MORE-UFT School Reopening Campaign Toolkit
See the most updated version of this toolkit and share at http://tinyurl.com/StopUnsafeReopening
Educate yourself with these resources on reopening:
Ten actions you can take to help prevent an unsafe return to school in September:
1. Organizing 101 workshop: Learn how to organize your coworkers! Workshop Materials + Full Presentation and Slides from Strike Ready Workshop 8/29
2. Survey your school: What are you willing to do to stop the DOE’s unsafe reopening plan? Template Staff Survey Form (which you can make a copy of)
3. Sign and share the Petition to Stop Unsafe Reopening (Sign and share the UFT Petition for Safety too!)
4. Encourage staff to Apply for Medical Accommodation: Apply here. Template/sample medical letter.
5. Encourage families to opt students into remote learning. Sample letter to Parents. Spanish translation. Folder of more outreach tools
6. Join our Upcoming Actions:
- District 15 Rally For Safe Schools, Tues. 9/1 11:30am Cobble Hill Park and march 12pm to Sunset Park
- Delegate Assembly Tues. 9/1 3:30pm: make sure your UFT chapter leaders and delegates check their emails, register, and attend! Likely a Strike Authorization Vote happening
- UFT Town Hall Wednesday 9/2 3:30pm-5:15pm: Members Only
- City Council Resolution to Delay Reopening Thurs 9/3: *Public testimony begins sometime after 12pm, 2 min/person. Register to speak by 12pm Wed. 9/2. Write testimony at testimony@council.nyc.gov or at https://council.nyc.gov/testify/ up to 72 hours after hearing’s close.
7. Set Up a Community Phone Zap and Social Media Session! Phone Zap Script and Resources and Act For Safe Schools
8. Organize at your local schools and districts:
- Delegate Assembly Tues. 9/1 3:30pm: make sure your chapter leaders and delegates go and vote YES for strike
- Collection of School Surveys and Letters for Families you can use as discussion points in your own school/community
- Parent Town Halls, meetings, Pickets outside of schools with information warning parents & families of how unsafe schools are
- Join MORE-UFT District organizing! Sign up for your district organizing group
9. September: organize rolling sickouts at your school site, timed to minimize Taylor Law risks
10. Strike Readiness:
For updates on these actions and more, follow MORE-UFT on our website, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, sign up for our emails and texts, and join our caucus!
A poll released this week by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 60 percent of parents overwhelmingly prefer that schools wait to restart in-person classes to reduce infection risk. Among parents of color, 76 percent want schools to delay in-person classes, compared with 51 percent of white parents. Nine in 10 parents of color said they are either “very worried” or “somewhat worried” about their child getting sick with coronavirus if they return to school in the fall, compared to 55 percent of white parents.
