I just got off the phone with one of the KIPP AMP charter school teachers who led the school’s organizing drive, Emily Fernandez. Maybe the most interesting part of our short conversation was the fact that, during it, Fernandez took two phone calls from students, both homework questions.
Thus is the world we live in now. I can only imagine what my type A peers in Montgomery County, Maryland, would have done with that kind of information, back in the day. Fernandez, for her part, said she likes it that students have her cell phone number. Answering their homework questions makes sure they learn best, she said.
Fernandez was more vague on the subject I called her to discuss: why she and other teachers decided to unionize. She said that she wants to improve the school’s “sustainability” — “making it a school that has longevity for kids and families aas opposed to not,” she said. Against some of the speculation about the school, she said that there hasn’t been an “extreme amount” of turnover at KIPP AMP since it opened. (The school is now in its fourth year.)
More from her:
We really want to see how much we can cooperate and make the school better. We’re not looking to antagonize and change everything. We all signed onto KIPP and support what they want to do.