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De Blasio Moonlights as School Teacher in Back-To-School Video

By Nicole Levy | September 9, 2015 4:19pm | Updated on September 9, 2015 4:46pm
 Mayor Bill de Blasio stars in a video promoting the NYC Department of Education's online back-to-school resources.
Mayor Bill de Blasio stars in a video promoting the NYC Department of Education's online back-to-school resources.
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NYC Department of Education

The last two weeks haven't done much to burnish Bill de Blasio's public persona. 

First the mayor hosted an impromptu Twitter chat that left questions about city policy unanswered. Then his official Twitter account posted a mock New York Post cover that critics panned as immature. And this week Vanity Fair published a profile that painted him as an unpopular mayor better suited to public activism than pragmatic politics. 

So a cheery video that features de Blasio preparing a grade-school classroom for the first day of school can been seen as a calculated move by the mayor's office to remind New Yorkers that they wouldn't have universal pre-kindergarten education and mostly free after-school program without him.

Or the video, uploaded Tuesday, can be taken at face-value: a means of publicizing the NYC Department of Education's online back-to-school resources

Either way, you can watch the steward of New York City schools — for at least one year more — sorting crayons by color, sharpening pencils and generally tidying a teacher's classroom for the school year ahead. 

We love the outsized proportions of a 6'5"-tall adult galumphing among tiny chairs. And the Italian gesture of satisfaction he makes when his work is complete.