East Side Teachers Association/CTA/NEA 888 So. Capitol Ave San Jose, Ca 95127 December 12, 2003

Don McKell, President Julie Pratico, Vice Pres Carla Holtzclaw, Secretary Ralph Giannini, Treasurer

The deadline for filing as a candidate for all statewide Assembly and Senate contests has passed. Primaries for all contested seats will be held on March 2, 2004. Winners of the primaries will square off in the general election set for next November 2.

A very large portion of San Jose and the ESHUSD falls within AD23, currently represented by Manny Diaz. Diaz has decided to seek election to the State Senate from District 13 to replace the termed-out John Vasconcellos. Last spring, the ESTA Assembly enthusiastically endorsed outgoing Superintendent Joe Coto in his bid for election to the State Assembly from AD23. Coto is running as a Democrat.

Now that the filing deadline has closed, we know exactly who the candidates are. Democratic voters from AD23 will have a choice between Joe Coto and three other hopefuls: Kathy Chavez Napoli, Patricia Martinez-Roach, and Khanh Tran.

None of these four individuals has held an elected state office. Coto currently has a website up and running; the other candidates do not. On Google, Kathy Napoli is shown as the owner of Santa Clara Truck Wreckers and as having some presence in a few women’s issues forums. Patricia Roach is currently a teacher in the Franklin-McKinley School District, and a member of the East Side school board. She has been an unsuccessful mayoral candidate in San Jose as well as having sought other electoral offices. Khanh Tran is a former East Side district employee who ran unsuccessfully for election to our school board in 2002, placing a distant fifth out of five.

If elected, Joe Coto would be the first former school superintendent to serve in the California Assembly. We believe that he would be a strong advocate for legislation and budgetary decisions that would further the interests of public schools more than his rivals.

ESTA members who live within AD23 and who wish to display lawn signs in support of Joe Coto, or to volunteer to assist his candidacy in other ways, should contact me.

ESTA members are reminded of the deadlines for application to either of the two the CTA Scholarships or the ESTA Scholarship, all of which were announced in October.

CTA’s offerings are either for CTA members or the children of CTA members who are seeking college degrees. Application deadline is February 15, 2004.

ESTA’s scholarship is established for either children or grandchildren of active members who will be pursuing a college degree in 2004. The application deadline is March 5, 2004.

Application forms for any of these scholarships are available from Dorothy or Ly at the Mt. Hamilton CTA office.

State law requires that school employees undergo a test for tuberculosis no less frequently than every four years. TB is one of a number of serious infectious diseases, yet it is the only disease for which a regular test for school employees is required by state law. Recent studies have shown incidents of TB on the upswing, and cases of antibiotic-resistant strains are becoming more common as abuse of antibiotics rises. As a courtesy, our district customarily tries to notify employees of their need to take periodic skin tests as required by law. Having a positive skin test is not conclusive proof that one has the disease, but may necessitate the need for a follow-up chest x-ray.

If you get a notice from HR that your TB renewal date is approaching, don’t ignore it. By law, you can be barred from your worksite if your test records are not current. Costs of a TB skin test are covered under all three of the available health plans, minus any copay. Further details about other arrangements can be found on the reverse side of the district form used to notify employees of their need for a TB test, or from me.

¨ Twenty million human beings have died from AIDS.

¨ Between 1938 and the end of World War II, more people were killed by samurai swords than by atomic weapons.

¨ Only three states (Rhode Island, California, and Arkansas) require more than a majority vote by their legislatures to pass a state budget.

¨ ‘Facetious’ is the only common English word that contains all five vowels once, in alphabetic order.

¨ The attorney who defended the British officers and soldiers (two different trials) accused of murder in the infamous Boston Massacre was John Adams, who later became our second President.

¨ The last case of ‘wild’ smallpox in a human being occurred in 1975. Except for repositories in various national weapons laboratories and the NIH, the virus has effectively been eradicated from the planet after killing an estimated one billion people.

¨ The world’s first recorded automobile collision fatality occurred on September 13, 1899.

¨ The farmer who grows the wheat used in a $4.35 box of Wheaties receives about 4¢ for his grain.

¨ In Santa Clara County, there are about 348,000 students in 32 school districts with 350 public schools staffed by 13,500 teachers, 2,100 of whom do not have clear credentials.

About midway through the 1999/2000 school year, our school board entered into a ten-year contract with Pepsi Cola, making that firm the exclusive provider of all vended nondairy beverages at every district site. In return for granting exclusive access to students, staff and spectators, both the district and Pepsi receive certain benefits. Pepsi agrees to install and operate all beverage dispensing equipment and to supply product for sale in student food lines, athletic contests, booster club activities and special events.

Health considerations aside, the district benefits from the arrangement in several ways. One benefit is a reduced need for coaches, teachers, custodians (and others) from having to be involved in stocking, maintaining and accounting for the proceeds of hundreds of beverage machines as means of supplementing program costs. Another benefit is a flow of significant funding back to the district from Pepsi in the form of fixed annual donations and a portion of the gross revenues from beverage sales. The table below summarizes revenue provided to the district from the contract. (Data provided in a report to the school board by Lorraine Guerin on Dec 4)

Proceeds from Pepsi are largely channeled into various student athletics programs, buying equipment, trophies, and transportation and paying for officials. Other uses are scholarships, travel and gear for music and performing arts programs and ASB supplies.

Four ESTA members have now been notified of their having achieved National Board Certification in 2003. They are Eleanor Aguirre (WO), Jennifer Bishop (I), Graciela Perez Vokt (SC), and Michael Winsatt (AH). This is a huge personal and professional accolade achieved by only 689 California teachers in 2003. It represents a typical investment of two year’s time and not a little money on the part of each candidate. According to the NBC website, www.nbpts.org:

So why would a California teacher spend the time (two years is not uncommon) and money to become National Board Certified? Apart from the personal challenge and the desire to improve, the State of California at one time offered a financial incentive of $10K for achieving NBC, plus another $5K for each of as many as four years if the candidate agreed to work in a so-called underperforming school. Incredibly now, only after successfully accomplishing Certification, this year’s NBC awardees have been notified by the state that their stipends will not be paid, presumably as a consequence of California’s financial condition.

This seems patently unfair to me, and possibly an illegal breech of contract. Through our local CTA Executive Director Bruce Berg, I have asked CTA’s Legal Department to look into this situation to see if our four members, along with their 685 equally stiffed colleagues up and down the sate, have some legal redress to this lousy turn of events.

A "grievance" is a written allegation by either a member or the Association that the district or one of its administrators has violated, misinterpreted, or misapplied a provision in the contract. (Thus, ESTA members cannot files grievances against one another.) The procedure for filing and processing grievances is found in Article 13 of the contract. Many school sites have elected a local Grievance Representative to assist ESTA members who seek help in examining possible grievance issues. At sites with no local Grievance Rep, the ESTA Site President is the typical source of assistance. ESTA also maintains a Grievance Committee chaired by Larry Scharsch (IHS) who coordinates training of local personnel and stands ready to help in issues that cannot be solved at the local level. Of course, an ESTA member may select any other willing ESTA member to assist as an advisor or representative in a potential grievance situation.