No Strike, and No Plan

New York City’s teachers won’t walk out—but talk of a work stoppage obscures Mayor de Blasio’s failure to plan for a successful school reopening.  

Ray Domanico September 1, 2020

There will be no teacher strike in New York City. The leadership of the teachers’ union is not foolish; there has not been a strike in 45 years, and for good reason. The last thing Michael Mulgrew needs is a loss of the dues check-off privilege in a post-Janus world. Neither does he need to alienate political allies by staging a walkout in the face of a 1 percent positive Covid rate when other municipal workers have been reporting to work throughout the toughest days of the crisis.

Carefully leaked announcements regarding preparation for a strike vote—supposedly coming today—are simply the latest farce brought to us by the de Blasio administration. We’re being treated to this melodrama because the mayor wasted four months that he had to plan for a successful school reopening. By the beginning of May, it was clear that schools would not be reopening for the remainder of the 2019-20 school year.

The city had the entire late spring and summer to develop a working plan for September. To do so, it had to accomplish a few things, some easier than others. Given the strong possibility that a hybrid of in-class and remote learning would be required, and the lesser possibility that a new wave of infection might require the re-closing of schools, the city needed a demonstrably better approach to remote learning than the haphazard one offered last spring. To provide sufficient distance between students, school officials needed to think creatively about the use of building space, the surrounding outdoor areas, and the possible uses of other community facilities in the community. Above all, they needed to convince parents, teachers, and principals that it would be safe to go back to school.........To Read More..