Prior to the establishment of the Union Free School District No. 2 of the Town of Flushing (of which Bayside was a part) in 1864, The Bayside School served the community since its inception in 1842. The original one-room school house was erected on the Cain Farm at 48th Avenue and 216th Street at a cost of $360. In 1859 a two-room school house replaced the original and relocated across the street. By 1883 the school was moved again. This time near the site of the present day P.S. 31.

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In 1895 an entirely new school was constructed. As seen in this postcard, the school faced east on Bell Boulevard and had four classrooms, an office, reception room, library, two playrooms and a four-room apartment on the third floor for the custodian. The older two-room section of the school was used as an assembly room.

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Bayside became part of the City of New York in 1898 and the school was officially renamed P.S. 31. In 1929 the Bayside Taxpayers and Improvement Association started a campaign to replace the older, 1895 building with a new one. The old school was demolished and by July 1939 construction of the new school began. It officially opened its doors for the fall semester of 1940.