United States: New York schools add two Muslim holidays to their calendar
New York will be the first great metropolis of the United States to close its public schools for the Muslim feasts of Aïd el-Adha and Aïd el-Fitr, announced the New York Times on March 4, 2015. The two holidays will be added to the school calendar in September 2015. Bill De Blasio, democratic mayor of New York, who entered into office on January 1, 2014, declared that from now on: “Hundreds of thousands of Muslim families will no longer have to choose between their most sacred feasts and their children’s presence at school.”
Thus, on September 24, 2015, the schools of the city of New York, that count 1.1 million students, will be closed for Aïd el-Adha. After promising in his electoral campaign to make the city more tolerant and open, Bill De Blasio described the policy as a simple “question of equity”. The mayor also plans to close schools for the lunar new year, a date dear to Americans of Asian origin, but explained that he “would continue to work on this point”, since he has to work with a full school calendar.
Anticipating “those who would criticize”, the mayor declared that they should “look back and reread the United States Constitution,” and he added: “We are a nation that was built to be multi-confessional and multi-cultural.” According to official numbers, 600,000 to 1 million Muslims live in New York.
(sources: apic/nytimes/huffpost – DICI no.313 April 24, 2015)
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