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 State Council

The California Teachers Association State Council of Education is the statewide representative body of the Association. State Council has nearly 800 delegates that are elected statewide by members at a ratio of 1 to 350 members. These representatives meet four weekends a year to perform the following functions:

Please contact one of our KHFA State Council Representatives if you have any questions, concerns, or comments that you would like brought forward regarding any of the issues listed above.

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 Council Decides

Next State Council of Education: January 25 - 27, 2008

October 12-14, 2007 (PDF)

CTA's Being Heard on NCLB

CTA President David A. Sanchez praised State Council for its hard work to make the union’s campaign against the current proposal to reauthorize President Bush’s flawed No Child Left Behind Act a definite success.

“Our collective voice is a powerful one,” he said. “Our campaign is working.”

With CTA news conferences, rallies, radio and Internet ads, labor outreach and more than 12,000 calls made by CTA members to Congressman George Miller and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the campaign is making the voices of California’s teachers heard.

“It has certainly gotten Congressman Miller’s attention and he’s not a happy camper,” Sanchez said. “We are leading the charge and speaking out against this destructive proposal and it’s making a difference.”

Sanchez urged teachers to continue to call the special CTA toll-free number to tell Congress to vote no on Miller’s proposal: 1-888-268-4334.

The dangers posed to public education by the current NCLB reauthorization proposal might mean that the 340,000-member CTA makes a presidential recommendation before the California primary in February, Sanchez said. “NCLB is a defining moment in federal education policy. And the next president of the United States must fully understand our concerns with this law and be committed to making it right.”

The flawed federal law and its one-size-fits-all philosophy and overemphasis on testing is denying students a well-rounded education by forcing teachers to teach to the test, he warned. “It’s destroying our profession.”

He urged delegates to keep up the lobbying pressure against Miller’s proposal, which “just makes a bad law even worse.”

The proposal being considered in the House of Representatives now would institute merit pay based on student test scores. Sanchez said it would “weaken our collective bargaining rights, create new sanctions for struggling schools, and make it harder to recruit and retain the thousands of teachers this state is going to need in the coming years.”

Sanchez, the first Latino to be elected as CTA president, also reminded delegates that the power of CTA lies in its chapters, where educators and education support professionals must remain active as we tap into the strength of our diversity to improve public education.

Council OK's initiative Fund Spending

State Council delegates approved spending up to $4 million from the CTA Initiative Fund to support CTA’s positions regarding four statewide initiatives that are either on the February ballot, or in the signature gathering phase.

The ballot measures are Prop. 92, the Community College Initiative; and Prop. 93, the Term Limits Initiative. In signature-gathering is the Richman initiative, which reduces public pension and retirement health care benefits; and the Presidential Electors initiative.

Council had already taken an oppose position on Prop. 92. CTA strongly supports securing additional resources for California community colleges, but Prop. 92 is poorly crafted and fatally flawed.

CTA supports Prop. 93, the term limits measure, which shortens the length of time a legislator could serve in Sacramento to 12 years, but allows the time to be served entirely in one house or the other.

Two other initiatives are in circulation. One would change the way California allocates its electoral votes in the presidential election from winner-takes-all to a misguided system based on who wins each congressional district. The second measure in circulation would gut teachers’ pensions and retiree health care.

“Former state Sen. Keith Richman is collecting signatures for an initiative that would cut pensions for new teachers by up to 60 percent,” said Sanchez. “Do not sign these petitions, and tell your friends not to sign.”

Doggett Outlines CTA Policy Briefs

Stable school funding, teacher-led professional development and more help for our schools of greatest need are among the CTA priorities for improving school financing and promoting teacher quality, according to Executive Director Carolyn Doggett.

Her Sunday morning speech offered delegates a preview of two policy briefs that CTA later presented at an Oct. 19 forum convened by EdSource. The papers on teacher quality and school finance are CTA’s response to the “Getting Down to Facts” package of education studies released earlier this year.

