Caravan Seeks School-Reopening Brake

Sarah Miller’s backseat looked like it belonged to both a mom and traffic guard and on Thursday she was both. Eight bright orange, scuffed-up traffic cones were stacked on top of a well-worn car seat.

Miller, a mother of two, is an organizer with the New Haven Public School Advocates. She was on her way to the state Capitol to help lead a protest against an in-person reopening this fall, which she said will put her children and many others’ health at risk.

She and other New Haven organizers joined 100 teachers, parents, paraprofessionals and kids from the state’s major cities in close to 100 cars on the streets of Hartford to protest the state’s plan to reopen public school for full-time, full-capacity, in-person instruction this fall.

A yellow school bus, decked out in signs reading “#RefuseTorReopen” and “#14DaysNoNewCases,” led the protestors’ procession. Cars honked in unison.

Earlier, the protesters had gathered in a parking lot on Capitol Avenue to listen to speeches by New Haven’s Citywide Parent Team President Nijija-Ife Waters, teachers Leslie Blatteau, teacher Tina Manus, and New Haven Paraprofessionals Union President Hyclis Williams.

With a crown of white hair and the exuberance of an experienced teacher, Blatteau yelled the protesters’ demands into a loudhailer.

“First, put the brakes on in-person learning until we know it is safe. Second, we want a fully-funded return to school,” said Blatteau.

She called on the state to fully fund the personal protective equipment that teachers, students, and staff will need to return safely to school, which they are not currently doing. She also called on the state to fund professional training so that teachers can effectively do online distance teaching.

The event was organized by a coalition of groups: the New Haven Public School Advocates, the New Haven Citywide Parent Team, the New Haven paraprofessionals union and CT Teachers Supporting a Safe Reopening Plan.

Gov. Ned Lamont said last week that he will only continue requiring schools to reopen in the fall if it is safe. The state administration will make an announcement in early August about whether districts can roll back from providing full-time, in-person instruction.

“For the teachers, you’ve got to know I’ve got your back. Everything I’ve done today, we’ve erred on the side of caution,” Lamont said during a daily briefing last week, reported the CTMirror. ​“I’m gonna do everything I can to give you the confidence you need – when it comes to masks, when it comes to disinfecting, when it comes to social distancing, when it comes to cohorting – to make sure that you know you can get back safely if it’s okay by a doctor for you to get back. … I’m leading with the science.” (And click here for a story about public health experts who call reopening a safe option.)

Blatteau said the target of her criticism is the state, not New Haven district, leadership. She criticized the lack of clarity on which of the three plans — in-person, hybrid, and distance learning — local school districts should use, and what criteria would trigger the districts to implement each scenario.

During a Board of Education meeting Tuesday night, New Haven Public Schools Superintendent Iline Tracey announced that the district plans to hold fully-in-person classes only if there are no reported cases of Covid-19 in the New Haven area, but said she still does not have clarity on whether the state will allow New Haven to make this decision. 

“The lack of clarity doesn’t reassure me that there’s a clear vision of how things are going to work,” Blatteau told the Independent Wednesday afternoon.

In-Person ​“Not Feasible”

Protesters noted that many public schools are housed in buildings with windows that don’t open. Under-maintained heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems may simply recirculate virus-infected air.

Fana Hickinson, a teacher at New Haven Academy, questioned whether the district will realistically be able to reduce class sizes without diminishing the quality of teaching. She said that she sees no plan for providing funding to hire well-educated, well-trained teachers, to lead classrooms of reduced class sizes.

“I don’t think any school is going to have that social distancing — I don’t believe it,” said Iris Jimenez, an administrative assistant at Common Ground High School. ​“You sit in rows. And in high school, those rows aren’t six feet apart. You can stretch out your hand and touch another student.”

At the rally, cars horns blared and people whooped in solidarity. A booming voice called out through a loudhailer: ​“This is not about subjugation. This is about education.”

The voice belonged to Tina Manus, who has been an English teacher for 20 years and now teaches at a Bridgeport public school. ​“I’m afraid my students are going to bring this home to someone they care about who is the only person in their life who takes care of them,” she said.

