With stories, text and songs, the UFT Jewish Heritage Committee/Jewish Labor Committee Educators’ Chapter celebrated Passover at its seventh annual Labor Seder on March 12 at union headquarters.

The many faces of the UFT were in evidence — and working toward common goals — at a Functional Chapter Leader Training weekend on March 9-10 in Rye Brook, New York. Workshops on all aspects of being an effective leader were on tap for members whose work takes place in nurse, guidance, psychology and administrative school offices, therapeutic settings, the homes of truant students and one-on-one with the city’s neediest.

More than 1,200 UFT members traveled to Albany on March 6 for the union’s annual Lobby Day. Topping their agenda were a call for a moratorium on closing schools, CEC approval on co-locations, reforms to school governance, and funding for Teacher Centers and community learning schools.

During an afternoon visit with staff members of PS 42 — to which staff of the co-located District 75 P17 was also invited — UFT President Michael Mulgrew brought members up to date on issues related to evaluation, the status of contract negotiations and the union victory in the SESIS arbitration. Mulgrew also explained the importance of political activism on the part of all UFT members in the upcoming mayoral election.

Students left their school, PS 18 in the South Bronx, on March 4 with bags full of pasta, tuna, oatmeal, pears and milk to bring home to their families.

It was hard to leave the New York Public Library without rhyming on March 1, when UFT officers joined the sponsoring National Education Association in a Dr. Seuss-fest. This Read Across America project celebrated the late author’s March 2 birthday with 1st- and 2nd-graders from Manhattan schools PS 51, PS 111, PS 126 and PS 154.

More than 370 revelers celebrated the Chinese New Year at the UFT Asian American Heritage Committee banquet on March 1 at the Grand Harmony Restaurant in Chinatown.