NYC Department of Education Leaving $800,000 in Food to Rot in Storage

This is outrageous!

CBS ch. 2 reports that "Nearly $800,000 worth of food warehoused by the Department of Education when schools were closed could end up in the garbage because it will expire before the fall."

With long lines for food throughout New York City, and schools closed to students, the New York City Department of Education has put no thought into distributing the stored food? So it will go into the garbage soon, leaving needy families hungry.

Mayoral control and incompetence.

Stop Mayoral control of the Department of Education in NYC!

Betsy Combier, betsy.combier@gmail.com
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NYC Chancellor Richard Carranza

Exclusive: Nearly $800k Worth Of Food May Land In The Garbage Because Department Of Education Has No Plans For It

June 12, 2020 at 11:10 pm

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) – It’s a stunning discovery in these tough economic times: Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of food that was supposed to be served in school cafeterias could go to waste unless the Department of Education quickly comes up with a plan to stop it from being dumped.

CBS2 political reporter Marcia Kramer has the exclusive details.

Hungry New Yorkers at a Brooklyn food pantry were stunned to learn about a CBS2 discovery: Nearly $800,000 worth of food warehoused by the Department of Education when schools were closed could end up in the garbage because it will expire before the fall. And it’s all because the DOE has not yet made any plans for what to do with it.

“Feed the poor people, and feed the poor people on the streets,” said Brooklyn resident Alla Kapustina.

“Instead of putting it in the garbage at the end of the summer, they can bring it to us,” Ruven Diaz, manager at the Masbia Soup Kitchen Network.

At issue are what sources tell CBS2 are nearly 20,000 cases of cheese breakfast bagels, pizza products, cheese and other items that are set to expire sometime this summer. Under Department of Education guidelines, some food expires six months after it is manufactured. The cheese breakfast bagels in a school cafeteria were manufactured on Feb. 7. They expire in early August.

“Food pantries and soup kitchens all over the city can make use of them. We’re seeing a 500% increase in demand, so that supply would be a blessing for all of us,” said Alexander Rapaport, executive director of the Masbia Soup Kitchen Network.

Public officials are outraged – especially Assemblyman Felix Ortiz – who passed legislation empowering the Department of Education to donate all unused food. He wants the chancellor and the mayor to develop a plan to put the food to good use.

“To hear this news makes me angry and upset, because we have so many communities, my own district in Sunset Park and Red Hook, who need the food and I think it’s imperative that they take these actions now,” Ortiz said.

City Council education chair Mark Treyger suggest the food be donated to help homebound seniors who have complained about the quality of the food they receive.

“It would be an outrageous, outrageous waste of money and resources and food. Especially in this fiscal crisis, especially in this food insecurity crisis to let that food just expire,” Treyger said.

Resolving the issue could be complicated. A Department of Education Spokesman said the agency is trying to work out a plan to ensure the unused food in cafeteria freezers doesn’t go to waste.  But that’s only a small percentage of the food – the rest is in distributors’ warehouses.

The agency is questioning its responsibility for food ordered in anticipation of needs that changed drastically when schools were closed. The agency says its still trying to work that out.

Student Teams at Two NYC Public Schools Win First Place In NPR's Student Podcast Challenge

Jaheim, a student at Brooklyn’s High School For Innovation in Advertising and Media,

 helps record an episode of the now-award-winning student podcast, “The Flossy Podcast.”

 Courtesy of Mischaël Cetoute

Congratulations to the student teams at Brooklyn’s High School For Innovation in Advertising and Media and P.S. 126/Manhattan Academy of Technology!

Betsy Combier
Editor, ADVOCATZ.com
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Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, NYC Public Voice
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NYC student podcasters take top prize, shining a light on anti-Asian racism and on environmental injustice

Students at two New York City public schools beat about 2,200 other entries from across the country

By Reema Amin  Jun 12, 2020, 3:01pm EDT

P.S. 126 students Nicole Zheng, left, and Becky Liu, right, record an episode 

of “The Dragon Kids” podcast.

 Courtesy of Karin Patterson

Students at two New York City public schools each won first place in National Public Radio’s Student Podcast Challenge for audio segments examining racism and inequality, beating about 2,200 other entries from across the country, NPR recently announced.

