WWW.QNS.COM RIDGEWOOD TIMES DECEMBER 24, 2020 17
2020 YEAR IN REVIEW
during the COVID-19 pandemic
nervous about what lies ahead,” said
Feldman. “If my silly songs and jokes
can help put a smile on their faces
and get through this, that’s the most
important thing to me.”
To respond to childcare needs,
the DOE established more than 100
Regional Enrichment Centers (REC)
where children of emergency and
essential workers could stay during
the COVID-19 health crisis.
In Queens, one of those RECs was
located at P.S./I.S. 128 in Middle Village.
Chancellor Carranza and first
lady Chirlane McCray paid a visit
to the facility in June, which gave a
first look at what schools may look
like once buildings reopened — children
and staff wore masks all day,
they had to get their temperature
checked at the door, and indicators
were placed on the floor and desks
to maintain six feet distance.
As COVID cases decreased and
Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s re-opening
plan ensued — bringing back temporarily
dormant jobs and businesses
— parents and educators anxiously
waited to hear a plan for the city’s
new public school.
De Blasio and Carranza introduced
their plan, which included random
COVID tests for students and school
staff as well as two diff erent learning
models: blended learning, a mix of inperson
and fully remote school days,
or fully remote learning. The city
promised 100,000 childcare seats for
students in blended learning, with
less than 30,000 of those seats slated
to open by the beginning of the school
year. Meanwhile, Catholic schools
in Brooklyn and Queens mostly prepared
for in-person learning.
But in the weeks before the
original start to the school year
in September, teachers and school
staff across the city and Queens —
some protests took place in Jackson
Heights and Bayside — called for a
delay in reopening school buildings,
with safety and staff shortages as
their main concerns.
Aft er negotiations with the United
Federation of Teachers (UFT), the
mayor announced that schools would
open in phases and provide more
safety measures for each school
community.
Students were still getting into
the groove of the new way of learning,
many missing in-person learning
and activities. But some found
creative ways to get kids out into
their communities, such as Maspeth
High School’s “Maspeth Making a
Diff erence” club in which students
helped clean up their surrounding
neighborhood.
But blended learning came with
some confusion for some Queens
parents. In October, parents at P.S.128
protested over what they said was
a lack of live instruction and clear
communication from the school.
“Why didn’t they organize this better?
Be truthful to the parents,” one
parent, who is an essential worker
and asked to remain anonymous,
told QNS at the time. “If you decided
blended, the rest of the week your
child would not have a live instruction.
Explain it fi rst, then we could
have organized this diff erently.”
A DOE spokesperson said the
school was working on getting
the needed staff to ramp up live
instruction.
More than 335,000 families have
opted into blended learning after the
city’s second opt-in period in November.
Opt-in periods were originally
meant to take place in a quarterly
basis, but that plan was scratched
after the city reported lower than
expected in-person class enrollment
and attendance.
But as a second wave threatened to
fully shut down schools once again,
de Blasio announced schools would
close for two weeks prior to the
Thanksgiving holiday. While many
parents argued the closure, the decision
was based on the city reaching a
3 percent infection rate, a threshold
previously negotiated with the UFT
to ensure school safety.
More than 800 schools returned
to in-person learning in the second
week of December, with the DOE
establishing more weekly COVID
testing and a map of schools that is
updated on a weekly basis, showcasing
the buildings and classrooms that
have closed due to COVID cases. Just
a few days after schools reopened,
nine schools in Queens were closed
again due to COVID cases.
The city later announced a new
plan to address the “COVID achievement
gap” for public school students,
and rolled out plans to overhaul the
admissions process for the upcoming
school year, including the elimination
of screenings for middle school
students, among other changes.
With two COVID-19 vaccines now
approved by the FDA and their distribution
currently underway as
COVID infection rates and hospitalizations
see a resurgence, there is no
telling what other transformations
New York City’s school system will
undergo in 2021.
File photo by Angélica Acevedo/QNS
Photo by Dean Moses
/WWW.QNS.COM
