For those coping with grief, the shift from fall to winter can be especially hard, as the holiday season lies ahead and our thoughts turn to people, things and experiences that are missing. Mental health professionals with the UFT's Member Assistance...

As a hearing officer for the city's Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings, Aubrey Lee adjudicates cases involving summonses issued by the city’s regulatory agencies. "I can’t imagine what this job would be like without a union," she says.

UFT Vice President for Special Education MaryJo Ginese writes that our special education teachers, paraprofessionals and related service providers do incredible work supporting children with IEPs, but the DOE too often has not fulfilled its part.


High school teacher Amy Matthusen of East-West School of International Studies in Queens explains how to deepen students' engagement with a play or novel by having them produce a talk show featuring characters from the text.

The Tax-Deferred Annuity program is a simple and powerful way to save additional money for your retirement. Your TDA account is funded exclusively through your own contributions.


The UFT has asked the State Education Department to investigate the city Department of Education for its continued failure to provide mandated special education services to students.

With New York City facing a chronic shortage of bilingual special education teachers, the UFT was able to negotiate a new incentive program to encourage tenured special education teachers with a bilingual extension to combine those two specialties.

Signing up for Medicare involves more than just checking a box on a form; there are multiple parts to Medicare, and rules and premiums vary.

UFT retirees turned out in force this election cycle to make calls and knock on doors in support of Kamala Harris for president and other union-endorsed candidates down the ballot.

Retiree Lorraine Castro has traded in lesson plans for shopping lists since joining forces with her daughter, an in-service teacher at DeWitt Clinton HS in the Bronx, to launch Flavor Bandits, a food truck business that serves up empanadas and other...

We may have differences, but we all work together on the important stuff. We put members first, and we don’t let our differences get in the way of our similarities.


Two-hundred educators and their families gathered in Queens for a day of wellness and fun. They heard from MindUp CEO and founder Goldie Hawn and took part in activities and workshops to nurture their mental and physical health.


Every election is important, but one could argue that the general election on Nov. 5 is the single most important election in our lifetime. As union members and public school educators, we have a clear choice: Kamala Harris.
We are also supporting...

The UFT is pushing back against the DOE's use of part-time therapists from private agencies rather than operationalizing the ninth session negotiated in the 2023 DOE-UFT contract to enable full-time therapists to do this work.

Problems with the U.S. Department of Education’s rollout of a new Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) form and an understaffed call center caused a 3% drop in applications this year, a set of federal reports released in September found.


Petitions from workers seeking union representation doubled during President Joe Biden’s presidency, compared with the numbers during Donald Trump’s term as president, according to new figures released by the National Labor Relations Board.


Transgender and questioning high schoolers experience high rates of bullying and depression in an increasingly hostile political and social landscape, according to new data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

UFT members and their families now have access to mental health support by phone, text or online chat, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The new mental health helpline, an initiative of the union’s Member Assistance Program (MAP), is staffed by...

More than a hundred 3- and 4-year-olds with disabilities at the Mosaic Pre-K Centers in Queens will now receive the related services they need to thrive, the culmination of a two-year organizing effort by the union and the broader school community.


Marian Thom, a dynamic force for Asian American causes and a founding member of the UFT Paraprofessionals Chapter, died on Sept. 4 after a nine-month battle with pancreatic cancer. She was 88.

The latest online mapping tools can do much more than get us from point A to B. With features such as data collection and media integration, online maps can be used in the classroom to take student activities in completely new directions. 


Among the many meaningful contractual rights UFT members have is time carved out for teachers to do unassigned professional work. Whether they teach elementary, middle or high school, teachers are generally entitled to five preparation periods per...

Two factors have contributed to the increase in bullying in recent years: the pervasiveness of social media and lingering stress from the pandemic. But no matter the reason, the surge has prompted educators to address the issue more urgently. 


As a member of the UFT Welfare Fund, you and your eligible dependents can obtain optical services annually. Learn all you need to know about your optical benefit.

High school Spanish teacher Dianne-marie Cotto of World Journalism Preparatory in Queens has her class create an elaborate ofrenda (or altar to the dead) to help them better connect to the Mexican celebration El Dia de los Muertos.

UFT Welfare Fund members, both in-service and retired, and their families now have special access to Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) thanks to a new partnership between the UFT Welfare Fund and the hospital.

New York City schools, particularly in District 75, are in dire need of paraprofessionals, who provide essential support services for children with disabilities. The shortage won’t get resolved until the city Department of Education streamlines its...

Delegates at the UFT Delegate Assembly approved a resolution calling for the union to push for a fairer cost of living adjustment for New York City public employee pensions.

The school-based special education committee — created as part of the 2023 DOE-UFT contract — gave Naing the tool she needed to fight to ensure special education students in her school receive the services they are entitled to.

Leading with the positive, focusing on a student's specific goals and having parents be assured that an educator has a plan to further their child's needs are among the best ways to have more effective parent-teacher conferences.

Will Dulin, a third-year teacher at Pathways to Graduation in Jamaica, Queens, takes pains to truly see his CTE students, helping them to forge pathways to educational success even when they can't quite envision them themselves.

It was a great time for a great cause — raising money for the UFT Disaster Relief Fund — as members made their way out to the links at the Silver Lake Golf Course on Staten Island.

A pink wave crested over New York City school buildings on Oct. 16 as UFT members wore pink to work to raise awareness about breast cancer. The annual tradition is a way to celebrate survivors, pay tribute to lost loved ones and colleagues, and...

The NYC Association of Foreign Language Teachers/UFT's fall conference featured language-specific workshop sessions for teachers of Spanish, French, Greek and Russian.

UFT members hit the phone lines and fanned out from New York City to Philadelphia and Scranton, Pennsylvania, this fall to campaign for Kamala Harris for president, as well as other pro-union, pro-education candidates down the ballot on Nov. 5.


UFT members said the stakes could not be higher this presidential election season as members, elected officials and guests came together at UFT headquarters on Sept. 10 to avidly watch the presidential debate between Democrat Kamala Harris and...