Educators of NYC

08/11/2026

This is what real organizing looks like.

08/10/2026

🚨 TRS MADE THE MISTAKE. RETIRED PARAS ARE PAYING THE PRICE.

Imagine retiring after decades of serving NYC schoolchildren. You’re injured on the job. You rely on the pension TRS itself calculated for you.

Then, years later, you’re told: We made a mistake.

Your pension is slashed roughly in half — and you may owe tens of thousands of dollars back.

That’s the nightmare facing 183 retired NYC paraprofessionals.

On this week’s Talk Out of School, we hear directly from retired paras Anthony Delgardio and Edith Housni about what this means when the numbers on a pension statement become groceries, housing, healthcare and basic survival.

We’re joined by Marianne Pizzitola of the NYC Organization of Public Service Retirees and Arthur Goldstein, vice chair of the UFT Retired Teachers Chapter, to ask:

How did this happen? Who is responsible? Where is the union? And what needs to happen NOW to make these retirees whole?

This is more than a pension calculation.

Workers should not have their lives turned upside down because the retirement system made a mistake.

🎧 Listen, share, and help get their stories heard:

Podcast Episode · Talk Out of School · August 9 · 56m

08/09/2026

🚨 TRS MADE THE MISTAKE. RETIRED PARAS ARE PAYING THE PRICE.

183 retired NYC paraprofessionals had disability pensions slashed roughly in HALF — after TRS says it got the calculations wrong.

These aren’t numbers. These are people who spent their lives serving NYC schoolchildren.

This Sunday, retired paras Anthony Delgardio & Edith Housni tell their stories — joined by Marianne Pizzitola & Arthur Goldstein.

Who’s responsible? Who’s going to fix it? And where are the UFT and TRS?

📻 Talk Out of School | WBAI 99.5 FM
🗓 Sunday | 7 PM

Listen live at: wbai.org

A pension system’s mistake should not become a retiree’s catastrophe.

Will be available as a podcast after the live broadcast.

08/04/2026

UFT and AFT leadership must act now to protect 183 disabled paraprofessional retirees whose pension benefits have been slashed in half — for an error TRS itself admits making.

Tell them to act. Tell TRS to stop this until there is a full review. We must lobby for legislative changes!

UFT and AFT leadership must act now to protect 183 disabled paraprofessional retirees whose pension benefits have been slashed in half — for an error TRS itself admits making.

08/04/2026

🚨 183 RETIRED PARAS NEED US TO STAND UP FOR THEM.

They were injured on the job serving NYC’s children. They retired and relied on pension benefits calculated by TRS — in some cases for more than a decade.

Now TRS has cut their pension checks by roughly HALF and is seeking repayment of alleged overpayments going back years.

And here’s the part that should make every UFT member and retiree angry:

TRS admits the error was theirs.

These retirees didn’t calculate their pensions. TRS did.

They planned their retirements around the benefits they were told they had earned. Now 183 disabled retired paraprofessionals are being asked to bear the consequences.

That is not respect.

We are calling on UFT leadership to stand publicly with these retirees — and on TRS to stop the cuts and collection efforts while this is fully reviewed.

✊ Retired paras deserve respect.

📝 SIGN THE PETITION. SHARE IT. MAKE SOME NOISE.

http://fixretireebenefits.org/campaigns/parapetition

Every signature sends the message directly to union leadership.

👉 SIGN THE PETITION — http://fixretireebenefits.org/campaigns/parapetition

If we allow this to happen to 183 retirees today, what does that say about the retirement security of every member tomorrow?

07/22/2026

For years, NYC paraprofessionals were told to wait.

Then rank-and-file organizing changed the conversation in the UFT and The City.

The $10,000 Respect Check didn’t happen in a vacuum. It was won through sustained pressure. But the fight isn’t over.

How did a fixed, annual pay proposal become a temporary, one-time, non-pensionable payment? What happens next? And what should union members learn from this campaign?

Real victories deserve honest analysis—not just celebration.

Read The Good, The Bad & The Ugly and join the discussion.

