Teachers and students in Nyack, Yonkers to rally against education overhaul
Union leaders to join events
Teachers unions will lead a series of rallies across the country Monday — including ones in Nyack and Yonkers — to decry an overemphasis on testing and demand more investment in public education.
A “National Day of Action” is being led by the American Federation of Teachers, whose president, Randi Weingarten, will be in Nyack early. She and Richard Iannuzzi, president of New York State United Teachers, are scheduled to join teachers and parents for a 7 a.m. rally at Nyack High School. They will then move on to Nyack Middle School and three elementary schools.
At each school, students are set to sing “One Voice” and “Data This, Data That,” an ode to New York’s controversial plans to send identifiable student data to a privately run database.
At 11 a.m., Weingarten and Iannuzzi are set to join local union leaders at the Richard C. Dodson School in Yonkers. Teachers union presidents from Yonkers, Mount Vernon and Harrison are slated to attend.
In New York, rallies will also focus on concerns about the implementation of the Common Core learning standards. Across the state, rallies are scheduled in West Seneca, Albany, Jamestown, Binghamton, Rochester, Syracuse and Manhattan.
More than 60 coordinated events are planned across the country. At each stop, teachers are supposed to wear blue “National Day of Action” T-shirts.
Twitter: @garysternNY