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Health Risks, Education Gaps too Great to Reopen Schools say Protesters at Syracuse District HQ

Benjamin Schiller/WAER News

More than a dozen residents stood in front of the Syracuse City School District headquarters on Friday evening to protest the district’s decision to reopen public school on Monday, October 5th. Teachers and parents have concerns over COVID 19 health risks and learning disparities. 

The Democratic Socialists of America, Syracuse Chapter organized the demonstration to support their members and allies who work in the school district or local health offices.

The protestors held up homemade signs and chanted alongside Harrison Street in hopes of gaining community support. One of the protestors is Joseph Bennett, a science teacher at Nottingham High School in Syracuse, who feels nervous about returning to his classroom on Monday.

“It doesn’t seem like a possible task to keep everyone safe. I do feel a little bit scared.”

Bennett’s colleagues are also scared about returning to the classroom, though the Physics teacher acknowledges the school’s administration and the district have taken steps to protect staff members and students.

“We are socially distanced. We are wearing our masks. We are trying to stay as separated as possible. There’s a lot of cleaning equipment and I think the district has done a lot.”

Credit WAER File Photo
SCSD installed measures to ensure health and safety, including barriers at each desk and air filtration units in each classroom.

Bennett shares that half of his students for the Fall will not be returning to the classroom and will continue their academic endeavors online. Bennett fears that the school district will not have other personal protection equipment to mitigate coronavirus spread in the classrooms.

Last week District Superintendent Jaime Alicea announced the schools purchased thousands of air purifiers to put two in each classroom in order to purify air from virus particles.  Each desk also has a plexiglass screen on three sides to limit any spread of expelled breath that could carry the coronavirus.

Bennett isn’t the only teacher who is fearful of in-person learning at the local city schools.

Joshua King, a teacher who quit his job at the beginning of the pandemic, is with The Academy of Excellence.  He believes the hybrid learning plans, dependent on online instruction, will not benefit students from low-income families.

“We are currently still trying to put technology into the hands of students that absolutely need it…. We have a whole bunch of families who are essentially now back to work with students who are unsupervised and unnourished and completely unengaged.”

King shares that he has sat in on several virtual classes within the past few weeks and finds it heartbreaking to see students and teachers struggling with virtual courses. He believes there is a growing consensus among his former colleagues and other faculty members in the district that the city’s plan for hybrid and virtual learning will be a complete failure.

Credit Benjamin Schiller/WAER News
Opponents to school reopenings say they'll continue demonstrating over their health and education concerns.

“I actually received a text earlier from one of my former colleagues advising that ‘it was a (blank) show and we are not ready,’ and they are truly petrified.”

Teachers aren’t the only ones scared about the return to in-person instruction next week. DSA Co-Chair and Health Professional Jeanette Zoeckler alludes that most parents fear the possibility of community spread in classroom settings.

The mother of seven, whose children are grown, believes that the hybrid learning schedule the district is promoting will collapse in a matter of months. She believes that it will be too confusing for younger children and parents to remember which days of the week they are online and go to class in-person.

The DSA is planning to keep protests going during the upcoming week, including Monday when Syracuse Schools are planning to invite students back into classrooms for the first time this semester. 

Chris Bolt, Ed.D. has proudly been covering the Central New York community and mentoring students for more than 30 years. His career in public media started as a student volunteer, then as a reporter/producer. He has been the news director for WAER since 1995. Dedicated to keeping local news coverage alive, Chris also has a passion for education, having trained, mentored and provided a platform for growth to more than a thousand students. Career highlights include having work appear on NPR, CBS, ABC and other news networks, winning numerous local and state journalism awards.