Yesterday, a friend texted me, “Are you at the Town Hall thing?” I was not at the town hall. I had no idea that anything was happening at the town hall. I had just sat down to a late lunch of leftover Mexican food. I may or may not have still been in my pajamas. Don’t judge me: I’d been up late the night before!
As I scooped Mexican rice, chicken, and fajita veggies into my face, I was checking my phone for, well, the scoop.
This, I learned, was Michael Dickerson, a social studies teacher at Niskayuna High School who had been placed on administrative leave. If you click on his name, you’ll see a letter from him on his account on Bluesky. It looks like he’s also behind this Instagram account and maybe this Instagram account, too? I don’t know for sure, because I don’t really know him: neither of my daughters were his students. But it sounded like something I should know more about, and it could count for my one thing a day. By the time I had eaten my lunch, put on a bra and hard pants, and pedaled like Miss Almira Gulch stealing Toto from Dorothy to the town hall, the event was mostly over. As the musicians shut down and people milled about, I learned more through gossip and blatant eavesdropping. Mr. Dickerson was absent from school and had placed an explanation for his absence, something about preserving history in the face of threats without specifying a political party or any specific politicians, on Google classroom, which the school administration found objectionable. And/or maybe it was the absence itself? And an update based on more local intel: possibly there’s a whole other situation that is getting camouflaged by the political stuff. I am not clear on any of that, but it’s not really the point, because in spite of my tardiness, I still learned interesting things.
First, I hadn’t realized that this Mr. Dickerson is the same guy who’d gone viral for telling Congressman Paul Tonko in a town hall that if he asked us to show up in D.C., we will show up. At the time that I first saw this video, it really resonated with me, because I’d literally just called Tonko’s office and some very nice aide of his said something like, “He’s doing everything he can…” and I said something like, “I don’t want to argue with you, but that’s not true, because I’m here at my house, and if he had told me to show up somewhere to protest, I would be there right now.” So when I saw the video, I was like, exactly! Anyway, did y’all know that Congressman Tonko will be at Schenectady High School for a Town Hall on St. Patrick’s Day? You can sign up for it here. Before you do, you should know that part of the sign-up process is that you can ask a question ahead of time. So you might want to take a minute to think about what you’ want you’d like to ask if you’re in the district.
Also at this event, I ran into another friend, who said, “I was just talking about you with someone….” and we pieced together that it was a mutual friend, who wondered if I knew that J.R. Rickert is running for town supervisor, because I should spread the word. Why, yes, as it happened, I already knew that our high school principal, who will (finally!) be retiring after this year, will be running on the Republican ticket for Niskayuna Town Supervisor. I, like the Schenectady County Conservative Party (it’s true, and I love this for him!), am rooting for the Democratic candidate and current supervisor (since she was unanimously sworn in in September), Erin Cassady-Dorion. Did you know that while JR is officially a Niskayuna town resident, he resides in the rare territory in which he pays Colonie School District taxes instead of Niskayuna taxes? The students I chatted with at this event, like my daughters, agree that we will not be voting for him. Really, I think it’s a kindness: I want to give him the chance to fully focus on his unbelievably lucrative career as a sports agent, now that he won’t have his distracting principal side gig anymore.
Also talking with students, I learned about a new student group, Niskayuna for Civil Rights. Again, I was late to the party — now that my kids aren’t in high school anymore, my finger is no longer on the pulse of the district — so we’re too late for this petition, but you can click on the image below or on the name above and follow them on Instagram.
According to the students organizing the civil rights group, Niskayuna HS, which used to be designated as a No Place for Hate school, no longer meets the requirements and has lost the designation. I’m trying to learn more about that. But meanwhile, if you’ve got kids in the high school and you’re concerned, you should let the administration know.
And of course, all of this information made me think about how I need to do a better job of keeping up with the news. I had told myself that attending Board of Education meetings would be great as one of my one-thing-a-day game, but they are always on Tuesdays, and I’m currently signed up for a yoga class at the same time. Plus, they are just so dreadfully boring. Really: God bless the members who are willing to join the board for no pay, it just seems like so much unappreciated work and monotony. But even if I don’t make it to the board meetings, I can at least keep up with things by checking out the minutes, which I hadn’t been doing. Sure enough, the last meeting minutes indicated multiple students advocating for the new group. So far, the Superintendent Carl and has done a good job of reaffirming the district’s commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging in all schools, but this is only going to get tougher, so they’ll need support from all sides.
There’s also an effort to create a history club with the plan to participate in National History Day; apparently there is a little resistance from the school administration. I had said that as a history fan girl and holder of a history MA, I’d be happy to throw in whatever support would be helpful. Then I remembered, while biking home, that I was actually a judge at a National History Day competition once upon a time.
So! There’s a lot going on locally, and hopefully now that I’m following the Niskayuna for Civil Rights account on Instagram and Mr. Dickerson’s Bluesky account, I’ll do a better job of keeping up with it. Incidentally, in spite of my ardent desire to avoid Mark Zuckerberg, I still find the Progressive Schenectady Facebook group to be the best way to keep up with local happenings. You can also sign up for their emails on their website.
