Karen Alford--Thanks members for toy drive donations. Says many children got toys, and over 20K in monetary donations, not to mention toys.
Al Shanker scholarship deadline extended to February 1.
Anthony Harmon--Food drive to help communities--partnered with restaurants to get 1K meals per week per borough, over 20K done so far.
UFT President Michael Mulgrew--Moment of silence for Jerry Rainer, teacher at MS 216, who passed last week.
We will continue helping communities with food.
City and state have different numbers. Currently state numbers take precedence. Discrepancy is large, but COVID definitely rising. Number for state is 6.2 while city number is over 9, yet mayor says he's following the state. Testing is continuing to work. Since 12/7 closed 390 schools, over 45%. Just today, we had 121 schools shut down due to pre-break tests.
We need everyone to continue to report testing issues. They have made changes, but we need quick turnaround and real random testing. In order to get it all done, they can't just test a whole school. They will test 20% and leave, and they can't test only adults. Governor said if school district reaches 9% it's up to them to close. UFT says we have to close at 9%. This could be a fight if we get there.
My focus has been moving teachers up in terms of vaccine access. There are tens of thousands of doses sitting in freezers, and worst offender is NYC, having distributed only CONTINUE READING: NYC Educator: UFT Executive Board January 4, 2021--Vaccines, Openings, Closings and Food Banks
