By Walter Elliott
MONTCLAIR – The paths to hybrid virtual or remote/in-person classroom learning instruction, as of Feb. 10, by the Montclair Public Schools and the South Orange-Maplewood School District, 6.5 miles to its south, could not be more divergent.
The Montclair Education Association, as of press time, may have received a notice to appear before New Jersey State Superior Court-Newark sooner rather than later.
MPS Superintendent Dr. Jonathon Ponds and the Montclair Board of Education filed suit Feb. 2, seeking a court injunction that would force the union’s 1,000 members back to the classroom.
Ponds asserts that the MEA’s Jan. 22 refusal to report to school buildings Jan. 25, in preparation for phased-in hybrid learning, was a job action. The teachers’ continuing remote instruction from their homes through Feb. 8 was equal to a “strike.”
The MEA membership and leadership said that they will not return to school until two conditions are met. The first condition is that they will not return until they are all vaccinated for COVID-19. The second condition is that classrooms, offices and other interiors of MPS buildings are sufficiently ventilated.
Ponds and MPS administrators said that they have ordered 400 air purifiers, to be installed and repaired windows to the tune of $26 million. Teaching may be meanwhile done in rooms with HVAC, like the 2010-built Charles H. Bullock elementary school.
MEA leaders, however, counter that Ponds and MPS administrators had not negotiated in good faith with them and a mutually-appointed mediator the week of Jan. 19. Their charge includes department heads not furnishing details of classroom upgrades.
Teachers’ Jan. 25 “no-show” prompted up to 800 parents from two groups to protest before some MPS schools. Montclair Families Advocating for In-Person Learning (FAIL) and Concerned Parents and Community Members of Montclair, N.J. (CoPCoM) have signed petitions calling for five-day full-time in-person learning.
The MPS-MEA impasse has various Montclarions taking stands – including in its Municipal Building.
Mayor Sean Spiller, on Jan. 25, said that he believed that all sides want to reopen the schools “once everyone is convinced that the schools are safe.” The first-year mayor and former councilman added that “vaccination is the only way to guarantee safety.”
Spillar has more weight here than as an opinion giver.
Montclair’s Board of Education and Board of School Estimate members – like those in East Orange and, with the BSE, in South Orange-Maplewood – are appointed by the mayor.
Spillar’s day job is as a vice president in the New Jersey Education Association.
The SOMSD-South Orange-Maplewood Education Association may have meanwhile implemented their “back to classroom” agreement while you read this. Their Jan. 28 accord had been postponed due to recent snowstorms.
The agreement includes SOMEA members teaching from classrooms that have been retrofitted with ventilators and other upgrades. More classrooms among the 11 two-town district buildings will be opened when ready.
Teachers will simultaneously instruct from those outfitted classrooms to in-person students and those virtually on Zoom. This hybrid model is to start gradually from two-days-a-week and selected grades plus all special education and English language learners.
This administrator-teacher pact came after some of the latter’s members held a lunch hour walkout and rally Jan. 19. That Tuesday was when teachers were to start preparing for a Jan. 25 hybrid learning start.
Although some selected elementary school students entered their designated classrooms Jan. 19, the demonstration led Schools Superintendent Dr. Ronald Taylor to postpone the hybrid launch a third time this school year.
Montclair and South Orange’s approaches to reopening schools are similar or at variance to those in districts in “Local Talk” land, New Jersey and across the country.
Teachers, administrators and politicians have struck agreements in Chicago and New York City public schools. San Francisco has sued its school district to reopen, however, and Buffalo’s teachers union has sued to postpone in-person learning.
Some of the schools that have shut down in the wake of the COVID-19 Novel Coronavirus pandemic’s outbreak here in March have been grappling with when and how to reopen since before the 2020-21 school year.
Of the 584 New Jersey public school districts, 272, at last word, have gone to hybrid learning. Each district’s plan has to pass the New Jersey Department of Education’s muster. School administrators then have to get buy-ins from parents and teachers.
Some parents, depending on their stations in life, either had to go out as essential workers or have also stayed in house to work or if they had work at all. Those levels may limit time they can help with their children’s instruction.
Some parents have discovered that virtual or remote learning is not a one-size-fits-all instructional model. Some children have thrived, some on or around pre-pandemic par and some have lagged behind.
Remote student performance may have other factors. Internet and computer availability is something many school districts, including Newark Public Schools, have strived to meet.
There are also intertwining social, economic and racial considerations. SOMSD, for example, have been grappling with getting more African American students in Advanced Placement courses, hiring more African American teachers and redistricting its schools to close a decades-old “Achievement Gap.”
Some parents, under economic pressure, want to see the schools reopen as soon as possible. This is why groups like Montclair’s FAIL and CoPCoM have formed. At least 11 SOMSD parents have filed a lawsuit in Superior Court, seeking an injunction to open both towns’ schools five-days-a-week.
There are some parents, however, who remember past vaccination abuse and are reluctant to take COVID vaccines for themselves and their children.
“You have to consider the history of America when it comes to science and testing in the Black community,” said Montclair Councilman and former MBOE member David Cummings Feb. 9. “The Tuskegee experiment on Black people is something we’ll never forget.”
Some parents’ desire to open schools ASAP conflicts with the wants of teachers and school staff. They are inclined to wait until the classrooms are sufficiently revamped and they can get vaccinated.
Gov. Phil Murphy, as of Feb. 10, has said that “teachers are on the on deck circle” in prioritizing who will get the COVID vaccines. The million-plus vaccination shots so far given have been given “Priority 1A and 1B,” including health care workers and first responders, based on CDC guidelines.
Teachers are currently grouped with people 65-years-old and older and [people 18-64 with chronic medical conditions like cancer, heart disease, cancer, obesity – and smoking.
“I haven’t smoked in 20 years,” asked one reporter to Murphy. “What’s keeping me from smoking again so I can cut in line?”
“It’s a false choice to compare smokers versus everyone else,” replied Murphy (D-Rumson). “This’ based on data, facts. “Anyone under 65 who’s the most vulnerable, including if you’re an essential worker, an educator, you’re eligible right now.”
The status of the other “Local Talk” public schools districts, subject to changing COVID infection levels, are:
BELLEVILLE: Hybrid; grade schoolers, special education students have in-classroom option; Belleville High School remains all-remote.
BLOOMFIELD: All remote through at least Feb. 28.
EAST ORANGE: All remote until at least April 12.
GLEN RIDGE: Hybrid. Elementary, junior high school, special ed students have the in-classroom option; High school students all-remote.
IRVINGTON: All remote through Feb. 16 (for teachers) and March 1 (students). (Note: Parent school return survey form is online.)
NEWARK: All remote until at least April 12.
NUTLEY: All remote.
ORANGE: All remote until at least March 1. Reopening Phase 2, modified Jan. 12, has teachers reporting to classrooms Feb. 22, students March 1 for in-person option. Central Office staff are to meanwhile work inside four days a week, school administrators and secretaries twice a week.
WEST ORANGE: Transitioning from all remote. Classrooms open to all special ed students and Pre-Kindergarten-Grade 5 students. Middle school (Grades 6-8) students are to return Feb. 16, West Orange High School (Grades 9-12) March 1.
