Issue link: http://educator.cta.org/i/498229
among his 29 kindergartners, but has heard of others in the district. "I probably need to educate myself more" about pesticides, he says. "I'm suspicious." Causey says she will raise the safety issue with col- leagues in numerous local school districts as chair of the CTA Central Coast Counties Service Center Council, serving e d u c a t o r s i n M o n t e re y, S a n t a Cruz and San Benito counties. "You can't have a child learning if they're exposed to pesticides," she says. "It can affect how students learn. Some of the pesticides are neurotoxins. They affect the brain. It's a strong concern of teachers." Salinas native Karina Curiel, vice president of the Gonzales Teachers Association, has taught for nine years in Gonzales Unified and grew up in this fertile valley, worrying about pesticides. She will never forget how her fourth-grade teacher had her class write letters to the editor of the local paper in the early 1990s about the chemicals used on the agricul- tural fields that at the time bordered her school, where tract homes exist now. Her letter was published. "The letter said we were all concerned about pesti- cides," Curiel recalls. "We were worried about things like kids having to go over the fence to get a ball and exposing themselves to pesticides." "I think it's extremely important because farmworkers have for decades been trying to get the ear of Sacramento," Weller says. "With other organiza- tions and people like teachers unions and school administrators and parent teacher organizations getting involved, that will finally make a headway to getting some real regulations that help make things safer." He says the coalition is preparing for upcoming local hearings to be held by the state Department of Pesticide Regulation about possible new restric- tions under consideration. The report does not predict health impacts to students, but includes a call for ongoing surveillance of pesticide use near schools and an online database that's publicly accessible about pesticides applied on school properties. Ezekiel's colleagues in the Alisal Union School Dis- trict in Salinas tell of those who have died of cancer in recent years, saying that it's hard to connect pesticides directly to those cases. Estela Mercado-Rodriguez, president of the Alisal Teachers Association, has heard about studies linking certain pesticides to autism in children. She has taught kindergarten for 12 years at Frank Paul Elementary, a short distance from the fields, and says two of her 29 students are on the autism spectrum. But again, exact cause is hard to pin down, she says. "Children do seem less focused," she says of her students, many of whom have parents who work in the fields. "As kindergarten teachers, I think we definitely see that." Two colleagues at nearby Fremont Elementary, Aniceto Cortes and Vir- ginia Causey, talk quietly about various school employees and other Salinas friends stricken with cancer over the years. Cortes has no autistic students Alisal Teachers Association President Estela Mercado-Rodriguez is concerned about pesticides because many of the parents of her kindergarten students work in fields like this one, near her Salinas school. (Photo by Mike Myslinski.) Karina Curiel Virginia Causey CHEMICAL PERSISTENCE CAN HAVE IMPLICATIONS FOR CHRONIC EXPOSURE RISKS AND DELAYED OR CHRONIC HEALTH OUTCOMES. 38 www.cta.org Feature f r o m s t a t e r e p o r t