You might think state COVID policies are gone, and you'd be right, aside from some sewer testing and other data collection. But that doesn't mean everyone wants it to be that way.
Meet the Detroit teacher who wants her own remote rules.
Report from Chalkbeat, the ed-focused arm of Bridge Michigan.
Twice-fired DPSCD teacher wants her job back — and a seat on the school board
A veteran teacher is hoping to get her job back and a spot on the school board this fall after she was fired for refusing to conduct classes in person.
The Detroit Public Schools Community District Board of Education voted during a meeting this month to fire math and science teacher Nicole Conaway for failing to report in person to her latest school assignment, Mumford High, for the 2022-23 and 2023-24 school years.
This is the second time the district has terminated Conaway for refusing to work in person. In 2022, the teacher repeatedly asked to be allowed to teach remotely due to COVID risks, citing recurring issues with her sinuses as well as chronic asthma.
Conaway told BridgeDetroit that she doesn’t want to take the risk of teaching in person and argued that the school doesn’t have the proper air purification and that masking alone is not enough.
“There’s no possibility of social distancing in this school, and there’s no testing, no vaccination policy, no requirement to even report if you’re infected,” she said.
Conaway filed a lawsuit in federal court in 2021 seeking to force the district to allow her to work remotely. During that time, she also sought time off and accommodations from the district under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act and the Americans With Disabilities Act, but was turned down. Conaway contends that DPSCD told her working virtually from home was not an option.
However, the State Tenure Commission called for a reversal of Conaway’s termination and, in January 2023, DPSCD Superintendent Nikolai Vitti said the district would abide by the commission’s decision and rehired her.
Conaway hasn’t been inside a school building since 2020 and hasn’t taught for the district since January 2023, even though she was reinstated and transferred to Mumford.
Conaway is also running for a spot on the school board this fall along with two core organizers from the By Any Means Necessary activist group, which she is heavily involved in.
Board members are expected to make regular visits to schools and, since 2022, the state Open Meetings Act has prohibited elected officials from participating in meetings remotely unless they are on military duty.
If elected, Conaway told BridgeDetroit that she would mask and practice social distancing at school board meetings. As for other duties, she said, she would consult her doctors and take the precautions they recommend. She added that attending meetings is less risky for her because there wouldn’t be a repeated and prolonged exposure to COVID-19 compared with being in a classroom. She can also check the vaccination status of board members and distance herself from people she would be sitting by.
Officials say Conaway broke district protocols
According to DPSCD’s board discipline summary chart, Conaway had violated multiple work rules, district policies on employee attendance, and standards of ethical conduct, as well as displayed unprofessional conduct.
During an investigatory interview conducted by the district, Conaway admitted that she had not reported to Mumford or any other district location for the past two school years. At the beginning of the 2023-24 year, she completed a medical examination ordered by the district. The exam showed Conaway has no medical limitations preventing her from performing her duties in person, according to the document. But Conaway said the exam wasn’t performed by her doctor or a pulmonologist, which “was not appropriate at all” since “I already had provided sufficient medical information.”
Conaway, in the investigatory interview, said that the district ordered her to return to school beginning March 11, but she refused to go back to class or attend any of the mandatory professional development sessions throughout the school year.
BridgeDetroit reached out to Vitti regarding Conaway’s case, but was referred to the discipline summary. The superintendent did not respond to an email regarding Conaway’s specific claims against the district.
Members of the Detroit Federation of Teachers did not speak on Conaway’s behalf at the school board meeting when she was terminated. DFT also did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
During the board meeting, DPSCD General Counsel Jenice Mitchell Ford read a June order from U.S. District Court Judge Gershwin Drain, noting Conaway would consider a compromise and return to school if it was approved by her doctor, the district met certain COVID-19 safety standards, and it guaranteed Conaway her own classroom and no in-person contact. However, Conaway said her doctor recommended that she stay at home until the virus is eradicated.
“If the only acceptable accommodation is permitting the plaintiff to work from home until the unforeseeable end of COVID-19, then the plaintiff does not seek an accommodation. She seeks to have it her way or no way,” Mitchell Ford read. Conaway told BridgeDetroit that she filed another request with the district for ADA accommodations in December, asked to be transferred to the DPSCD Virtual School and asked for her own classroom at its headquarters inside Northern Senior High School, which is no longer serving students. Her request was denied in March.
Fired teacher has been an outspoken critic
Conaway has spoken out against DPSCD multiple times throughout her 18-year career. When she taught at the now-closed Catherine Ferguson Academy, a high school for pregnant girls and teen mothers, Conaway fought against its closure in 2011.
In 2015, she rallied with her fellow teachers in Lansing to protest health care changes and then-Gov. Rick Snyder’s plan to reform education in Detroit. Later that year, she took part in teacher sick-outs, protesting building conditions like mold and broken windows, as well as large class sizes and cuts in benefits.