Doggett said those foundation-funded reports were disappointing because they “ignored the resource challenges our schools face and the work all of you have done to improve student learning over the past 10 years since California’s accountability system was established.”

She noted that the average public school in California has 30 percent fewer teachers and 90 percent fewer counselors and librarians than other American schools. The state spends about $1,000 below the National average on education. When measured as a percentage of personal income, California is spending nearly $5 billion less than all other states per year.

The new CTA policy papers strongly recommend protecting Proposition 98, which “should be a floor – not a ceiling,” Doggett said.

Flexibility in funding for local schools is needed, along with assurances that the money goes into the classroom. “Funding must be aligned with current academic content standards and it must be stable and have long-range consistent targets.”

CTA also supports expanding the Quality Education Investment Act so that all Decile 1 and 2 schools can benefit from the extra resources the law brings.

Teachers also need time to collaborate with their colleagues during the school day, and there must be mentors for new teachers, she said.

Doggett reminded delegates that the governor has declared 2008 “The Year of Education Reform.” While it’s unclear what he means by that, the new CTA policy briefs make it clear what educators want and need to keep our students and schools improving.

Community College Funding Bill Promised

Council voted to make community college funding a top legislative priority in the coming year and to find a way to enforce existing law that distributes education funding between California’s K-12 schools and community colleges.

At the request of the Community College Association, CTA will sponsor legislation to firm up the “split” in Proposition 98, the law that sets a minimum annual funding level for California’s public schools and community colleges. Under the split, 89 percent of education funding is to go to K-12 schools while 11 percent is to go to community colleges. Unfortunately, colleges have never received their full 11 percent of the funding.

Council also approved most of the recommendations in a revised report from the CTA Educational Change Workgroup.

Delegates approved four sections of the report: Part 1 - Adequacy and Equity in Funding; Part 3 - Teacher Development; Part 4 - Assistance to Schools; and Part 5 - Assessment and Testing.

Delegates postponed for further discussion at the next Council meeting the recommendations concerning teacher compensation.

In other action, State Council...

For all Council Actions and Committee Reports, print the October 2007 State Council Report Book.

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June 8-10, 2007

CTA bids farewell to President Kerr, welcomes Sanchez

At their final meeting of the school year, delegates to CTA’s State Council of Education joined a procession of dignitaries and special guests in paying tribute to departing President Barbara E. Kerr and witnessed the swearing in of President-elect David A. Sanchez.

Sanchez is the first Latino to serve in the association’s top post. Also moving up is former Secretary-Treasurer Dean E. Vogel, now vice president. And the newest member of the leadership team is Secretary-Treasurer Dan Vaughn. Their terms begin June 26.

Sanchez vowed to continue CTA’s ongoing fight to protect Proposition 98, and to secure for all students, including English Learner students, the resources they need to succeed. Sanchez had 53 family members from as far away as Texas and Indiana join him for the swearing-in ceremony that closed Council’s Sunday agenda.

Council’s Saturday tribute to Kerr was a moving one that included many speakers and stirring videos.

Among those saluting Kerr and extending best wishes to the new CTA team were State Treasurer Bill Lockyer; State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell; former gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides; NEA Vice President Dennis Van Roekel, Secretary-Treasurer Lily Eskelsen, and Executive Committee member Becky Pringle; and representatives of the Education Coalition and other labor unions who fought the good fight with CTA in the 2005 campaign against the governor’s ballot initiatives.

Leaders for hotel workers, correctional peace officers, firefighters, and the school boards association all praised Kerr. Lou Paulson, president of the California Professional Firefighters, presented Kerr with a firefighter’s ax. He explained that it’s a symbol reserved for the big ladder companies “whose job it is to go ahead of the people with the hoses, to open up the doors, to show them the path, to rescue the people, to open holes in the roof so they can get out.”