The pandemic should trigger a statewide reckoning with health and safety in the same way that the Sandy Hook massacre brought about increased gun control and security protocols at schools, said Manus. She walks through a metal detector every day when she arrives at school. She questioned why the state is not requiring something equivalent in this instance — like temperature checks at the door — for public schools.

Manus said that the state’s guidelines for reopening fall far short of what is necessary for safety, citing the American Federation of Teachers’ recommended reopening plan as a standard that Connecticut should aim toward.

She said she has seen how poorly schools comply with existing guidelines, such as school staff who violate Special Education 504 plans. ​“I have no confidence that they’re going to start following the guidelines. We’re going to become a super-spreading state again.” said Manus.

“You must have one standard of safety for all our students and teachers. They deserve that,” Manus said, arguing that the state must standardize social distancing requirements for schools. Lamont’s state reopening plan does not include a requirement for students to be six feet apart in classrooms.

She called it ​“ridiculous” that students and teachers are expected to provide their own masks. ​“Because I have access to special materials to make my mask than you, my mask is safer than your mask? C’mon. That’s not fair.” she said. ​“This is not about kids getting notebooks at the dollar store or a fancy store. This is about safety. They can pay for kids to have IDs; they can pay for them to have uniforms. You can pay for all this fascist nonsense. Pay for a mask.”

Underfunded, Overcrowded

As a teacher in a New Haven Public School, Leslie Blatteau knows how underfunded and overcrowded they can get. In normal times, she runs out of pencils because kids forget to bring pencils. She runs out of paper because kids forget to bring paper.

Now, she is especially concerned that teachers and students in New Haven will have to bring their own masks to the classroom if Connecticut public schools resume in-person this fall. Blatteau said the response from state officials — that ​“everybody brings their own mask and we’ll have a few extras” — is out-of-touch with the reality on the ground.

“We always make do. Public school teachers specifically in cities are extraordinary at making do. But I don’t think we should be asked to make do during a global pandemic,” said Blatteau.

Bridgeport, Hartford, and New Haven — three of the most overcrowded and underfunded school districts in Connecticut — will be disproportionately harmed by an in-person return to school, she said.

Sarah Miller, wrote in an op-ed that ​“The $8.5 million that New Haven received from the CARES Act will not come close to covering the costs of building retrofits, PPE, technology, testing, training, and hazard pay required to reopen schools responsibly.”

Bridgeport spent $14,041 per student, Hartford spent $16,903 per student, and New Haven spent $16,954 per student in the 2017 – 2018 school year. (In comparison, the most-well-funded district, Cornwall, spent $40,225).

Fana Hickinson, a teacher and activist from the New Haven Public Schools Advocates, told the Independent that the inequality between school districts will mean that some can open safely while others, like New Haven, cannot.

New Haven Public Schools Superintendent Iline Tracey told the Independent that the $8.5 million has to be shared with private schools in the area. The district is investing it to ensure every student has a one-to-one computing device, and plans to utilie some of the funds to invest in professional learning, cleaning supplies, and PPE.

She also said the state has indicated some other funding streams might be available and that they increases New Haven’s Alliance and Title 1 funds.

Scared To Return

Shakira Perez was the Hartford Public Schools’ 2020 Teacher of the Year. She said she is scared of returning back to school to teach in-person this fall.

“My heart is about to come out of my chest from anxiety,” she told the Independent at the rally, donning a blue face mask. ​“When I think about the governor pulling back from phase 3 but still going ahead to send our kids to school, that concerns me. I feel there is no concern for the students, for the teachers, for the other school personnel, everyone from the custodians to the lovely lunch ladies, there’s just no concern for us.”

“We want to work with our kids but we want to do it safely,” said Jennifer Smagin-Gorden, a school counsellor who attended with her daughter Mia, her friend’s daughter Mila, and her friend Perez. ​“We are not OK with 2 percent being casualties. That’s 6,000 babies plus that many if not more educators factored in. That’s a 9/11 times two.”

The pandemic in Connecticut is evolving daily, Blatteau said. ​“If things are so uncertain, why don’t we plan to return slowly so that we can feel in control and safe? That is why our first demand is a phase-in approach. To jump back in immediately seems very short sighted and dangerous.”

