Some Parents Are Boycotting School Reopening. What Will Teachers Do?
The nation’s largest school system is reopening Monday, but not all New York City parents are sending their children back to the classroom. And their stance is getting support from some teachers, even though their union is backing the Department of Education’s (DOE) reopening plan.
“Right now, the immediate action for educators looks like supporting our students, families, and parents who are deciding to keep the children home during this parent-led strike,” said Daniel Alicea, a special-education teacher at MS 53 in Far Rockaway, Queens. “We will not get in their way, nor act as liaisons for a DOE that falsely maintains that schools are the safest place for them.”
Alicea is concerned about the city’s safety plan and its goal to bring all children back to school full-time, in-person. But Alicea and some other advocates are concerned about conditions that they say include overcrowded buildings, inability to social distance, and a lack of mandatory testing. He agrees with those parents who say schools are not safe right now, especially with the resurgent Delta variant.
“My children will not be in school. We are 100% striking,” said Tajh Sutton, the mother of an eighth-grader and a third-grader in Brooklyn. “Parents across the city of New York have no intention of sending their children into unsafe schools.”
Sutton is president of the Community Education Council in District 14 and a leader within Parents for Responsive Equitable Safe Schools (PRESS), a coalition of parents that, they say, will “hold the DOE, the Mayor, and the education press accountable.” She created a petition demanding the DOE restore remote learning as an option; it has more than 6,000 signatures.
The petition demands “a centralized remote option” for students, along with resources for remote learning, such as quality internet and appropriate devices.
Sutton argues that a remote option would lower class sizes and enable more schools to stay open: “Offering a remote option actually helps make them safer.” She believes that removing the option disproportionately affects Black and Brown families who have been hit hard by the pandemic.
Nationally homeschooling has increased significantly since the beginning of the pandemic, from 5.4% to 11.1%, according to the U.S. Census. The increased rates are even higher for Black (from 3.3% to 16.1%) and Latinx families (from 6.2% to 12.1%). In the New York City metro area, the overall rate increased from 3% to 11%.
Alicea is a leader with Educators of NYC, a community of teachers who say they are re-imagining schools by prioritizing equity, accountability, unions and pedagogy. He also created a petition demanding heightened safety protocols, including mandated vaccinations for students 12 and older, heightened testing, proper ventilation, strict adherence to social distancing and a remote option.
“No worker can remain in a building that is unsafe — whether it’s the presence of asbestos, lead poisoning, or an infectious disease,” Alicea said. “The labor tradition and onus is to walk out until it’s safe to return. I know my union supports that posture.”
The United Federation of Teachers (UFT) has not publicly supported the fight for a remote option or addressed the parent-led boycott. It has reached an agreement with the DOE about remote learning for quarantined students, which includes guidelines for digital classrooms and compensation guidelines. Teachers will be paid $225 for setting up online classrooms, along with up to four hours at their scale for preparing for digital learning.
These online classrooms are not to be used for regular instruction for students who are absent.
Meanwhile, some teachers are confident about school attendance. “I do not expect this [a boycott] to happen,” said Eva Deffenbough, a middle school teacher in Manhattan. “We’re at maximum capacity, and a lot of our time has been spent on ensuring that we are following safety guidelines.”
Others believe this would be the DOE’s responsibility. “If a sizable number of parents decide to boycott reopening, it would be up to the administration as to how to handle the situation. It would be out of teachers’ hands,” said Pam Ritchie, a middle-school teacher in Brooklyn.
Alicea plans to contact parents as he typically does when a child is absent and address their concerns as best he can. “I cannot in good conscience tell a parent what the city wants them to believe, that NYC schools are the safest place for their children to be during this pandemic.”
He also notes that each school is unique in its approach. “All students at my school are enrolled in their respective Google Classrooms on day one as part of our overall instructional plan, which includes online access to a lot of our curriculum.”
In Chicago, parents organized a similar boycott: they wanted the district to offer remote instruction and decided to not take their children back to school. After several days of absence, some students were unenrolled from the system.
In a press conference on Sept. 9, NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio was asked about the possibility of parents not bringing their children to school. He passed the question to Chancellor Meisha Porter, who said that the administration for Children’s Services (ACS) will intervene “if there is a clear intent to keep a child from being educated.”
