{"id":248,"date":"2020-12-21T01:06:41","date_gmt":"2020-12-21T06:06:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/education-2272-fall-2020-tmsun\/?page_id=248"},"modified":"2020-12-21T02:26:11","modified_gmt":"2020-12-21T07:26:11","slug":"organization-around-school-reopening","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/education-2272-fall-2020-tmsun\/organization-around-school-reopening\/","title":{"rendered":"Organizing Against School Reopening"},"content":{"rendered":"
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https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/resizer\/DEjhblNPnxYtrpcEMRlWb0yfIHY=\/arc-anglerfish-washpost-prod-washpost\/public\/6RO44MHCJEI6VNU3MT33AR362Q.jpg<\/p><\/div>\n

MORE has been heavily involved in advocacy and organization opposing school reopening, emphasizing issues of social and health justice while doing so (MORE played a crucial role in propelling the UFT to formally endorse the Black Lives Matter at school movement on November 18). The UFT, with pressure from MORE, threatened to strike back in late August and early September, and negotiated the three percent threshold that NYC\u2019s seven day COVID average need be below to maintain school openings (the passing of this threshold is the primary reason for the reclosing of NYC public schools as of mid-November) (Shapiro, 2020). In the absence of significant in-person conversations and opportunities to share experiences, MORE has platformed the stories (on their website and through social media) of individual teachers and their experiences with teaching during COVID, their requests for remote learning, and their demands for improving resources for students and teachers. Currently, MORE members are speaking out against the December 6 reopening of elementary schools over social media and other online media and news outlets, but the previously mentioned divide created by the separation of the elementary school students has posed difficulties in maintaining a movement of solidarity across all grade levels.<\/p>\n

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9 staff members were sent home today from a NYC school due to cases\/contact tracing. The school remains open, while the rest of the staff are losing preps to cover those classes. This is happening all across @NYCSchools<\/a> and is completely unsustainable.<\/p>\n

\u2014 MORE-UFT (@MOREcaucusUFT) December 18, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Many of MORE\u2019s current strategies center around online information sharing and individual empowerment through equipping its members with the tools to educate both themselves and their peers, as well as to advocate for MORE\u2019s demands regarding school reopening. The tools<\/a> include workshops on organizing, premade remote-learning surveys to share with schools, templates for applications regarding medical accommodation, sample letters to encourage parents to opt into remote learning, community phone Zap instructions, planned outdoor rallies, and example questions for UFT town halls.<\/p>\n

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\u203c\ufe0fShare widely with NYC Schools Staff! MORE-UFT Movement of Rank-and-File Educators is collecting information from staff about how NYC schools reopening has been this fall 2020. Please fill out & share this survey so educators on the ground have a voice! https:\/\/t.co\/n50t5E4W0g<\/a>\u203c\ufe0f<\/p>\n

\u2014 MORE-UFT (@MOREcaucusUFT) December 13, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Back in March, MORE was one of the first groups to call for remote learning, and staged a \u201csickout\u201d with more than five hundred members through a Zoom call. MORE\u2019s demands<\/a> include adequate internet access for students participating in remote learning, personal protective equipment for all school-based staff and students, remodeling and reequipping of schools to ensure proper ventilation and healthy water supplies upon reopening, and a focus on anti-racist teaching and educational practices upon school reopening in conjunction with the Black Lives Matter movement (Health Justice Agenda For NYC Schools, 2020).<\/samp><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MORE has been heavily involved in advocacy and organization opposing school reopening, emphasizing issues of social and health justice while doing so (MORE played a crucial role in propelling the UFT to formally endorse the Black Lives Matter at school movement on November 18). The UFT, with pressure from MORE, threatened to strike back in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1178,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":5,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-templates\/full-width.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-248","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/education-2272-fall-2020-tmsun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/education-2272-fall-2020-tmsun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/education-2272-fall-2020-tmsun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/education-2272-fall-2020-tmsun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1178"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/education-2272-fall-2020-tmsun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/education-2272-fall-2020-tmsun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/248\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.bowdoin.edu\/education-2272-fall-2020-tmsun\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}