Year: 2023

EM-R would like to send a huge thanks to everyone who volunteered, spread the word or voted to help elect all three of EM-R’s endorsed school board candidates.  A special shout-out to Heather Rietz (ECSE) and Brooks Hidaka (RAHS) for the many hours they spent coordinating our phone banks and lining up callers.  It was clear from the thousands of calls made and conversations had that the residents of Roseville put a huge value on teacher input when it comes to supporting education-friendly candidates!  

Click here for a full rundown of the election results.  

Every Saturday till election day the three candidates that Education Minnesota-roseville has endorsed will be organizing events to campaign for Todd Anderson, Todd Bogusczewski and Rose Chu. We are going to need all the support we can get to continue targeted door-knocking and lit-dropping across the Roseville area to ensure folks come out to vote!

Sat Oct 14, 10 to noon, Makwa Coffee, 2805 Hamline Ave N, Roseville

Sat Oct 21, 10 to noon, Caribou Coffee, 3354 Rice St, Little Canada

Sat Oct 28, 10 to noon, TBD

Sat Nov 4, 10 to noon, TBD

What is a TRA pension?

TRA is a defined-benefit pension plan, which differs from a 403(b) or 401(k) because you receive a predictable retirement benefit for your lifetime, not an account balance that you might outlive. With TRA:

• Savings are automatic. During your teaching years, a percentage is deducted from every paycheck for your retirement.  This is a mandatory deduction based on state statute and there is both an employee and employer contribution for each paycheck. 
• It’s easy. Contributions from you and your employer are pooled with all state public pension fund assets. The State Board of Investment manages these assets so you don’t have to.
• Contributions are pretax. This reduces your taxable income.
• Job change? No worries. If you stay employed in city, county or state government in Minnesota, you can keep your contributions at TRA and continue to accrue public sector service credit toward your eventual pension under a Combined Service Annuity.

Contribution Rates

Vesting

You are “vested” in the TRA plan after three years of service. Once you’re vested, you have earned enough service credit to be eligible for TRA benefits.

The TRA website contains a wealth of additional information but a good starting point would be one of the following links:

*PENSION BASICS*TRA FOR EARLY CAREER EDUCATORS

*TRA FOR MID-CAREER EDUCATORS

*TRA FOR EDUCATORS NEARING RETIREMENT

The following four-minute video is also a great resource for understanding how your pension works:

EM-R Pension Specialist Todd Richter will be sending out pension updates throughout the school year.  Please contact Todd via email at Todd.Richter@isd623 with any pension-related questions.  

Please see below for upcoming grant opportunities available through Education Minnesota and the National Education Association. 

Classroom Focused Grants – up to $3,000 for project design and implementation 

PD Grants for Teachers – Up to $1500 for teachers to either facilitate or attend innovative PD sessions. 

IMPACT Grant – up to $15,000 for projects that team up with a local non-profit

NEA Foundation Grants – a variety of grants awarded through the NEA Foundation including Envision Equity Grants,  Learning & Leadership Grants, Student Success Grants and a Global Learning Fellowship grant.

The AFT Teachers Leaders Program run by RAHS Science Teacher Jodi Kyllonenrecently presented the findings on their action research. There was some amazing work done by these skilled professional leaders.

Borré, Agustina “Rethinking Sheltered Content Instruction” Presentation | Slides | Paper

Hidaka, Brooks “Education Support Staff Shortages” Presentation | Slides | Paper

Jaspers, Mark “Exploring Implications of Educator Emotional and Mental Health” Presentation | Slides | Paper

Mondanelli,  Duccio “Digital Literacy and 21st Century Skills Development in Roseville Area High School” Presentation | Slides | Paper

Morgan, Jessica “Teacher, Teacher, Where are you? A Look at the Teacher Retention Problem” Presentation | Slides | Paper

Moriarty, Lis “Workload Considerations in Early Childhood Special Education” Presentation | Slides | Paper

Rietz, Heather “The Benefits of Implementing the Pyramid Behavior Model with Fidelity” Presentation | Slides | Paper

Scierka, Stephanie “The Importance of Purposeful Academic Calendars” Presentation Video and slides | Paper

Much of this will be useful for district leadership as well as our union and our Student Support family!

This weekend Silvia Vasquez, Myriam Castro-Franco, Dan Beck, Maria Le(with a new representative), Myriam Castro-Franco and Greg Martinson attended the Education Minnesota Rep Convention. We walked away a lot more informed on a variety of issues including pension reform and the historic new monies coming to school districts including ours.

EM-R would like to send out a huge congratulations to Bee Lee, art teacher at EDW, for being named one of 11 finalists for the 2023 MN Teacher of the Year!!  

The selection panel meets again May 6 to conduct individual interviews with each of the 11 finalists and to cast votes for the 2023 Minnesota Teacher of the Year. For a look at how the selection process works, go to https://educationminnesota.org/news/awards-and-honors/teacher-of-the-year/ . 

All Teacher of the Year candidates and their supporters are invited to the 59^th annual Minnesota Teacher of the Year recognition banquet on Sunday, May 7, at Saint Paul RiverCentre. At that time, all of this year’s Teacher of the Year candidates will be honored, semifinalists and finalists will receive special recognition, and the 2023 Minnesota Teacher of the Year will be announced.

You can order tickets here: https://www.cvent.com/c/express/18e45944-51e9-4ada-81e1-3c29208f477a.

EM-R is so proud to count Bee as one of our own and we wish her all the best as she moves into the final phase of the process!!