Results tagged “teachers” from School Notebook

Today, I received a lengthy email from an anonymous "South Bay Pollyanna" who identifies herself as a local elementary school teacher. (Or "himself"? We'll just say herself since the writer chose a female fictional character as a pseudonym.)

This writer is asking South Bay residents to donate $5 to each of the area's 12 public school districts.

Can you afford to donate $60 in total to this one time cause? If just 10% rose to the call, it would be an impressive $430,000 for EACH district! If every man, woman, and child took action, we would raise over $4.3 million for EACH of these districts.

She describes what she calls "chaos" caused by state budget cuts and beseeches South Bay residents to take action in support of students' education.

I'm not endorsing the writer's views (or anyone else's) or vouching for all the data she cites, of course. Nor am I suggesting that I would in future post anything sent to me by readers. But someone obviously put a lot of effort into this, so here it is.

The letter is posted below.

This is too sweet to go unmentioned, so here you have it:

About a week ago or so -- it could have been two weeks, I lose track of time so easily, sigh -- my colleague Megan Bagdonas wrote a short story about efforts on the Hill to raise enough money to fund salaries for teachers who may be laid off from Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified due to the massive funding cuts all but certainly coming down from the state.

Well a few days ago Megan gets faxed copy of a letter from Silver Spur Elementary first-grader Isabella Parks, who donated and hand-delivered her stash of stockpiled "chore money" to the "Save Our Teachers Now" campaign.

Here's the text , unedited:

"I'm Isabella Parks and I whant to save are teachers. This will be a big oppertonuty for me so here is all the money I have from my chores."

Tres adorable!

Here's the text of the email circulating:

The 4th and 5th grade teachers will be holding a rally
at 6pm tonight, outside the Board of Education
facility on Plaza del Amo. Our teachers want to raise
awareness of the challenges our children will face
with the proposed class size increases, projected to
be ~36:1 in 4th/5th grade next year. Please bring your
family and friends and support the teachers in their
efforts to draw attention to the real impact the
education funding crisis will have on our children.

The meetings are open to the public starting at 7:30
p.m. the evening of the meeting. The board room is
located in the Educational Materials Building at 2336
Plaza del Amo.

Paul Clinton reports that the Palos Verdes Peninsula School District is looking at nearly $4 million in budget cuts through the 2008-09 school year in response to the state funding cuts. That would include some layoffs.

District managers have identified as much as $3.7 million worth of cuts, which would include the elimination of 57 teachers, counselors and other positions.

The district will notify teachers, counselors and other certified personnel of layoffs by March 27. Layoff notices for janitors, secretaries and other classified staff will be mailed by Feb. 28, the district said Thursday.

Read the story.