Blatteau expressed concern that the state and school district might inform teachers of the plan only one or two weeks before school reopens on Aug. 24, and many of the older, most experienced teachers will retire. ​“It’s either retire and know that they will be less likely to get a virus that will impact the last ten or twenty years of their life, or go into a building where you know you’re vulnerable to the virus,” said Blatteau, emphasizing the need for a clearer plan from the state.

Donna Goglia attended the caravan rally with Paola Suero, a parent who works in Goglia’s classroom. They are preschool special education teachers who manage entire classes of special needs students at Dr. Reginald Mayo Early Childhood School. Goglia said she wants the state to start the school year virtually, just as they took a phased approach to reopen the economy, to ensure the safety of teachers and kids.

Goglia has health concerns and is from a higher-risk group. She is not sure if the state will grant her an exemption from teaching in-person in the fall.

“I want to be in the classroom. We know that it’s the best place for the kids. But we just want it to be safe,” said Goglia. ​“We want the powers that be to provide us with PPE, and provide us with the lower numbers in the classrooms, and provide us with everything that we need instead of us paying for it.”

Tiffany Moyer-Washington stood outside a yellow jeep, her three kids poking their heads out of the windows, with a hot-pink, hand-written sign that read ​“Keep us safe.”

“I’m a teacher and I have four kids in four schools. And that’s five schools worth of exposure,” said Moyer-Washington, who teaches at Hartford Magnet Trinity College Academy. ​“It’s hard for me to even get them to wear their masks for this amount of time, and I’m concerned about sending my most precious things in the world to a place that I’m sure is going to be safe.” As she talked, the kids fidget with their cloth face masks.

Stafford Springs middle school art teacher Celeste Forst is terrified to return to teaching, which would put the health of her three kids and four step-kids, one of whom has asthma, at risk.

“I might have to quit my job for my kids’ safety and I really can’t afford to,” she said. ​“I just don’t think it is safe to open schools at full capacity because we don’t have social distancing. We already are underfunded. I bought my own art supplies for my classroom. We’re not going to have enough safety equipment. I had to buy my own N‑95 mask.”

Paraprofessionals: The Front Line

Hyclis Williams, president of the New Haven paraprofessionals union, called on the state to reconsider a return to in-person classes, and to spend more money to protect paraprofessionals against the risk of returning to work in-person.

“A lot of the time, paraprofessionals are put on the back burner,” said Williams. ​“Lawmakers and administrators talk about teachers but there is no mention of paraprofessionals. And we are right there alongside the teachers and support staff. We are right there in the front line because they want us to do the dirty work.”

If a child needs a diaper changed, a snotty nose wiped, paraprofessionals do the work. If a teacher calls in sick, paras step in to oversee the class. If the school is short of a custodian, the paras do clean-up. They do everything from security to feeding preschool-age children, In cafeterias, hallways, playgrounds and classrooms, ​“paras are the first line of defense” in public schools, said Al Alston, a paraprofessional of 20 years. 

Alston works with a disabled, wheelchair-bound student who cannot stand to have gloves, let alone a mask, put on him. ​“He doesn’t wear a mask and that’s going to put us at risk every time he drools. If we’re not provided the equipment, that’s going to expose us,” Alston said.

For now, paras will have to purchase their own personal protective equipment and their own technological devices, should schools transition to distance learning, said Williams. ​“We don’t make enough money to purchase those things,” she said. Alston said paras are underpaid; he started out making $16,000 a year and now makes $23,000 a year. He works a second job as a postal worker.

Williams said that paraprofessionals did not sign up for this level of health risk when they took this job. She said she wants the state to fund a safe reopening of schools, including covering the cost of PPE for paraprofessionals.

“School Is Not A Laptop”

Like many other parents and teachers present, Moyer-Washington said she would like for her kids to be able to go back to school and hug their friends, but said she thinks in-person learning at this stage in the pandemic would cause more harm to them than studying from home.

“Online teaching is better than unsafe teaching in person,” she said.

Shakira Perez said the protest is not about teachers being lazy or being unwilling to teach. After all, distance learning is a ​“thousand times” harder than teaching in person, Smagin-Gorden said. ​“But we don’t want what’s easy, we want what’s good for everyone.”

“I recognize the dangers and limitations of distance learning. School is not a laptop,” said Blatteau.

