville and Canarsie
District 20: Bay Ridge, Fort Hamilton, Dyker Heights and Bath Beach, and parts of Bensonhurst, Borough Park, Sunset Park, Kensington, Gravesend, Mapleton/western Midwood and western Flatbush
District 21: Coney Island, Sea Gate, Brighton Beach, Gravesend, Homecrest, Mapleton/Ocean Parkway and Midwood, and parts of Bensonhurst, Borough Park, Madison and western Flatbush
District 32: Bushwick, and parts of East Williamsburg and northern Bedford-Stuyvesant
Brooklyn’s Districts 18 and 23, part of this year’s first 2-K program, stay in. Districts 13, 14, 15 and 22 are not on next year’s list. You can look up your district on the Education Department’s school search map.
Toddlers who turn 2 in 2027 will be eligible. The city has not said how many seats each district will get, and officials did not promise a seat to every eligible child. Citywide, the program is on track to reach 12,000 2-year-olds next year, up from 2,000 seats this year, when more than 5,000 families applied.
The city funds most 2-K programs from 8am to 6pm, year-round, which can save a participating family more than $20,000 a year.
