East Side Teachers Association/CTA/NEA 888 So. Capitol Ave San Jose, Ca 95127 March 1, 2005

Don McKell, President Ralph Giannini, Vice President Jane Voss, Secretary Tom Richardson Treasurer

EstaPres@pacbell.net fax: (408) 272-7569 voice: (408) 272-0601 website: www.EastSideTA.org

Two separate forms have been distributed to all ESTA members to advise of the upcoming elections for a delegate to CTA State Council and four delegates to the NEA RA. Filling these delegate positions is an important move in guaranteeing that the voices of our 1,200 members are heard when policies are made in the two primary parent organizations to which we belong.

At the present time, Don Dawson (SC) occupies the CTA State Council seat whose three-year term will expire in late June. Theresa Flores (ST) and Allan Roberts (IH) hold ESTA’s other two State Council seats, which expire a year from now. State Council delegates are limited by CTA Bylaws to no more than three consecutive three-year terms. Both Dawson and Roberts will be able to seek reelection.

Any ESTA member can declare her/himself a candidate for election to our expiring State Council seat. Election means taking on a commitment to attend all four annual meetings of State Council, plus bi-weekly meetings of ESTA’s Assembly and Executive Board.

At the national level, ESTA is also entitled to send up to eight delegates to the once-yearly meeting of the NEA Representative Assembly. Overall attendance at the RA typically runs to between 10,000 and 12,000 persons, and it has been called the world’s largest deliberative body. California’s delegation is always the largest, but every state and D.C. sends a delegation proportional to their state’s membership in the National Education Association.

The RA is always held in the week of July 4 in one of the 20-or-so U.S. cities capable of hosting such a large convention. This year’s RA will be July 1 – 6 in Los Angeles. Next year’s RA will be in Orlando, Florida.

Any ESTA member can declare him/herself a candidate for election to one of our four vacant RA delegate seats. Three of the vacant seats are for three-year terms; the remaining seat is for the one year remaining in a position brought about by the resignation of a delegate. The delegate seats and their alternates will be filled based on the numbers of votes received.

The deadline for returning Declarations of Candidacy to the Mt. Hamilton CTA office is 4:00 p.m. on Wednesday, March 9. They can be dropped off in person, or faxed (272-7569) or entrusted to your site’s ESTA Building President.

Additional Declaration forms can be downloaded from our website www.EastSideTA.org or can be obtained from your Building President. The election is scheduled for March 23.

Voting by mail is possible for ESTA members who know at least a week in advance that they will not be able to vote in person at their sites on March 23. Watch your school mailbox for details on how to apply.

The Governor and his conservative education reform allies have declared war on what they condescendingly refer to as the status quo in California public schools.

The particular status quo being assailed includes concerted attacks on:

If any one of these issues fails to raise concerns in you, you might just be a panda. (The panda, an admittedly cute but otherwise unremarkable mammal, is in danger of extinction because even healthy mixed-gender pairs placed in close proximity often remain too unmotivated to procreate.)

Don’t be a panda. This is a time when we cannot wait for someone else to do the work. Our students, our careers, our paychecks, and our retirement depend upon crying out in one voice so loud that the Governor and the legislature will not be able to ignore us. The November special election will feature a boatload of ballot initiatives that, if passed, will drastically change California public education. Staging the election in an off-year is going to cost upwards of $50,000,000.

There will be a rally on Wednesday, March 9 at 4:00 p.m. to call attention to the funding crisis created by the Governor's Budget proposals. Hundreds of teachers from school districts around the County will come. We need to be there to lend mass and credibility to our concerns about the Governor’s plans to eviscerate school funding. The rally will be at John Muir Middle School, 1260 Branham Lane (between Cherry Ave and Almaden Expy) in San Jose. My advice: Be there.

For a week or so, it looked as if the current budget woes of the East Side would be wiped out by a financing scheme proposed by CFO Jack Mahrt known as Certificates of Deposit, or COPS. In essence, the District would have sold one of its sites to outside interests and then leased it back over a period of years. The up-front proceeds from the COPS would have been banked, theoretically drawing a higher interest rate than the lease payments.

Our school board had embraced the notion in concept, but acknowledged that the County Office of Education would need to give the nod in order for the plan to proceed. Apparently, some component of the COPS plan became unappealing to the County, and on the Friday before our Winter break it was reported in the SJ Mercury News that the County had failed to approve the proposal.

