new york mayor designates lunar new year a public school holiday | reuters
TRANSCRIPT
New York mayor designates Lunar New Year a public schoolholiday | Reuters
Mayor Bill de Blasio designated the Lunar New Year an official public school holiday in New YorkCity on Tuesday, following through on a campaign pledge to Asian voters.
The move came after de Blasio in March declared school holidays on the most-observed holidays inIslam, Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha.
De Blasio, making good on a promise made during his 2013 mayoral campaign, said students willalso have a day off on the Lunar New Year, an Asian holiday that next takes place on Feb. 8, 2016.
"We pledged to families we would keep working until we made Lunar New Year an official schoolholiday, and today we are keeping that promise," de Blasio said.
The city's Department of Education had been working on the logistics of adding another holidaywhile maintaining the legally mandated 180 days of instruction. The problem was solved by mergingtwo half days that previously did not count toward the total into a single full day that can be tallied.
After San Francisco, New York is the second major urban school district to add the Lunar New Yearto the official school calendar.
"This holiday is not about kids just getting a day off from school," said Assemblyman Ron Kim of theNew York City borough of Queens, who sponsored the bill.
"It's about the City of New York telling hundreds of thousands of Asian Americans that their cultureand heritage is part of the American fabric," he said.
Kim said recognizing the holiday is one way of pushing back against feelings of isolation andmarginalization felt by the Asian-American community.
"The next wave of youth and children can grow up recognizing that Asian culture is part of themainstream American culture," he said.
(Reporting by Katie Reilly; Editing by Alan Crosby)