YOUR KIDS’ EDUCATION: TAKE ACTION!

Don’t let Sacramento balance the state budget on the back of our kids’ education again. Get involved and make your voice heard! Go one of to: www.sandi.net and click on “budget crisis” on the right of the page. Then do one or all of the following:

• Click on “Budget Reports,” or “State Budget Information” (left side of the page) and educate yourself

• Click on “Budget Blog.” (left side of the page) Share your ideas and read others’ ideas.

• Click on “What can you do?” (left side of the page) and call or send and email to any or all of the legislators listed telling them education funding as a means to balance the state budge is OFF LIMITS this time

• Join the Birney PTA!

• Download and Sign the form letter in English or Spanish and either mail it to your state legislator or drop it in the box marked “letters to Sacramento” in the office and we will mail if for you

Race to the Top Funds
This is an Obama Administration initiative. It is a competition among states to secure stimulus money for education. To qualify, a state must implement certain educational reforms, including merit pay for teachers.

On Friday, December 11, the California Assembly passed Assembly Bill ABX5 8 which is designed to make the reforms necessary in order to compete for up to $700 million dollars. ABX5 8 was sponsored by Julia Brownley, (D-Santa Monica) and her bill won out over Gloria Romero’s (D-East Lost Angeles.)

Romero’s bill, supported by Governor Schwarzenegger, charter school advocates, the California NAACP and some Latino legislators, would have maintained much of the freedom of charter schools to serve as “laboratories” for educational methods and gave parents more power to trigger reforms in schools they deemed unacceptable. Brownley’s bill, which passed, is supported by the California Teacher’s Association, the California State PTA, the Association of California School Administrators and the California Federation of Teachers, among others.

Governor Schwarzenegger said in a press release the if Brownley’s bill reaches his desk in it’s current form, he will veto it. The bill could be in the Senate for consideration as early as next week.
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