Nearly 70k NYC families to receive offer for full-day Pre-K

NEW YORK (WABC) -- On Monday, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced that approximately 70,000 applicants will receive an offer for free, full-day Pre-K later this week.

70 percent of families were awarded their top choice, and 82 percent of families got one of their top 3 choices.

Mayor de Blasio made the announcement at P.S. 5 in Washington Heights, where he handed offers of admission to Olivio Capellan and his four children to attend pre-K this fall. Each of the four children received an offer to P.S. 5, where programs specifically focus on helping children whose parents are immigrants to develop English language skills.

The Capellan quadruplets join thousands of other four-year-olds in September as Pre-K in New York City gets even bigger. For the quadruplets, the mayor's early childhood education plan is a miracle. Privately, such schooling would cost $40,000 - for this family, and all New Yorkers, it's free.

"That's why we couldn't put it on a daycare while they were younger, because it's just too much money," said Olivio Capellan.

Mayor de Blasio also made a pitch to Albany to vote on letting him run city schools. Without mayoral control continuing he says Pre-K for all would have never happened.

"That's only possible on this kind of scale, this kind of speed because of mayoral control of education, and it's crucial that Albany renews mayoral control of education and it does soon," Mayor de Blasio said.