Bellerose school kicks off Respect for All Week with
special guest from hit TV show ‘Fresh Off the Boat’
BY BEN VERDE
New York City public middle
schools will reopen this
month for in-person learning
after being closed since mid-
November due to the COVID-
19 pandemic, Mayor Bill de
Blasio announced Monday
morning.
Middle schools have the goahead
to reopen on Thursday,
Feb. 25, according to City Hall.
“Our educators have done
an incredible job supporting
students remotely but, as
we’ve said from the beginning,
nothing can replace in-person
learning and the support our
students receive in person,”
Schools Chancellor Richard
Carranza said during de Blasio’s
morning press briefing.
“We’re so thrilled to be able to
provide that.”
As part of the reopening
plan, middle school teachers
in the Department of Education
system returning to work
in person will be given priority
for the coronavirus vaccine
at city-run hubs between Feb.
12 and Feb. 21 and during the
mid-winter recess.
The Department of Education
will conduct weekly testing
throughout the middle
school system and add additional
TIMESLEDGER | QNS.20 COM | FEB. 12-FEB. 18, 2021
Hudson Yang, star of “Fresh Off the Boat” on ABC.
staff to its situation
room.
As it stands, two confirmed
cases in any public school
cause the school to shut down
temporarily.
City Hall’s announcement
comes as concerns rise about
the prevalence of new, more
contagious variants of the
coronavirus, the presence of
which has been confirmed in
New York.
City officials insisted that
the school systems’ ardent
safety precautions would prevent
the spread of the variants
in school buildings, which
caused school buildings to
Screenshot via Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza.
shutter throughout Europe.
“There were no European
countries adopting the same
rigorous approach that we
have adopted here,” said Dr.
Jay Varma, a public health advisor
with the mayor’s office.
“That means universal masking
regardless of age, universal
maintaining of physical
distance, aggressive symptom
screening, all the ventilation
improvements.”
Leaders of the United Federation
of Teachers, the union
that represents public school
educators, said they will monitor
the system to ensure that
widespread testing, use of
personal protective equipment
and physical distancing are
adhered to.
Union officials repeated
the City Hall talking point
that public schools are the safest
place to be throughout the
city.
“These strict standards,
and the requirement that
buildings close temporarily
when virus cases are detected,
have made our schools the
safest places to be in our communities,”
said UFT President
Michael Mulgrew. “They will
continue to be the strongest
protections for the health and
safety of students and staff.”
BY JENNA BAGCAL
A Bellerose public school
on Friday, Feb. 5, kicked off Respect
for All Week with a virtual
assembly in recognition of
No One Eats Alone Day.
To help celebrate, P.S./I.S.
266 invited Schools Chancellor
Richard Carranza and “Fresh
Off the Boat” star Hudson Yang,
who participated in a Q&A centered
around his experiences
with bullying. Also in attendance
was Laura Talmus, the
founder of Beyond Differences
and its No One Eats Alone Day
initiative.
Talmus said the day honors
her daughter Lili Smith, who
was born with cranial facial
syndrome and faced social isolation
during middle school.
Smith died in 2009 but Talmus
said that No One Eats Alone
Day helps to ensure that children
all over the country feel
“included every single day.”
Prior to the virtual assembly,
students watched a clip
from the ABC show “Fresh Off
the Boat,” about a Taiwanese-
American family living in
Florida in the 1990s. Students
then got the opportunity to ask
Yang, one of the show’s stars,
questions about his own experiences.
“I think bullying happens
to a lot of kids these days because
it happened to me in real
life,” Yang said.
Yang grew up in a Taiwanese
American family in New
York City and recalled that
other children bullied him for
his ethnicity and his acting career.
“The main reason why it’s
important to stand up for each
other is because you never
know what’s going on behind
someone’s mask. Everyone
wears a mask to cover their
emotions and you never really
know how someone is feeling
unless you go up and talk to
them,” said Yang, adding that
conversations with his bullies
led to them finding common
ground.
The actor added that although
most people can’t
avoid getting bullied, the “best
way to get justice for yourself
is just be successful” and
not let other people’s words
and actions cause long-term
negative effects.
Carranza shared a similarly
uplifting message about
growing through feelings of
isolation with a story from
his childhood. The chancellor
shared that as a native Spanish
speaker, his first year in
kindergarten was “isolating”
since his classmates only
spoke English.
“So I remember the first few
weeks of school, I really didn’t
have a lot of my fellow students
that I could talk to or share
things with on the playground.
It was kind of isolating — they
weren’t doing it on purpose but
I still remember what it felt like
to be isolated,” Carranza said.
Eventually, Carranza recalled
that continuous playground
interactions with the
other kids led him to make
friends and improve his
English.
Reach reporter Jenna Bagcal
by e-mail at jbagcal@qns.com
or by phone at (718) 260-2583.
City’s middle schools to resume in-person learning Feb. 25
2021
WINNERS HAVE
BEEN ANNOUNCED!
SEE IF YOUR FAVORITES WON BY HEADING TO
BESTOF.QNS.COM
@bestoftheboro
link
/BESTOF.QNS.COM
link
