February 25, 2021 MONTCLAIR, NJ – A group of Montclair parents, who have filed a class action lawsuit against the Montclair School District, the Board of Education and the Superintendent as defendants, are looking to bring students and teachers back to classes full time, five days a week. The group cites the “continued collective failure of the Board of Education (“BOE”), the Montclair Education Association (“MEA”) and Superintendent to safely and successfully reopen schools for in-person learning.” A statement from plaintiffs states: “At the beginning of this pandemic, virtual learning was an understandable situation and temporary exercise. At this point, a year later, it is abundantly clear that there is a collective and ongoing failure by those entrusted to protect the welfare of the children of our community. Remote learning is dangerously unsustainable, is doing irreparable damage to our students, and is largely a result of the inability of the BOE and the MEA to work together to find reasonable solutions within reasonable timelines. This debacle is further jeopardizing our younger students’ academic, emotional, social and physical well-being, already fragile and damaged after a year of remote instruction. The ongoing failure to the community and its students is just entirely unacceptable.”