By Greg Butterfield
On Sept. 21, the first group of students — special education students and pre-kindergarten children — attended in-person classes in New York City public schools for the first time since school buildings closed in late March due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
After school that day, teachers, other school workers, students and parents rallied to demand safe schools and call for remote-only schooling. The Movement Of Rank & File Educators (MORE-UFT), a social justice caucus of the United Federation of Teachers, called the action.
About 50 people picketed in front of the Department of Education in downtown Brooklyn before marching to nearby Borough Hall, where they occupied the steps, chanting “Money for schools, not for cops!” Soon after, they were joined by 100 educators and students who marched across the Brooklyn Bridge from Manhattan.
“This is a Black Lives Matter issue,” declared Dante, a student from Urban Assembly Maker Academy in lower Manhattan. “This is a funding issue.”