Coffee? Tea? Muffin?

Pat Arnow

Anthony Harmon (at left), the UFT’s director of parent and community outreach, and Nicholas Cruz, the parent and community liaison for the Bronx UFT office, pass out coffee and tea.

UFT members greeted charter school demonstrators in front of 52 Broadway on June 27 with offers of breakfast treats and conversation as the charter advocates called on the union to drop its lawsuit against 18 co-locations.

Their chants yielded to dialogue as UFTers engaged them in constructive conversation. “Parents of our children need not and should not be pitted against each other. The situation is a byproduct of DOE policy,” UFT Director of Staff LeRoy Barr told one of the parents.

“All children should have a good education,” said charter parent Myrna Prince. “I couldn’t agree more,” a UFT staffer replied to her.

The lawsuit, filed jointly with the NAACP and other plaintiffs, asks that the city and the Department of Education halt the closings of 21 schools and to ensure that students in district buildings where the 18 charters wish to co-locate or expand have the same access to facilities as the charters do.

A state judge on June 21 extended an order that forbids the DOE from destroying information necessary for keeping the schools open and from making certain physical changes to buildings with co-locations, while the court considers the request for an injunction. The judge is expected to issue a ruling in the coming weeks.

The charter parents were organized by Success Charter Networks founder Eva Moskowitz, who stood at the back of the small demonstration. They carried signs saying, “Your Lawsuit Hurts My Child” and denounced the UFT.

But as conversations broke out, the protesters accepted the coffee, and the children they brought with them smiled shyly as they munched on UFT bagels and jelly.