Dear Children’s School families,
It’s time to launch a massive Children’s School letter-writing campaign against the mayor’s terrible teacher layoff plan. Layoffs will hurt the students in every school in New York; we need to let our elected officials know the specifics of what our own school is facing. The staff are writing letters too.
**Please forward this email to every Children’s School family you can.**
We’re asking that you write two brief letters, one to
Bill de Blasio
Public Advocate for the City of New York
1 Centre Street, 15th Floor
New York, NY 10007
and one to
Council Member Brad Lander
456 5th Ave
Brooklyn, NY 11215
Lander and de Blasio are strong supporters of public education, and de Blasio is the father of two Children’s School graduates. We must urge them to go to the mat to stop teacher layoffs in New York City. Many of you may have already written letters to de Blasio, to the Chancellor, to Council Member Jackson, and to your Council Member after our Parent Coordinator’s email of March 31. Now it’s time for all of us to write. This campaign will focus on de Blasio and Lander.
Some “talking points” you may want to use in your letter:
–Emily Hallenbeck, 5th grade teacher, and Beth DiMarco, 1st grade teacher, are on the mayor’s layoff list. These exemplary educators were specifically recruited to our unique program when they were student teachers years ago, and their loss would be a terrible blow to instruction at our school.
–Susan Tierney and Mary Beth Crosby Carroll, reading teachers, are Orton-Gillingham certified specialists will nearly a decade of experience each. 20-25% of our school’s student body is dyslexic, and our dyslexic students’ performance, as evidenced by our school’s stellar report card, is outstanding. If we lose 2/3 of our reading department, as the mayor’s plan envisions, we cannot possibly serve our dyslexic students properly. Every child deserves to learn to read!
–In this time of austerity, we all understand that the education budget will be cut. But the mayor has choices to make about what to cut and what to save; choosing teacher layoffs is a destructive and irresponsible course of action.
Please include a strong request that Lander/de Blasio meet with a delegation from the Children’s School. Ask them to have their staff contact Mary Beth Crosby Carroll, Children’s School UFT Delegate, at marybethcc@aol.com/917-716-2429 to arrange the meeting.
Please write, sign, seal, and stamp your letter, and then place it in Steve Quester’s mailbox next to the lunchroom at the main site. Families can also send in sealed letters via the “backpack express,” and teachers will put them in Steve’s mailbox.
Steve will keep the school community apprised of how many letters he has mailed…let’s shoot for 500 at least!
Peace,
Steve Quester
Children’s School UFT Chapter Leader
Mary Beth Crosby Carroll
Children’s School UFT Delegate