'F' Grade Shocks a School Whose Popularity Was Rising.

It seemed to Virgil de Voldere that each year his son attended Public School 84, the school became more popular. The number of parents taking tours he organized swelled from a few dozen to several hundred. Families who lived in other districts began to apply, preferring the school, on 92nd Street between Columbus Avenue and Central Park West, to the one they were zoned for. A school that was once unappealing to middle-class parents began to attract them, with French and Spanish dual-language classes, new after-school programs and an increasingly active parent-teacher association. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]