Dear Chancellor Porter and Superintendent Skop,

As parents of students at MS 136 in Sunset Park, we are writing to express our deep and sincere support for Principal Amanda Bueno.

Ms. Bueno is an educator and school leader who has faced the unprecedented challenges of the past year and a half with strength and courage.  She has provided a safe, loving, inclusive school environment for a student body and neighborhood that has faced devastating losses from COVID, economic struggles, food insecurity and the day-to-day toll of structural inequity.  She loves our children and knows them personally and well.  She has organized the provision of meals, after school care, and support from neighborhood organizations for clothing and other much needed resources.  She has implemented an initiative that provides a copy of a brand new, beautiful “book of the month” for every single student, mailed directly to their homes. These books feature children of a wide variety of races, ethnic groups, religions and abilities, because Ms. Bueno is trying to cultivate a school where children are both seen and see honest and beautiful representations of themselves in the world.  While other schools in our district offered little or no live instruction on blended learning students’ remote days, Ms. Bueno programmed her school so that students would have live instruction every single day of the week.  Dewey has been a source of consistency and strength in an incredibly challenging time for all students and families, and we recognize that Ms. Bueno’s leadership has made this possible.

Anti-racist work is a stated priority of the DOE, and empathy is one of the DOE’s Six Core Leadership Values.  On the Together for All page of the DOE website, it states “...we must address violence and racism in our society, and help create discussion and dialogue about how it has impacted people in the past and continues to do so in the present.” We believe that discussion and dialogue, with empathy at the forefront, is the appropriate way to address the email Ms. Bueno sent to her staff and the concerns that were raised.  If you, as educators and DOE leaders, truly want your teachers and principals to work toward anti-racism, you cannot silence them with public reprimands and required apologies. You must acknowledge that difficult conversations, mistakes, continued dialogue and continued learning are all critical parts of anti-racism, and support Ms. Bueno and all of your staff who are trying to do this work, even when they do it imperfectly.

We, the undersigned parents of students at MS 136, support Ms. Bueno and urge you to do the same.  Her dedication to our children is without question and she deserves our mutual respect and empathy.