And that, he said, is what Kerr does.

Among other things, Paulson said Kerr taught him never to forsake your ideas or your reputation, for without them you are nothing. She also taught him to “never let a bully push you around.”

Angelides praised her passion and dedication. He added, “She did something I couldn't’t do. She kicked Arnold Schwarzenegger’s ... all over the state of California.”

About the 2005 campaign, Kerr said in her final speech to State Council that it was historic. “We soundly defeated those who wanted to destroy our public schools, the teaching profession and our rights as union members.”

She said that, in her four years as president, she is proud CTA formed new alliances with unions and other groups, built stronger local chapters, passed billions in state school construction bonds, and co-sponsored the Quality Education Investment Act to provide nearly $3 billion over seven years to our schools of greatest need.

“You are all amazing,” Kerr told delegates. “Despite below-average funding and the testing mania that is driving our curriculum today, you are succeeding and making a difference for our students and for the future of California.”

CTA Keeps Up Pressure On Congress Over ESEA


The CTA’s State Council of Education delegates are continuing to put the heat on Congress to “Erase, Rewrite, Reauthorize!” the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, currently known as No Child Left Behind (NCLB).

In addition to sending individual messages to Congress in a cyber lobbying campaign at the June meeting and videotaping the horror stories they’ve experienced as a result of NCLB, the nearly 800 delegates wrote on every available spot on a massive 8 x 12-foot postcard addressed to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. The intention is to bring our sense of urgency for the need to change this bad law because of her ties to U.S. Rep. George Miller, one of the authors of NCLB.

“We are going to need her leadership and support in this reauthorization effort,” said CTA President Barbara E. Kerr in her address to Council.

Kerr thanked CTA members for the 50,000 postcards they’ve already sent to members of Congress.

Doggett: Our schools, students succeeding

Despite the doom and gloom from critics of public education, the facts show that our schools are making meaningful progress, CTA Executive Director Carolyn Doggett told Council delegates.

She stressed how important this reality is, with the governor declaring next year to be his year of education reform, and with his secretive Committee on Educational Excellence due to issue its recommendations this fall.

CTA is seizing the opportunity to drive educational change in California with its final Educational Change Workgroup report, distributed to Council delegates.

She outlined the hardships our schools face, and how much progress our students are making nonetheless.

First, California is educating two million more students since 1980. That’s a 53 percent increase in student enrollment in 25 years.

“Have we built the capacity to handle that increase?” Doggett asked. “No. California ranks dead last in the ratio of education staff to students.”

At the same time, we spend about $1,000 less per student than the rest of the country. Yet the overall average Academic Performance Index score statewide is currently 720, up 11 points from last year and significantly closer to the state goal of 800.

Doggett offered a few other quick statistics:

  • Statewide student reading scores have increased 20 percent and math scores have gone up 14 percent in the last three years.
  • The number of students taking algebra has increased 44 percent; biology, 49 percent; chemistry, 39 percent; physics, 36 percent; and earth science, 177 percent.
  • California secondary students are taking 40 percent more college-bound courses than three years ago.
  • The number of English learners scoring advanced or early advanced on the CELDT exam has increased 91 percent in the last three years.
  • And there’s even been significant progress in the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) scores.

Council endorses term limits initiative

Council delegates took a support position on the Term Limits and Legislative Reform Act, the initiative on the February 2008 ballot which would shorten the length of time a legislator could serve in Sacramento to 12 years, but allow the time to be served entirely in one house or the other.

Current law limits terms to six years in the Assembly and eight in the Senate.


Council elected two new members to the CTA Board of Directors – Jim Groth from Chula Vista Educators for District P, and Tyrone V. Cabell from the Los Angeles County Education Association for District L.


The Council went on record as opposing the Community College Governance, Funding Stabilization and Student Fee Reduction Act, a ballot initiative that would change the way community colleges are funded under Proposition 98.