If teachers and students could make a return to in-person learning as it was pre-pandemic — complete with full social interaction, singing, and freedom to learn — then it might be worth the health risk of reopening, Blatteau said. But she said she is convinced that in-person learning will be nothing like what it was before the pandemic.

Blatteau at 44 has a resonant voice and an infectious energy that could fill a classroom. ​“I’m pro-play, pro-team building, making the classroom a place of joy,” she said. Some of her favorite teaching techniques include switching discussion partners often, having five students write ideas on the wall, and passing objects around during circle-group discussions.

“How am I doing circle in a pandemic?” Blatteau said. ​“How is my daughter going to sing and dance in a pandemic? How is she going to honor the lessons her daycare teachers taught her: of learning to share with her peers, of comforting someone when they’re sad? I worry it’s just not possible and we’re kidding ourselves.”

The shift to online learning when coronavirus cases began skyrocketing in the spring was a sudden and unplanned move, driven by the emergency situation. Teachers had a matter of days to devise a new plan. Hickinson and Blatteau both emphasized how they now have time on their side and how it is possible to improve the experience of distance learning in the fall.

Blatteau suggested schools can fund, create, and deliver packages of art supplies, math equipment, and rulers to families who do not have them, making the home-based classroom a more engaging place. Hickinson said schools could group students into homeschooling pods.

“I can understand parents of color who already are facing so many hurdles in order for their students to get access to the opportunities they deserve. I understand parents whose first response is, but my kid is falling behind,” said Hickinson. She said teachers and schools should be spending time now devising innovative ways to make online learning more effective rather than figuring out how to keep everyone safe with an in-person return to school.

“Instead of planning this caravan, I should be putting my effort into planning how to distance learning next year,” said Blatteau.

Nijija-Ife Waters, parent of a special education child, recalled how frustrating it was for him to do distance learning in the spring. She still does not want schools to reopen in-person.

Every class he took in the spring required students to type out answers, but he never learned how to type. Waters said that by federal law, his education should have been tailored to his specialised education plan, but it wasn’t.

She, who sits on the reopening committee for New Haven Public Schools district, said the state and district should be developing a plan for special education students and medically-compromised students to do distance-learning effectively.

Since April, she has been asking Superintendent Tracey and state leaders about what legislative protections they have to ensure special education and medically-comprised students have access to a quality education, and said she has not received an answer.

“If you have a child that has life-threatening allergies to certain things, you can’t expose that child inside the classroom,” said Waters. ​“What does that look like? Silence.”

Adjusting Expectations

If distance learning does lead to a loss of student productivity during the pandemic, some teachers and parents said, they are OK with that.

Hickinson met with a student recently whose great aunt passed away from Covid-19. It was a struggle for Hickinson to get this student to graduation, but she did. She told Hickinson, ​“I know that there are some kids out there that are not taking this that seriously, but if you had someone impacted you just know that this is real and that this is serious.”

When her school transitioned to distance learning in the spring, some of Hickinson’s students had to take up jobs working for Door Dash or at Dunkin Donuts. Another one lost a great-aunt to the virus. Just getting into contact with them became difficult.

Students told her that completing assignments was not even a realistic goal anymore. In her capacity as a college-bound seminar teacher, she said, her priority became to respond to her students needs rather than to try and hold them to pre-pandemic academic standards.

“I’m so inspired by their power and resilience, and young people are beautiful and amazing. But at the same time, that doesn’t mean we as adults should continue to burden them when there are very real ways we can hold back until it is feasible to go back” to school, she said.

On Thursday afternoon, horns blared and cars carried foreboding signs warning of the danger of Connecticut’s school reopening plan. ​“Better safe than sorry,” read one. ​“Do you have our backs?” said another. ​“Teachers’ lives matter” was a key theme of the protest.

Steve Staysnick, a ninth-grade English teacher, said he had never before felt such a strong feeling of solidarity with teachers across the state.

Blatteau said that she was optimistic that the state will reconsider reopening in the fall. ​“We showed that rank-and-file teachers and parents can do it,” she said. Then she rode away on her bicycle, from which hung a cardboard sign: ​“Public servants do not deserve to be a public sacrifice.”