Sixth-graders from P.S. 126/Manhattan Academy of Technology won the middle school prize for their podcast episode about how Asian students were subjected to racist comments related to the coronavirus. Seniors from Brooklyn’s High School For Innovation in Advertising and Media took the top prize in the high school category for their episode about climate change and environmental racism.

Both teams had already created a podcast series at their respective schools. The sixth graders call theirs “The Dragon Kids” and typically feature lighthearted topics, such as food reviews of restaurants near the school in Chinatown or how families celebrate the Chinese new year. The high school students run the “The Flossy Podcast,” a name based on the school’s Canarsie neighborhood. They’ve aired episodes on immigration, what it means to be masculine, and video games.

For the NPR challenge, the P.S. 126 students had been set to work on a comedic episode about things adults do that make teenagers “cringe,” said Leo Yu, one of the middle schoolers behind the podcast. But then, the threat of the coronavirus descended on New York City, sparking racist behavior toward some Asian Americans.

“I knew there was lots of bullying going on,” Leo said in an interview with Chalkbeat. “Those people singled out were hurt, and their feelings were sad and not good.”

The students started the episode explaining the coronavirus and dispelling rumors, while introducing listeners to words in Mandarin, such as “mask” and “sneeze.” Then they interview two students, including Amanda Chen, an Asian high school sophomore who had been helping the sixth graders put their episode together when she found herself in the middle of the story. While at school one day, a group of students told Chen and her Asian-American friends that they probably had the coronavirus because of their race, and that Asians “were trying to spread” the virus.

Chen, who later addressed the issue with her principal, said she hopes the podcast will allow people to “actually feel how we feel at the moment.”

So far, the episode has been played about 1,200 times.

About 8 miles away in Canarsie, when the high school students wondered what to cover in their next episode of the Flossy Podcast, they went to September’s climate march in Manhattan in search of material.

The episode opened with interviews with marchers. Pretty quickly, the students, all of whom are Black, noticed they did not see many people who look like them at the event. They were “deep in Manhattan,” as senior and podcaster Jamar Thompson put it, and a long journey for people in some majority black neighborhoods like Canarsie or East Flatbush, where Jamar lives.

“We felt like we should talk about what we’re seeing and what’s going on from our point of view,” Jamar told Chalkbeat.

Their experience at the march inspired them to ask which communities are most impacted by the very issues these marchers were raising. In the podcast, they read from a 2018 Quartz article about a federal study that found black communities, regardless of wealth, face higher levels of pollution than white people and are more likely to live near landfills and industrial plants.

“Bro, that’s like environmental racism,” one student says. Another exclaims, “Climate change is racial injustice!” Students shared their own experiences with natural disasters, such as Hurricane Sandy, which ravaged Canarsie. The episode ended with a call to action, advising listeners to voice their concerns and participate in protests if they feel passionate about the issue.

“Our hope,” Jamar said, “was to educate people and inform them and tell them, ‘This is a big deal and you should care about this.’

Email From Chancellor Richard Carranza About the 2020-2021 School Year

NYC Chancellor Richard Carranza

From: Chancellor Richard Carranza NYCChancellor@schools.nyc.gov 

Sent: Tuesday, June 9, 2020 5:27:53 PM 
To: Chancellor Richard Carranza   Subject: Update on 2020-21 School Year 

  

Dear Colleagues,  

   

I hope you and your families are safe and healthy. At this moment you are serving our students, families, and colleagues not only in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, but as we mourn anew the senseless loss of Black men and women at the hands of police, and confront the institutional racism from which it springs. I remain amazed and humbled by your commitment and perseverance.  

  

It is my job to be an anchor for you and provide as much support, leadership, and guidance as possible during these difficult and unpredictable times. Today I am writing with an important update about how the reopening of school buildings in the fall.  

  

We started planning for this return the moment that we closed buildings in March. While there are still significant uncertainties with respect to COVID-19 and its impact on New York City in the months ahead, one thing is for sure: it will take all of us working together to rise to the occasion to support student learning, address the trauma of COVID-19 disruption and loss, and keep our children on a path to success.  

   

Since we cannot yet predict what September will look like, we can—and we must—be prepared for a range of possibilities. Our job is to be ready and nimble.  

   

That is why we are looking at all aspects of our academic programs and school operations, and have developed what we are calling the Fall Framework, consisting of 8 key areas outlined below. That framework reflects our discussions with labor partners and an advisory group of seasoned principals, and is guiding our planning and organization at a citywide level. It spans a universe of areas we must consider.  