Saying they “fully understand the plight of their community college brothers and sisters,” delegates argued that the present initiative is fatally flawed. It would prohibit changes except when four-fifths of the vote can be mustered, a threshold that’s virtually impossible to meet.


Recognizing the need for prompt attention to the problem, Council directed the CTA Board to look into ways to enforce the current Proposition 98 split of 89 percent for pre-K-12 and 11 percent for community colleges.


In other actions, Council also:

  • Urged the CTA Board of Directors to go all out to defeat the governor’s effort to provide “back-door funding” for testing of second-graders.
  • Wrote postcards to the governor asking him to support real health care reform that includes cost containment measures and guarantees affordable health care for all.
  • Adopted a new version of CTA’s statewide bargaining goals that now cover education support professional staff as well as certificated staff.
  • Elected Claire Merced, a member of United Educators of San Francisco, to the NEA Board of Directors. Greg Bonaccorsi from Fremont Unified District Teachers Association was re-elected as an alternate to the NEA Board.
  • Elected new members of CTA’s political action committee, CTA/ABC: Constance Gearhart, a member of the San Diego Education Association, for the District P seat, and Karl Stuck, president of the Lake Elsinore Teachers Association, for the at-large seat.

For all Council Actions and Committee Reports, print the June, 2007 State Council Report Book.

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March 30 -April 2, 2007

CTA launches major national campaign to change ESEA

Beginning with the March State Council, CTA launched a full-front campaign to “Erase, Rewrite and Reauthorize” the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, (ESEA), that was first implemented in 1965. Named No Child Left Behind (NCLB) by President Bush in 2001, CTA wants to erase the punitive and onerous provisions of the act and rewrite it so it once again helps students and schools.

“It’s time to erase the one-size-fits all doctrine of NCLB that is destroying the joy of teaching and learning in our classrooms and is punishing schools based on a snap-shot of test scores taken on one single day,” CTA President Barbara E. Kerr said Saturday morning.“It’s time to rewrite this law so that it recognizes the individual needs of our students and schools,” Kerr said. She called for Congress to restore the federal class-size reduction program and spend money to attract and retain teachers in hard-to-staff schools, as well as providing quality training for all educators, including education support professionals.

Playing right into CTA’s campaign to reform the ESEA were a series of Stanford University studies released earlier in the month that determined California needs an increase in funding of at least 40 percent in education funding — or an additional $17 to $24 billion. The studies show that Texas spends 12 percent more than California. Florida spends 18 percent more. And New York spends 75 percent more on its students and public schools than California does, Kerr noted.

“Politicians like to talk about the poor quality of our public schools and holding students, teachers and schools accountable,” Kerr said. “Well, there are two sides to that coin. It’s time they be held accountable for providing our schools the resources they need, so we can do our jobs and help all students succeed.”

Daniel Vaughn elected CTA Secretary-Treasurer

Daniel “Dan” Vaughn, a language arts teacher at West Middle School in Downey Unified School District and CTA board member, was voted secretary-treasurer-elect on Sunday.

Vaughn, who represents CTA members in southeastern Los Angeles County, will join CTA President-elect David Sanchez and Vice President-elect Dean Vogel when they begin their two-year term June 26.

Vaughn is past president of the Downey Education Association and holds a bachelor’s degree in liberal studies and a master’s in school administration from Pepperdine University in Malibu.

“We have several challenges facing public education,” said Vaughn. “I am committed to ensuring our public schools have the resources and support they need to provide all students with the best education possible.”

Other representatives elected at this meeting were: Jim Rogers, CTA/NEA Coordinating Director; Elizabeth Ahlgren, NEA Director, Dist. 10; George Sheridan, NEA Alternate Director, Seat 3. CTA’s Board of Directors incumbents re-elected include Mikki Cichocki (Dist. O) and Dian Hasson, (J-HE). Joining them will be Eric Heins (Dist. C) and Dana Dillon (Dist. D). Greg Bonaccorsi was re-elected NEA Alternate Director, Seat 1.

