Bronx Engineering and Technical Academy Chapter Leader Yvonne Reasen used the new expedited resolution process for operational issues, negotiated as part of the 2018 DOE-UFT contract, to get the basic instructional supplies desperately needed by science teachers at her school.

Even before he was elected chapter leader at PS 116 in Bushwick in September 2018, Adam Shapiro led a “brigade” of 25 UFT members to a meeting at the UFT’s Brooklyn borough office to discuss their principal’s intimidation of staff and extensive breaches of the DOE-UFT contract.

Susan E. Wagner HS Chapter Leader Lillian Palladino credits the union-negotiated process for tackling excessive paperwork for resolving an issue at her Staten Island school and for “unifying staff, revitalizing morale and bridging the gap with administration.”

Melissa Alvarez, the chapter leader at John Bowne HS in Flushing, Queens, used the new dispute resolution process in the DOE-UFT contract to get a speedy response to a safety violation: no teacher assigned to the high school’s SAVE room.

The union spirit reigns in the shop classes at Aviation HS in Long Island City, where the class is run as a simulated unionized workplace. Teachers José Vaz and Antonio Pepenella instituted the practice five years ago to give the students a taste of the kinds of unionized jobs they’re likely to find in the aviation industry.

At Forest Hills HS in Queens, Chapter Leader Adam Bergstein and his members have passed a vote of no confidence against their principal.