Parents call on mayor to alter closure guidelines
Caribbean L 28 ife, JAN. 29-FEB. 4, 2021
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BY JENNA BAGCAL
Parent organizers in New York are calling for the
mayor to end his “two unlinked cases” policy, which
calls for Department of Education schools to close if
two unrelated cases of COVID-19 are found.
In a letter to Mayor Bill de Blasio and several
of his advisers — including Dr. Jay Varna, Health
Commissioner Dr. Dave Chokshi, Dr. Ted Long and
Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza — and United
Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew,
the group of parents known as #KeepNYCSchoolsOpen,
said that closing schools was “needlessly
disruptive” to hundreds of pre-K through fi fth
grade students across the city.
Under the “two unlinked cases” rule, if two unlinked
cases of COVID-19 are found in a public school
building within a seven-day period, regardless of
the school’s size or population, the DOE will close all
schools co-located in the building for 10 days.
“As of Jan. 21, 312 buildings are closed. Because
each school building can contain multiple schools,
it is impossible to know exactly how many schools
are closed. Suffi ce to say that the number of closed
schools represents a signifi cant portion of the approximately
850 elementary and D75 schools that the
mayor touts as being open,” said Daniela Jampel, a
#KeepNYCSchoolsOpen organizer. “Because of this
rule, my 6 year old will have two days of in-person
school in January. This overly restrictive rule is
not evidence-based and is taking away in-person instruction
from our children for no valid reason.”
Jampel told amNewYork that her daughter’s
school shut down the week before Christmas break
after three children tested positive for COVID-19.
The DOE’s Situation Room, which involves the DOE,
the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene and
the Test & Trace Corps, began shutting down schools
on Dec. 27, despite the fact that schools were already
in the middle of winter recess.
“So they could have backdated the closure to Dec.
24, but they didn’t,” Jampel said. “Instead of being
able to open on Jan. 6, they opened on Jan. 11.”
The group of parents said that the United Federation
of Teachers (UFT) was the city’s main “bargaining
partner” in helping to perpetuate school closures.
In the letter, the parents wrote: “During a January
13 meeting of delegates, UFT President Michael Mulgrew
called numerous school closings ‘positive,’ adding:
‘271 schools, 100 classes closed today. This means
our program is working … We need to shut them down
and our testing program was designed to do that.’”
Additionally, the parents said that Mulgrew admitted
that he was going against the advice of doctors
who said that shutting down schools for two unlinked
cases was “unnecessary if schools followed
protocols that are currently in place.”
“Doctors have said if you do everything else you
can keep them open but I said no,” Mulgrew said.
Jampel also told amNewYork Metro that when
schools shut down, students and staff in classrooms
that were unexposed are not told to quarantine. In fact,
the mother of two said that students can “do anything
they want to do,” including going to daycare, grandparents’
homes, the playground or parents’ workplaces.
“They just can’t go to school, that’s the one place
they cannot be,” she said.
“As public school parents, oftentimes with multiple
children in different schools, we are struggling,”
the group said in the letter. “The Mayor has rightfully
fought to safely open some City public schools.
But the reality is that the majority of our schools
are closed. All middle and high schools are closed
indefi nitely, with no plans to reopen. And the “two
unlinked cases” rule has ensured that our elementary
and District 75 schools will continue to unnecessarily
close, upending the routines, educations,
and livelihoods of the families who chose an in-person
education.”
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