A deep dive into the UFT and City Council's $10k pay plan for paraprofessionals.

07/19/2026

Movements don’t start with press releases.

They start with members refusing to accept poverty wages.

The fight for para pay wasn’t born in union headquarters—it grew from rank-and-file organizing that made ignoring paraprofessionals politically impossible.

That’s the story behind today’s RESPECT Check.

Read the backstory here: https://thewire.educators.nyc/p/the-respect-check-passes-a-temporary

How rank-and-file pressure pushed paraprofessional pay from a union fight to a City Hall vote—and why the legislation remains temporary, non-pensionable and legally unsettled.

07/15/2026

The promise kept getting smaller.

It started as a proposal for an ongoing solution to one of the biggest inequities facing NYC paraprofessionals — the need for A LIVING WAGE.

Then it changed.
Then it changed again.

We break down how a proposal that was promoted as a long-term fix became a temporary one-year payment , in quarterly payments, and why the actual bill matters more than the talking points.

Read the legislation. Compare the promises.

Decide for yourself.

🎥 Watch and listen to the the Reel.

📰 Read the full article at
http://thewire.educators.nyc

What do you think changed-and why?

07/11/2026

How Respect Became Temporary: The UFT Respect Check Rewrite

Last year, paraprofessionals were told the RESPECT Check would be built around a permanent Para Pay Index—a separate annual payment designed to begin closing the pay gap created by decades of pattern bargaining.

Today?

That promise has changed.

📌 The Para Pay Index is gone.

📌 The permanent recurring concept is gone.

📌 The latest amended bill is limited to the 2026–27 school year, with four installment payments and no automatic mechanism for continuing beyond that school year.

Does that mean paraprofessionals shouldn’t support the bill?

Absolutely not.

Every paraprofessional deserves every dollar they can get in this current affordability crisis.

But members also deserve honesty about how the proposal evolved—from what was originally presented to what is now before the City Council.

This isn’t about opposing the bill.

It’s about asking a simple question:

When did a permanent solution become a temporary patch?

What’s the more permanent solution? And how can it include all paras in its creation — not more top down decision-making?

We compared the original UFT FAQs, every version of the legislation, and the latest amended bill.

The timeline tells a story every paraprofessional should see before the Council votes.

👇 Read, judge the facts for yourself, and share.

How the UFT sold a permanent para pay index that would seek to offset pattern bargaining—and ended up with a temporary one-year payment. And only if it passes or survives legal challenges at all.

06/30/2026

Mr. Mulgrew, False Equivalence Isn’t an Answer

UFT leadership’s latest update claims the RESPECT check can still pass because other wage laws were enacted “outside the budget process.”

Then they cite laws requiring private housing developers and Uber Eats/DoorDash to pay workers more.

That’s a false equivalence.

Those laws don’t require New York City to write a check.

They regulate private employers, who bear the cost themselves.

The RESPECT check requires New York City taxpayers to fund a recurring payment for city employees.

Those are fundamentally different things.

Saying these laws passed “outside the budget process” ignores the real question.

The issue isn’t whether legislation can pass after the budget.

The issue is where the City will appropriate the money for a recurring municipal expense.

A mandate on a private developer isn’t the same as an appropriation from the City treasury.

A mandate on Uber Eats isn’t the same as a City-funded benefit.

Equating them either reflects a basic misunderstanding of municipal finance or attempts to blur an inconvenient distinction.

If funding has been identified, tell members where.

If the plan is to fund it through a later budget modification or another appropriation, explain that.

Members deserve facts—not comparisons that don’t withstand even basic scrutiny.

Paraprofessionals deserve the RESPECT check as a sustainable LIVING WAGE. Not temporary bandaids or empty reassurances.

They also deserve honest communication — not incompetence or hastily written talking points that misinform.

Using private-sector mandates to justify a city-funded spending bill isn’t an explanation—it’s a distraction from the questions everyone is asking: How will New York City pay for it? And when will paraprofessionals finally begin to be paid a LIVING WAGE?

Stop with the head games.