The city is revamping its schools for troubled students and axing several failing programs - including schools for pregnant girls, officials said.
Next year, the four pregnancy schools and the last seven New Beginnings centers for students with behavioral problems will be phased out because of low attendance and poor performance.
Education officials will create a hotline, an e-mail address and referral centers in each borough designed to "triage" students in danger of dropping out, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein said yesterday.
"Whatever life challenges or opportunities our students face, we have to find the individualized solutions," Klein said.
The city will create five more transfer schools - small, rigorous programs that have a 56% graduation rate for older students who are behind in credits, compared to 19% for such students at typical schools.
Yesterday's announcement comes amid a renewed focus on the city's graduation rate, which the city puts at 60% and the state calculates at 50%.
Education officials had retooled programs for problem students in 2003, when they announced the creation of 17 New Beginnings centers, one-year programs designed to boost students' performance so they can transfer back to their original school. Ten have already been shut down.
Critics of the pregnancy schools believed they were relics from a bygone era and applauded the Education Department's move.
But Giovanny Lantigua, 18, credits the Ida B. Wells school in Flushing, Queens, with keeping her on track while she was expecting.
"It was close to my home and more comfortable for me," said Lantigua, who now attends the Cascades transfer school in Manhattan and plans to graduate in January.
