Editors’ Response to Letter to the Editor from Stuy Faculty

Be sure to read the faculty’s letter here: https://www.stuyspec.com/opinions/letter-to-the-editor-from-stuy-faculty

The reaction of some faculty members to a portion of The Spectator’s Issue 1 Staff Editorial “An Open Letter to Principal Yu” is a reasonable one. Teachers, no less than students, were forced to adapt quickly with few resources to a totally new set of challenging circumstances, and with that in mind it is understandable that not all teachers were able to continue live instruction.

We wholeheartedly agree with the writer’s argument that “we will need open, respectful communication between students, faculty, and staff” in the coming year. We agree too without hesitation that many teachers have put in extraordinary effort since mid-March, rising far above their standard call of duty to meet the occasion of the coronavirus pandemic. And most of all, we agree with the writer’s central focus on empathy, which is crucial not only in difficult and traumatic circumstances but in everything, all the time.

In hindsight, much of the section fails at achieving its intended purpose—opening a constructive dialogue about the undeniable failings of Spring 2020’s remote learning—and instead paints teachers with far too broad a brush when in actuality not all teachers were deficient or absent. Indeed, many of the bravest, most conscientious and most present teachers are among the signatories of the letter, and our initial Editorial failed to acknowledge their many successes and the radically different experiences of teachers during the pandemic.

Despite its failings, the message still stands. In the Editorial Board’s discussions surrounding the content of the then-prospective Editorial, several editors who spoke had an experience with a teacher who consistently assigned busywork to students while not maintaining any active presence. The letter demands empathy, and admirably so—but empathy goes both ways, and teachers who piled up daily assignments during a pandemic while not engaging in other ways with their students are also guilty of a lack of it. The intent of our Editorial was never to name and shame teachers, which is why throughout the section we used “some,” “a few,” or “certain” teachers to refer to those we saw as remiss, and a majority of Stuyvesant teachers can rest easy in the knowledge that they did right by their students in a time of crisis.

While the admirable efforts of many teachers should have been acknowledged, to recognize those real failures which did take place on the part of faculty should not be taboo, and indeed one of the keys to the open and constructive dialogue referenced in the teachers’ letter is an openness to criticism on all sides in the interest of improving upon the remote learning experience for all parties.

We thank the signatories for contacting us with their concerns about our Editorial and hope that this can be the beginning of a new era of open communication between students and staff with an eye toward the betterment of the entire Stuyvesant community.