Re-elected to the CTA/ABC Committee were Terri Jackson (Dist. C) Ron Edwards (Dist. D), Chaumonde Porterfield-Pyatt (Dist. J-HE), Margie Garrett (Dist. L), and Andy Megaw (Dist. K).

Elections will be held in June for CTA/ABC Committee seats Dist. P and at Large; and CTA Board Director seats Dist. P and Dist. L.

Doggett: CTA can bring important change

The California Teachers Association has a chance to make some significant changes in school reform and raising student achievement in the coming months and years, CTA Executive Director Carolyn Doggett told Council Sunday morning.

Paraphrasing a statement by labor leader Cesar Chavez on the just cause of farm workers, Doggett said, “There isn’t a more just cause than working to fulfill our mission to improve the conditions of teaching and learning and to advance the cause of free, universal, and quality public education, as well as a more just, equitable, and democratic society.”

CTA, she said, is moving its education agenda to center stage with the Quality Education Investment Act (SB 1133) which provides nearly $3 billion over seven years to help schools of greatest need.

The work of the Educational Change Workgroup will also provide the direction CTA needs to improve the conditions of teaching and learning for all students. “That agenda gives us a blueprint for providing adequate and equitable school funding, providing fair salaries to all educators, providing assistance to our schools of greatest need, providing quality training and mentoring to beginning teachers and providing some common sense to the state testing system,” she said.

While Gov. Schwarzenegger has taken credit for rediscovering the importance of Career Technical Education, (CTE) in his budget address, it was actually CTA who began strategizing about the future of technical and vocational education, Doggett said. CTA believes that all students should have access to CTE programs and that the state must increase the pool of needed teachers.

“When you hear Gov. Schwarzenegger tout the $32 million increase for CTE funding in this year's state budget, just say ‘thank you CTA,’ ” Doggett said.

CTA to co-sponsor single-payer health bill

With healthcare reaching a continuing and deepening crisis, CTA’s State Council committed itself to co-sponsoring SB 840, a single-payer healthcare bill authored by state Sen. Sheila Kuehl.

A similar bill that would provide healthcare coverage for all Californians was approved by the state Legislature last year, but was vetoed by Gov. Schwarzenegger. With healthcare at the top of the state and federal agenda, CTA is hopeful that Kuehl’s bill will find renewed support among the legislature and voters. Unlike other proposals that have been introduced, a single payer system establishes a health insurance plan that covers all residents, and replaces all other health insurance plans, public and private. The plan is financed by state health taxes and federal money that now goes to health care, such as Medicare, MediCal and Champus.

Earlier Sunday morning, Council heard from Robert K. Ross, M.D., the president and CEO of The California Endowment, which is funding CTA’s “Teachers for Healthy Kids” project as well as a new asthma awareness project. Noting that 800,000 children in California have no healthcare, Ross reminded teachers that it doesn’t matter what kind of education reforms are passed, “you can’t teach an empty desk.”

In other action, Council:

  • Heard three of California’s “Teachers of the Year, Dawna Countryman, Charles Reynes, and Alan Sitomer, and California Education Support Professional of the Year Joline Tripp.

  • Took positions on hundreds of legislative bills.

  • Voted unanimously to commit “the full resources” of CTA to support Hayward educators as well as the California Faculty Association on CSU campuses if they strike over a struggle for fair salaries.

  • Approved the expenditure of up to $500,000 from the CTA Initiative fund to support CTA’s efforts to advocate for health care reform and pass term limits reform.

  • Adopted major changes in procedures for the Presidential recommendation process for the February primary.

  • Observed Cesar Chavez Day by collecting children’s books on labor topics for hotel workers and canned food for a local food bank.

For all Council Actions and Committee Reports, print the March-April 2007 State Council Report Book.

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