The 2023 DOE-UFT contract came at the perfect time for PS/IS 78 in Long Island City, Queens, and its chapter leader, Annawa Naing.

Naing, a 2nd-grade general education teacher, was given an integrated co-teaching class for the first time last fall and discovered the administration was using “cookie-cutter” or “templated” individualized education programs when the needs of special education students in the class were varied.

Naing also discovered that both her class and the 3rd-grade ICT class were getting just 15 periods with a special education teacher. “We were sharing a special education teacher, which is less costly — but not in compliance with some students’ IEPs,” she said.

But Naing had access to a new tool — the school-based special education committee that the union negotiated as part of the new contract — to resolve violations of special education rules and regulations.

“When I reached out to our staff to join that committee, all the service providers did so enthusiastically,” Naing said.

At the special education committee’s fall meeting, she raised these issues with the principal, who refused to budge.

That’s when Naing got UFT liaison Elizabeth McGovern involved. McGovern helped Naing, other staff and parents file special education complaints. The complaints spurred the DOE to solve some of the violations, but it became like Whac-a-Mole, with new ones cropping up.

A new opportunity came when that principal retired. The new principal, McGovern said, is committed to ensuring that students with disabilities get the services to which they are entitled.

Lisa Poveromo is the 3rd-grade general education teacher who now has Naing’s students from last school year. “Annawa has advocated for not just these children but for other children in the school,” Poveromo said. “And she educates all of the teachers about special education compliance so we have the knowledge we need.”

Naing credited the mandated annual special education training for staff that was also part of the 2023 contract, her co-workers for their willingness to get involved and the union for its support.

“We did it as a team,” she said.

Naing said all the hard work was worth it. “These are our most vulnerable kids,” she said. “If we don’t fight for them, who will?”