By Len Feldman
Just a year ago, California was facing its second year of massive funding shortfalls with no relief in sight, and public education was reeling under the weight of several years of state funding cuts.
Despite the tough economic times, CTA and its allies preserved for public schools a cost-of-living adjustment (COLA), full funding for K-12 student increases and appropriations for instructional materials during 2004.
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CTA officers Barbara E. Kerr, David A. Sanchez (right) and Dean E. Vogel (left) present former Senate President Pro Tempore John Burton with CTA's Legislator of the Year Award during the November meeting of the CTA Board of Directors |
CTA also made legislative gains that are boosting benefits for retirees, protecting the health and safety of students and employees, and improving the educational program.
When Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the state budget late this summer, he finalized an agreement with CTA and the Education Coalition that boosted school funding and staved off education cuts that could have exceeded $4 billion. The agreement also protected the integrity of the state's minimum funding guarantee for schools — Proposition 98 — and promised that schools would not be subjected to further cuts during 2004-05 even if the state's financial problem worsened.
To make sure the Legislature would agree to the terms, CTA mobilized its members throughout the state, lobbied lawmakers in their home districts and in their Capitol offices, wrote letters and made phone calls.
"CTA derives its strength from the power of our chapters and our members," notes CTA President Barbara E. Kerr. "Working together, we can accomplish virtually anything. Our successful efforts on the budget and other legislative issues this year are a tribute to that fact."
During the year, CTA won a host of other major victories. At CTA's urging, lawmakers approved a sponsored measure — AB 1852 by Assembly Member Gene Mullin (D-South San Francisco) — that will make more teachers eligible for longevity retirement bonuses.
With the passage of CTA-sponsored SB 102 by then-Senate President Pro Tem John Burton (D-San Francisco), the association also won changes to the state's Golden Handshake early retirement program that will allow retirees to teach in other districts without jeopardizing their pension benefit enhancements.
On the instructional front, CTA won the enactment of a law that will help eliminate unnecessary and redundant testing for second-graders and free more school time for instruction. The legislation brings California in line with federal law that governs testing of these students. As of 2005, schools will no longer administer the state norm-referenced test — the CAT/6 Survey — to students below the third grade. In 2007-08, the state will also phase out the practice of testing second-graders on standards-based tests.
Teacher power helped win legislative approval for a measure that will allow eligible English language learners to take state standards-based tests in their native language, in addition to the California Standards-Based Test (CST).
CTA also worked to ensure that the collective bargaining process and contracts are observed and that teachers and their organizations as key stakeholders can have direct input with school districts identified for program improvement as required in AB 2066, a bill to implement the federal accountability system.
Other teacher-backed legislation closes legal loopholes that allowed some charter schools to sidestep the stringent academic and financial accountability required of other public schools.
With CTA's backing, lawmakers approved and the governor signed legislation that will help protect the health and safety of students and employees. Two measures in particular will allow students with asthma and other respiratory ailments to use their medications — including inhalers — on school campuses. The action was taken in response to cases in which students nearly died because school rules prevented them from bringing their inhalants to school or using them without medical supervision.
Another new law will help protect school employees against identity theft. The measure forbids school districts from putting more than the last four digits of employees' Social Security numbers on their paychecks.
CTA also helped win support for legislation providing safe routes to school for students and employees who walk or ride bicycles.
CTA-backed legislation also commemorated the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, the U.S. Supreme Court decision that paved the way for school desegregation — and celebrated the Day of the Teacher.
Other important CTA victories stem from the defeat of a long list of adverse bills that lawmakers killed or the governor vetoed at the Association's urging. Among them was a bill that would have instituted unnecessary and duplicative credentialing requirements for teachers in a variety of fields, including physical education. Another measure targeted by CTA would have eliminated the requirement that students in in-house suspension classrooms be taught by credentialed teachers.
The next session of the Legislature starts Jan. 3.
