New York City schools will receive another $383 million for new technology and needed improvements in the coming year, thanks to the Smart Schools Bond Act, a UFT-backed measure approved by voters in 2014.

UFT members overwhelmingly ratified a new contract with the city Department of Education that gives members a compounded 7.7 percent pay raise over 43 months, UFT President Michael Mulgrew announced at Teacher Union Day on Nov. 4.

“This event and this room is for everybody,” said a beaming Silverio Pacifico, the instructional coach at the new UFT Teacher Center at PS 211 in the Bronx, as he raised an apple-cider toast to colleagues for their hard work preparing for the Nov. 14 grand opening.

The union faced some of the gravest threats in its history over the past year. At Teacher Union Day, members celebrated how the UFT had emerged stronger than ever because they had banded together to face those challenges.

Voters in Arizona overwhelmingly defeated a ballot proposition on Nov. 6 that would have greatly expanded the state’s school voucher program. 

Parents in Arizona fraudulently spent $700,000 of public money intended to help fund their children’s education during the 2018 fiscal year, according to a report by the state’s attorney general.