A disappointed Superintendent Zendejas called me at my home prior to the Merc’s article to inform me that because of the County’s response, the District was abandoning the COPS idea. As a result, the planned reassignments of librarians and counselors will now once again be put into action.

My phone and email have been buzzing non-stop since the issuance of first semester class size overage payments began. Nearly all of the contacts have been from ESTA members who either did not receive any payment at all, or who received amounts that were far less than their expectations.

For the record, you will not receive class size overage payments for any class for which you signed a class size waiver. Otherwise, you should receive $1 per day for each student over the Article 15 departmental class size maximums in every one of your classes. These payments should now have already gone to every teacher who had class size overages on the 17^th day of first semester, and should be retroactive to the first day of the school year.

I have repeatedly requested records from the District to be able to verify the amounts that were calculated. At this writing, I have not received that information.

If you believe that you are entitled to first semester class size overage payments that you have not received, or if you received an amount that you believe to be wrong, please email me with the details. Include your name, site, and department, the periods (by number) and your best recollection of the week-by-week class sizes, and how much you received. And be patient. This may take weeks to sort out.

This goes in the "As if we needed something else to deal with" department. Scant information coming to me suggests that, as a part of the so-called Williams Settlement, every teacher at JL, WO, YB, or AH that has a class with 20% or more English Language Learners in it will have to have CLAD certification by April 8 of this year. It appears as if the District will be out of compliance if these schools fail to meet that threshold, and will therefore not qualify for certain (significant) funds. There is much more to come on this topic, and I will write more as soon as I know more.

Soon after the Governor announced his intentions to renege on his agreement to support the Prop 98 school funding in the wake of an improving state economy, CTA and others from the California Education Coalition began airing radio spots in the major markets in the state. In the Bay Area, the spots can be heard on KGO and KCBS.

For those who haven’t heard them, here is the text:

Barbara Kerr: I'm Barbara Kerr, president of the California Teachers Association and a classroom teacher.  It's ironic.  Just days after a respected report chastised California for severely underfunding our public schools, the Governor proposes a budget that will cut school funding by billions more. And this is on top of the $9.8 billion in cuts that classrooms have already suffered.  Here's what teachers say:

Teacher # 1: The class sizes are so large it's hard to focus attention on every student.

Teacher #2:  When kids are sharing text books and other classroom materials, it's harder for them to learn.

Teacher #3 Because of state budget cuts, schools have had to lay off librarians and even counselors and they are so important to what we do in the classroom. 

Barbara Kerr: We must let the Governor and the Legislature know that they've got to stop balancing the budget on the backs of our children. It's time for lawmakers to keep their word and provide our schools the resources our kids need to succeed.

Announcer: This message was brought to you by the California Teachers Association.

OPERATOR: Governor's office...

MAN: Uh, hi.  I was calling because I'm worried California's public schools just aren't getting the funding they need?

OPERATOR: Uh huh…?

MAN: Well, um, you know Governor Schwarzenegger?

OPERATOR: Yeah...

MAN: Yeah, well, um...didn't he borrow two billion dollars from the education budget last year?

OPERATOR: (bored) Mmm hmmm

MAN: Well...now Governor Schwarzenegger has no intention of putting that money back.

OPERATOR: And?

MAN: Ahh, we need that money for our kids.  You know...to reduce class sizes.  Purchase text books.  And not cut art and music...

OPERATOR (annoyed): And?

MAN: (frustrated): And...when he was campaigning for Governor, Schwarzenegger promised to protect Prop 98, a law passed by voters that guarantees minimum funding for our schools.

OPERATOR: Yeahhh...?

MAN (exasperated): Well, now he wants to gut Prop 98, and stiff our kids for two billion dollars every year!

OPERATOR: Sirrr…what were you expecting?

MAN: Well, I guess I expected the Governor to keep his word to our students.

MAN: See…that's why you should call the Governor and tell him our children depend on us for their future.  And politicians should take it as seriously as we do.

WOMAN Voiceover: This message from the California Education Coalition is brought to you by the California Teachers Association

These two radio spots seem to have had an effect on the Governor, although he has given no indication he is willing to back down on his budget proposal. Instead, he reportedly sought a Temporary Restraining Order to block the further airing of the Barbara Kerr spot. He sought that TRO on the day that the ad was scheduled to stop playing, but it is unlikely he would have been able to find a judge willing to give him what he wanted.