District 99 Teachers Returning to Classrooms January 11 Despite Concerns
Exterior of the District 99 Administrative building on 24th st in Cicero, Illinois. Photo by April Alonso.
By Irene Romulo
Cicero District 99 teachers are scheduled to return to the classrooms on Monday, January 11 but some are still concerned about their safety and are scrambling for options.
Since July of last year, teachers, parents and community members have attended District 99 board meetings to speak against returning to in-person learning.
“I’m part of a club of people who have lost a loved one [to COVID-19] and an October 19 start date is a death sentence,” said Dominique York, a teacher from Warren Park Elementary, during a virtual meeting in October where at least 35 people gave public testimony against the start of in-person learning. Plans to reopen in October were postponed until this year.
Several teachers with preexisting medical conditions filed requests under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) to continue teaching remotely fearing a return back to school. The majority of their requests, according to a union representative, have been denied.
“They took 47 business days to process my request,” said Rachel Nati Hardy, who works at Unity Junior High. “That was obviously strategic, that they would hold on to everyone's paperwork from their doctor and let things expire.”
Nati Hardy filed an ADA request in October because she takes immunosuppressives to treat multiple sclerosis. On January 6 she received an email from the district’s human resources department denying her request because her absence “create[s] an undue burden on the District’s operations,” according to the email.
Rachel Esposito, president of the Cicero Council, the union representing teachers, says that at least 175 ADA requests were denied by the district, including a request from someone with stage 4 cancer and teachers still recuperating from COVID’s lingering effects. Superintendent Rodolfo Hernandez did not confirm the number of ADA requests that have been approved.
In the same email sent to Nati Hardi, staff are advised that the district has implemented accommodations to ensure staff and student safety including: “mandated social distancing of at least six feet; the availability of personal protective equipment…; mandatory self-certification process for staff; modifications to building’s HVAC system to provide increased circulation of outside air; and all rooms will be sanitized daily.”
Esposito says these measures aren’t enough. She says teachers want a signed memorandum of understanding that includes safety measures such as daily deep cleaning of classrooms, not just spraying them down with sanitizing spray, a hazard analysis of school buildings before students and teachers return, a COVID-19 positivity rate of less than 8% in Cicero and to keep office staff on a rotating basis for the year.
“We're spending a lot of money on doing these additional things that are not mandated... to get our buildings ready. And they're ready,” said Superintendent Rodolfo Hernandez in a phone interview. He says the school met with their own experts to implement modifications to the AC systems at schools based on the union’s requests.
According to Hernandez, all schools in District 99 have also been equipped with a special “COVID area” for students and teachers to quarantine temporarily in case they present COVID-19 symptoms. The areas, he says, are outfitted with HEPA filters.
As of January 6, Cicero currently has a rolling positivity rate higher than 12% and 10,905 Cicero residents have tested positive for COVID-19. That is 13% of Cicero’s population.
This rate worries some parents like Yesenia Cruz whose daughter is a kindergartener at Cicero West.
“I don't feel safe and comfortable with her going back to school,” said Cruz. “Our community is very under-resourced and people have had to work throughout the whole pandemic. Even with precautions we are still at risk.”
District 99 is amongst six school districts that are participating in a program to provide COVID-19 rapid testing on site.
According to Jackie Matthews, spokesperson for the Illinois State Board of Education, Cicero schools were selected for the first cohort of the BinexNow school testing pilot because Cicero is a “low-income district that had students and/or staff in person at least part-time.” Student and staff participation for the rapid testing pilot is not mandatory and must not be a condition of employment or in-person learning. Each local school district will decide how testing is administered. Other districts include Zion ESD, Prairie Hills, Peoria 150, Murphysboro and Marshall.
Superintendent Hernandez says testing will be available only at a few sites because of limited funding. Esposito worries the testing site hours do not accommodate teachers’ schedules making the testing inaccessible for some.
More than 5,000 people have signed an online petition asking the district to continue remote learning until the positivity rate is lower.
According to two new studies cited by Chalkbeat, reopening schools in areas with higher COVID-19 cases helps spread the virus. In places where hospitalizations from the virus are rare, opening schools does not increase the spread of the coronavirus. In Chicago, 40% of teachers did not report to schools as ordered on January 5.
“Everyone wants to work, everyone wants to be there for the kids but nobody wants to die,” explained Esposito. “We want safety guidelines in place for everyone, not just staff, it's for students as well.”
The next District 99 board meeting is scheduled for January 13 at 6:30 p.m.. Interested members of the public can attend the meeting virtually by registering at this link. You can follow the district’s Facebook page for updates on the meeting.
Irene Romulo is a co-founder of Cicero Independiente.
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