  

Similar considerations around health and safety will guide when and how we return to office buildings. As noted previously, right now we anticipate that most staff will continue to work from home until at least the end of June. We are working with our City agency partners on guidance for office locations not just for DOE, but across the city, and will let you know as soon as we have more information.  

  

In the meantime, I want to ensure you are aware of these key planning considerations: 

  

1.    Enhanced Health Measures: This is priority #1 for a clear reason: we need to ensure that schools and other office buildings are well-equipped to manage the enhanced health requirements that are necessary to protect against COVID-19 infection. This includes PPE and other equipment, supplies, social distancing protocols, and monitoring of health indicators required to protect our children, teachers, and staff. While we continue to assess guidance to determine the specific protocols that will be implemented, we are confident we will need enhanced safety measures as we return to our buildings, and are continuing to work with the Health Department on what those look like.  

   

2.    Trauma-Informed Transition Back to School: The start of the 2020-2021 school year will be unlike any other that we’ve experienced. We know students and staff alike are experiencing a lack of closure from physically being out of school buildings since March of the current school year. We know that we must have a thoughtful process to reacclimate children, parents, and staff to being back in school buildings. This means we must focus on the social-emotional needs of school communities while implementing trauma-informed approaches to teaching and learning.  

   

3.    Blended Learning: Our schools have done a tremendous job adapting to remote learning over the past three months. We know that this has helped to close the digital divide, and we are incredibly proud and grateful for the heroic work of our students, families, and educators in keeping learning going amidst these unprecedented conditions. Even when we return to a traditional school day, we can prepare for a restart in the fall by leveraging approaches of both in-person and remote instruction—what I refer to as blended learning—to support our transition from remote learning and maximize both face-to-face and online instruction.   

   

4.    School Start Date: We are wholeheartedly working towards a September start date, while working closely with DOHMH to monitor health indicators to ensure that it is safe to return to school buildings and offices.   

   

5.    Rolling/Phased Starts: Traditionally, all staff and students begin their respective school years at the same time. We are seeing so far that other countries are modifying schedules, and/or starting groups of students in person at different times. This year for us, the timing of return to buildings, and under what circumstances buildings might be closed or have limited access, will be established in close coordination with NYC Health and based on health and safety indicators.  

   

6.    Social Distancing and Split Schedules: Based on health protocols, we must assess how social distancing could be implemented. Building capacity will need to be adjusted to reflect what the CDC, State, and City determine to be best for health and safety. We can’t predict what will be true in September, but as of now we are anticipating that social distancing will remain in effect. This means we may need to limit the number of students and staff in our buildings and we will need to think creatively about schedules.   

  

7.    Building Operations: Building operations also need to be adjusted to ensure that schools and other DOE work settings are safe, healthy places for students and staff. Building procedures will need to allow for limitations to movement of students and staff into, out of, and within the building, and for facilitation of enhanced cleaning and sanitation protocols.  

   

8.    School Support Services: School busing and school food operations will also need to be adjusted to accommodate health and safety operations. This complex area will be carefully analyzed and approached in the coming days and weeks.  

   

In each of the above areas, we must prioritize equity, excellence, and resilience. Equity means that we will account for the disproportionate impacts of this pandemic across New York City communities and neighborhoods over the past several months, and the different physical spaces we share. Excellence ensures we are laser-focused on providing the best, highest-quality instruction for our children regardless of where that learning is taking place. Resilience means that we are adaptive and nimble for an uncertain future.  

   

We will be engaging with families, parent leaders, community partners, students, and staff in the coming weeks to learn more about what they would like to see reflected in reopening plans.  

  

I thank you for your continued flexibility and patience. Along with all senior leadership, I am here for you as we continue in our work to serve students, colleagues, and families during this challenging time.  

  

In unity,  

   

Richard  

Dear Chancellor Carranza,

Thank you for your lovely note about what might happen in September or, as you say above, being "adaptive and nimble" for an uncertain future".

What does that mean?

Betsy Combier
Editor, ADVOCATZ.com
Editor, ADVOCATZ blog
Editor, Parentadvocates.org
Editor, New York Court Corruption
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, NYC Public Voice
Editor, National Public Voice
Editor, Inside 3020-a Teacher Trials