Issue link: http://educator.cta.org/i/5535
American Education Week focuses on budget cuts ACTION LEFT: At an Education Coalition news conference during American Education Week in Sacramento, CTA President David A. Sanchez (right), Vice President Dean E. Vogel (center), and coalition representatives tell reporters that education cuts of $17 billion are wreaking havoc on the state’s public schools. released by Education Coalition leaders from the perspective of students, teachers and adminis- trators across California. Ex- cerpts from the report tell the story of the damage being done. “On the first day of school, “Time and again, voters have made their voices heard in November during American Education Week. Events remind- ed the public of the damage done to classrooms from the state’s unprecedented $17 billion in cuts to education over the last two years. “American Education Week is A traditionally a time to celebrate our public schools and the suc- cess of our students,” said CTA President David A. Sanchez. “Our students are making steady progress, but this year is marred by the billions of dollars cut from our public schools and the dam- age being done to the academic future of our kids.” American Education Week was launched 88 years ago by the National Education Association. Sanchez spoke at a Sacramento news conference with other Edu- cation Coalition leaders during the Nov. 15-21 celebration of cross California, students, educators, administrators and school board members public schools. Joining Sanchez in speaking out at the news conference were many other leaders of the educa- tion community. Jo Loss, presi- dent of the California State PTA, which has nearly 1 million mem- bers throughout the state, was one participant. “Parents are stepping up as never before to help out our schools,” said Loss. “They’re vol- unteering in classrooms, serving on committees and joining PTAs in rising numbers. But they can’t make up for ongoing budget cuts. These cuts undermine all our talk about rising expecta- tions, widening opportunity and closing the achievement gap.” RIGHT: Josephine Carson, a librarian in the Mt. Diablo Unified School District, explains at a San Francisco town hall meeting that as a result of severe school cuts she spends most of her time checking in books rather than teaching information literacy. said that education should be protected from cuts, and that we should invest in our students and our state’s future,” echoed Paula S. Campbell, president of the Cali- fornia School Boards Association. “Our students simply cannot sus- tain further cuts. It’s time for our leaders to focus on real priorities — and for voters to hold those who don’t accountable.” A report detailing this year’s impacts of the school cuts was my seat in math was in the far corner and I couldn’t read the board,” said Stephany Young, 15, a student at Walnut High School in Walnut. “With increased class sizes, it takes longer to go through a math lecture, since the teacher has to answer more ques- tions. Instead of being able to go over homework quickly and teach the lesson slowly, we spend half of class answering questions, leaving only 20 minutes for the new lesson.” “We lost several key staff members,” said teacher Betsy Ve- ga from the Santa Ana Unified School District. “We have not 30 California Educator | september 2009 october 2009 CTA photo by Len Feldman CTA photo by Mike Myslinski