gpmartinson

This Saturday, May 20 we will be gathering at 11:15 at the Snelling and University Light Rail station to travel to Education Minnesota for the Rally for Public Education!

Where: Meet at Snelling Avenue Station

When: 11:15.  We will travel by light rail to Education Minnesota Headquarters

It’s the last chance to:

• Rally for the schools, our kids deserve with parents, students, community members and hundreds of educators just like you.
• Stand for the students on the margins who need us the most.
• Tell legislators face-to-face to stop playing risky games with our children’s futures and start investing in their success.
• Support Gov, Dayton in his fight for public schools and colleges.

This July Dan Beck, Emily Bergquist and Gregg Martinson will be travelling to Boston to participate in the National Education Association’s annual convention.  We would like to travel to Boston with good news for our national union that our members want to help elect pro-education candidates.

The NEA Fund is our voice in Washington—it speaks on behalf of our 3.2 million members from all 51 affiliates of the National Education Association. As the NEA’s national PAC, the NEA Fund provides direct financial support to recommended candidates for President, the U.S. House, and the U.S. Senate who will fight to support teachers, staff, and students and improve public education.

The NEA Fund also supports pro-public education candidates in gubernatorial and other important state races as well as making independent expenditures asking people to vote for or against candidates based on their position on public education.

Every member who contributes to the NEA Fund does so voluntarily. Every dollar contributed to a candidate, a political party, or independent expenditures is voluntarily given. NEA does not use dues dollars for this purpose. Just as the NEA Fund relies on small contributions from thousands of members, the NEA candidate recommendation process is driven by NEA membership. NEA never recommends or endorses a candidate for federal office without the support of State Association leaders.

You can help by contributing on our fundraising page, here.  Thanks

Education Minnesota’s Educator Policy Innovation Center (EPIC) recently released a policy paper on transforming discipline practices in Minnesota public schools from an exclusionary approach to a restorative approach. April Jackson , teacher at Central Park, was part of the statewide committee examining current discipline practices and recommending structural changes to how school districts implement discipline. An executive summary of the report can be found here.

The Legislative Commission on Pensions and Retirement is considering major changes to TRA contributions and benefits. The Board of Trustees has proposed a package that is balanced and should help keep the fund strong for generations.

Unfortunately, some are using this situation to propose unnecessary benefit cuts and increased active member out-of-pocket contributions. These ideas will exacerbate the teacher shortage and are designed to hurt public education.

Please call your legislators and the pension commission and indicate your support for the TRA proposal. The plan is thoroughly vetted and is the fairest way to ensure that our pension remains strong!

Feel free to contact your legislators through this link.

Education Minnesota invites all members to a one-day symposium on trauma informed, restorative practices for educators. The event will take place on Saturday, May 13 at Education Minnesota headquarters in St. Paul. The symposium was designed by both classroom teachers and TA’s to address school safety concerns and provide new alternatives and intervention strategies to curb the over-reliance on exclusionary punishments. This symposium will start the important conversation on how we can work together to improve school safety, close achievement gaps, end structural racism, and build stronger schools.

Further details and registration information can be found on the attached document . Breakfast, lunch and CEU’s are provided.

EM-R’s leaders are working hard to develop a better educational system in Minnesota. Maria is a leader in the Facing Inequities and Racism in Education (FIRE) recent retreat taking place this last April 7-8 in Saint Paul.

The goal of the two-day retreat was to pilot some community storytelling exercises that helped participants develop a deeper understanding of racial equity work in the context of their own lives. Participants also worked on creating an application for members to indicate their interest in and availability to be trained as a Racial Equity Advocate (REA) in the coming months. We hope to offer the initial set of training sessions for REAs at the 2017 Summer Seminar.

Education Minnesota-Roseville is a union of over 600 teachers in Roseville, MN.  We are represented by a leadership team that includes:

President Dan Beck

Vice-President Emily Bergquist

Treasurer Sandy Cassavant

Secretary Isaac Engel

Membership Chair: Joe Weyer

Member Rights Council:

• Dan Beck(Elementary),
• Gregg Martinson(RAHS and FAHS),
• Emily Bergquist(Student Services)
• Ben Schwanke(RAMS)

Negotiations: Dan Beck, Gregg Martinson, Emily Bergquist and Ben Schwanke