Newsroom
Defies Measurement: An interview with the filmmaker
Q&A with Shannon Puckett, parent and former teacher
Before making the film Defies Measurement, Shannon Puckett taught at Alameda’s Chipman Middle School for five years. The school’s story is central to the film’s depiction of how high-stakes testing is negatively impacting public schools.
CFT urges CalSTRS to divest from gun manufacturers now
New documentary film Gun-Free Retirement features CFT members
In April 2013, a few months after the shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut that killed 20 children and six adult staff members, the board of California State Teachers’ Retirement System voted to divest from firms making weapons that are illegal to own in California. More than two years later, that hasn’t happened, and Joshua Pechthalt, president of the CFT, wants to make sure it does. Soon.
Rank & Files, Apr-May 2015
Mediha Din, a part-time sociology instructor and member of the El Camino College Federation of Teachers, Local 1388, received a Gerald C. Hayward Award for Excellence in Education from the California Community Colleges, which comes with $1250. The award recognizes Din’s creative teaching strategies and outstanding work with at-risk students from diverse academic and cultural backgrounds, service as faculty advisor for the Muslim Student Association, and initiatives to engage students in community service.
Laura Rico: Ben Rust Award recipient inspired two generations
Laura Rico has worked in education for more than 40 years, starting as an early childhood teacher at the Artesia High School Children’s Center in the 1970s where she became a member of the ABC Federation of Teachers.
Retirees! CFT welcomes your participation in the new Council of Retired Members
CFT has formed a new division welcoming retiree participation and action, the Council of Retired Members. It is the first constitutional division the union has added in several decades. The Council elected its first officers at CFT Convention on March 20.
One by one: Organizing team signs up part-time faculty
Why does anyone join the union? …because someone asks them
Member organizers from local unions throughout the state joined forces at Palomar College to meet one-on-one with part-time faculty agency fee payers who had not yet signed their union cards — and asked them to join the union.
Local Wire, Apr-May 2015
ADULT EDUCATION
Funding in limbo… The last few years have been a
terrible time in the adult education world, according to Jack
Carroll, the executive director at the Pajaro Valley Federation
of Teachers. Carroll, who teaches office skills to adults, hopes
AB86 will alleviate that by providing $25 million for adult
education.
Floor debate: Delegates tackle rich array of social justice and education topics
Delegates took on social justice concerns, passing a resolution from the United Educators of San Francisco and the CFT Executive Council to officially support the “Black Lives Matter” movement. Resolution 23 calls for community meetings, teach-ins and curricula, such as what’s already posted on UESF’s website and AFT’s Share My Lesson.
Robert Chacanaca: The workers’ advocate
When he accepted the Raoul Teilhet Educate, Agitate, Organize Award, Robert Chacanaca, known as “Chaca,” asked for a moment of silence to remember Teilhet, the former CFT president who successfully pursued collective bargaining.
CFT supports families of missing Mexican students
Survivor tells horrific tale of persecution and murder
Angel Neri described the unique education given students at the Raul Isidro Burgos School in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero, in his speech at CFT Convention. The school takes students from rural farming communities, trains them as teachers, and then encourages them to return to work in schools in the poorest, most remote communities in Mexico. This has earned the school the enmity of corrupt and violent elements of Mexican society.
Librarian masters digital tools for workplace and union
Carla Arbagey creates infographics to illustrate workload
UC Riverside librarian Carla Arbagey says, “Technology is like air to me.” It is essential in the library, where she integrates systems and tracks information on more than 3.4 million items. She is the winner of the 2014 Technology New Leader Award from the California Library Association, and a self-described “type-A personality” who likes things to be tidy, organized, and efficient.
Jeff Duncan-Andrade: The effect of toxic stress on student lives
Jeff Duncan-Andrade grew up in Oakland, the youngest of seven children. He remembers one day when his mother sat him down, showed him a glass of water, and asked him if it was half full or half empty.