The largest sick-out closed 88 schools in January 2016, prompting the district to file a temporary injunction naming 28 defendants, including Conaway.
While a judge eventually dismissed the lawsuit, DPSCD’s case against Conaway and former union president Steve Conn remained in court, with the district saying the pair encouraged the sick-outs. That August, a judge ruled against the school district, saying DPSCD failed to meet its burden and interpreted state law in a way that is “offensive to fundamental rights of free speech.”
Conaway has been doing online tutoring since last year for a private company to support herself.
The district’s summary chart notes Conaway’s prolonged absence negatively impacted student instruction and district operations at Mumford.
Several members of BAMN spoke on Conaway’s behalf at this month’s board meeting, including former DPSCD teacher Benjamin Royal, who is also running for a spot on the school board.
“Make no mistake, firing Nicole means firing a teacher for following her doctor’s orders to protect her health and well-being. Is that really the type of policy that this board wants to stand for?” Royal said.
Conaway said despite her conflicts with the district, she’s not interested in teaching anywhere else.
“I’ve always taught in Detroit. My commitment is to the young people in Detroit,” Conaway said. “This is my home. It’s my community.”
Another candidate for election makes headlines, this time regarding a purported Michigan budget cut.
As regular forum readers know, we take a dim view of mental health clinics in public schools.
Choose your angle: state-run mental health clinics in the schools may be viewed as an intrusion into parental rights & responsibilities, a loss of focus on education, an instrument for cradle-to-grave state data collection and more.
In this case, it looks an awful lot like an appeal to a particular voting constituency. This candidate wants more spending on Flint schools, in particular. This is in addition to routine food pantries, medicaid recruitment, and - most recently - state guaranteed income handouts to Flint Moms.
The Flint Courier News reports.
President of the Michigan State Board of Education hopeful for supplement budget to help save children’s mental health services
Pamela Pugh, president of the Michigan State Board of Education and candidate for U.S. Congress for Michigan’s 8th Congressional District, talked to the Courier about her concern that the fiscal year ’25 (FY25) budget cut needed funding for mental health service by over 90%. The budget was approved by the state legislature at the end of June and was signed by Governor Whitmer by July 24.
The budgets consists of a cut from $328 million recurring dollars to $26.5 million in dedicated funding for school safety and mental health supports in the current year.
“The State Board of Education, during our June meeting, asked for the FY25 budget to maintain $328 million,” stated Pugh. “That was in Section 31aa dollars funding. That was that categorical line item, and that line item is used for children’s mental health and school safety. Those dollars were available in 2024, but they were non-recurring.”
Pugh pointed out the State Board of Education had a special meeting in May with parents of victims of Oxford. Pugh said these parents were calling for the funding in mental health and school safety.
“Districts are now scrambling, trying to determine what it is they’re going to do – at a time of mental health crisis,” said Pugh. “And we know that there’s great need, whether we look at gun violence that’s happening in our community that’s spills over and impacts our schools, or whether we’re just looking at in a post-pandemic world, the heightened need for mental health support.”
Pugh pointed out that mental health supports are needed in a community like Flint because of the Water Crisis, and communities such as both Saginaw and Flint where poverty and crime are both high.
Pugh recently hosted a session with community members in Saginaw, in the Saginaw High neighborhood Pugh grew up in – a high crime area that has been neglected and abandoned. There, she met with neighborhood groups, victims, children and spouses who have lost loved ones to gun violence. There, they talked about the connection between violence and lack of support or investment in communities.
“It is not the time to cut mental health budgets. If we look at the news, where we saw the attempt of the life of a former president…If we look at the increase in mass shootings, whether they’re at schools, whether they’re at the splash park, whether they’re in Detroit at the celebratory party…This is not the time to cut mental health budgets.
“Our communities have long suffered from just being in areas of poverty and all that comes with that.
“The increase in crime, the increase in violent events that we are seeing happen more and more in a post global pandemic environment, we see the need for mental health budgets.
“We need to make sure that our police have mental health supports -because police are not mental health professionals, but they should have access to mental health professionals so that they can refer and make sure that they are appropriately addressing issues that we’re seeing increase as our mental health crisis persists.”
“I called for the Legislature and our governor to put forward a supplemental budget that replaces these dollars – puts these dollars back, on a recurring basis. I will put forward a resolution so that my board and I speak in one voice. We are also planning to do some sort of public event to call for it as well.”
According to Pugh, details about the event are still being vetted out.
She said the worst-case scenario is that districts will be forced to lay off mental health professionals, such as school counselors.
However, the supplemental budget would go into effect after the Legislature comes out of recess and Pugh is still hopeful it will be approved.
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