California School Budget Cuts Affect Homeowners!

Save Our Schools Daily Journal Pic

I attended an insightful meeting the other night of PTA/PTO Presidents in San Bruno. I learned that ALL of the public schools in California are expecting a lot of teacher and counselor layoffs next week. San Bruno’s only middle school, Parkside Intermediate will possibly have the most layoffs cutting out music (they have an awesome marching band), art, leadership, counseling, and more. Our elementary schools will have no art, music, PE, large classroom sizes of 30+ kids per class, no English tutoring, GATE programs, loss of funds to improve libraries and to supply instructional material like BOOKS and one school, I hear, will loose up to 7 teachers, leaving them with 4!!

On March 4th, 2010, our PTA/PTO’s organized a peaceful rally along El Camino Real and at San Bruno’s City Hall. All of our public schools participated by holding signs that said “Save Our Schools!” Our guest speakers included students from Rollingwood Elementary School, Assemblyman Jerry Hill, and our Mayor Jim Ruane.

Even if one doesn’t have children or children in school, communities are affected! The governor’s proposed budget cuts to education changes the whole dynamics of a school and the city it’s in. I even heard that in this challenging economy, there are some people who can’t afford to keep their kids in private schools and are depending on public schools to be there! If schools struggle our property values will go down because some won’t want to live near a school in trouble! Crime will go up and residents will get nervous! It could potentially be a BIG change in our lives and not for the better, either.

We are so proud of our public schools! Parents, teachers, and friends spend a lot of time and energy working together to keep our children’s schools a safe and fun learning environment for this to happen! We want our children and our cities to thrive, not be suppresed.

A date to remember are Wednesday, March 17, 7:00 Crestmoor Elementary School – A follow up budget meeting where decisions will be made to determine the future of our schools. 

Feel free to pass on this link to other people you know who might find this news interesting.  The website below is the California Teacher’s Association website that talks a lot about what’s going on with the budget cuts.

http://www.cta.org/Issues-and-Action/Budget-Crisis/Index.aspx