Veteran Salinas Educator Peña Elected to Board of 335,000-member California Teachers Association
California Teachers Association
1705 Murchison Drive
P. O. Box 921
Burlingame, CA 94011-0921
(650) 697-1400
www.cta.org
Contact: Mike Myslinski at 650-552-5324
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 6, 2002
SALINAS - Cynthia Peña, a veteran special education teacher and union activist in the Alisal Elementary School District, is the newest member of the California Teachers Association's Board of Directors.
CTA represents 335,000 public school educators in the state. Peña now represents thousands of teachers in a large coastal region stretching from Santa Cruz County to Ventura County to western Fresno County. She was elected Sunday in Los Angeles by the delegates of the CTA State Council of Education, the governing body that sets the policy and direction of the union.
Less than a week after graduating from college, Peña, 44, took her current job as a special education teacher at Bardin Elementary School in Salinas. That was 20 years ago. Peña still excels at teaching her third- and fourth-grade students, and received the Alisal School District's Outstanding Teacher Award from her peers two years ago.
Born in McAllen, Texas, Peña grew up in Pacific Grove in Monterey County, where she lives now, and attended public schools there. Teaching runs in her family - a sister taught for 23 years in San Jose before moving out of state last year.
Her father died when she was 16, and her mother struggled successfully to put all five children through college. Peña holds a bachelor's degree in liberal studies and a master's in special education from the California Polytechnic University at San Luis Obispo.
She fills the unexpired term of CTA Board member Angela Boyle, who resigned to join the CTA staff. CTA employs a staff of 500 at numerous offices across the state. Peña's term will expire in June 2003.
She is a past president of the Alisal Teachers Association, a local CTA chapter in Salinas.
The CTA is affiliated with the 2.6 million-member National Education Association.