Call to Action: Our Schools Are on the Chopping Block

Last week, my husband forwarded me an email from his school district’s superintendent warning him and his fellow teachers that if the proposed “all-cuts” California budget passes, they are looking at four to six fewer weeks of school next year. (Yes, I said weeks.)

I nearly laughed at first, it seemed so ludicrous, but this is no joke. It’s come to these dire straits—in my husband’s San Diego County school district, here in Carlsbad, and across the state of California.

Right now, we are looking square in the face of another $2 billion to $4 billion being cut from K-12 school funding and the loss of some 20,000 teaching jobs if we let the current tax rates expire in June. In the past three years, $20 billion has already been slashed from public education funding and 30,000 teachers have been laid off, according to the California Teachers Association.  

California ranks dead last in the nation when it comes to student-teacher ratio, counselor-student ratio and librarian-student ratio; we are an abysmal 47th in per pupil spending, and 41st in school nurse-student ratio. The national education newspaper Education Week grades our state an F when it comes to supporting our schools and students.

All of this—and the looming deadline for getting this tax extension either passed in the legislature or onto the ballot—is why our state’s educators and their supporters have declared this week the “Week of Emergency” for California public education.  So, look out: Across the state, teachers and concerned citizens are going to be fighting back this week. Will you join them?

Sally Estep, Carlsbad Unified Teachers Association president, told me that at least half of Carlsbad’s public school teachers will be heading down to San Diego for a major rally on Friday. A group of Carlsbad parents is also inviting all concerned citizens to join them for an Enough is Enough protest at the offices of and Assemblyman Martin Garrick after school lets out at 2:35 p.m. on Tuesday. The same organizing parents also invite all to gather at the next Carlsbad School Board meeting on May 11 at 6 p.m., when the board will discuss how these potential cuts will affect Carlsbad schools. 

Estep puts it bluntly: “If you weigh continuing to live with the tax with what is going to happen if we let it expire, there is no comparison. Letting it expire will decimate our education system.” 

Carlsbad already has the second-highest class sizes in the county, and these looming budget cuts threaten to increase 1st- through 3rd-grade class sizes to 32 students. Teachers’ jobs are threatened across the board, and everything from arts programs to supplies budgets have been squeezed to the bare bones.

Of course, there is a two (political party)-sided debate and much complexity to this California budget issue, and how and why it is coming down to this level of desperation for our state’s public schools. This Education Week article describes the political sides of the debate better than I ever could. 

Whatever our political leanings, I think most of us can agree that the education of our children is absolutely critical for the future of our world. We cannot expect the generations to come to create a stable economy, peaceful global relations or a sustainable environment if they are not given the opportunity to be educated.

Whatever view you have on the “best” kind of education—public or private schooling, homeschooling, traditional or alternative approaches—and whatever you think about teachers unions, you likely agree that education is important. Our nation and democracy essentially rest on this belief.

I am blessed to be married to an innovative educator (who was selected as the 2009 California Teacher of the Year) and to be the daughter of innovative educators. I have written professionally about education since my internship at the now-defunct Teacher Magazine in 1994. We are a family who believes in the incalculable value of education for everyone.  

And, yet, in all the conversations my family has had, as we watch the California public schools (which my husband and I both attended from elementary through high school) freefall, and as we explore alternative education for our own kids, we simply cannot see how losing quality public education in our state is going to help anyone. Even if the public education system needs to be revamped—which I would argue that it does—we must not sacrifice an entire generation of California’s children in the process of revamping it. Letting this “all-cuts” budget pass, as it is presented to us right now, would sacrifice those 6 million students. 

So, whatever you believe about education, I urge you to get informed about what is happening to California public schools right now. I invite you to get involved in this education crisis and this Week of Emergency in some way (attend a rally, contact your lawmaker, spread the word), to help give all students better options and opportunities, and to give all teachers the tools and support needed to teach well. I ask you to think long and hard about what the future of California will look like if our public schools go down in flames. 

It’s not a bad dream, and it’s not a joke. California’s public education system is hanging in the balance here, now, and it is up to us to decide if we will do anything about it.