Send a letter to your legislators

Copy and paste the following letter into your word processor or download the Word document.

March 2008

An Open Letter to the California State Senate and Assembly on the Current State Budget Deficit

To The Honorable Don Perata, Senate Pro Tem, California State Senate; The Honorable Fabian Núñez, Speaker, California State Assembly; The Honorable Dave Cogdill, Senate Minority Whip , California State Senate; and The Honorable Michael Villines, Assembly Republican Leader, California State Assembly:

As middle grades educators - teachers, administrators and other professionals who serve young adolescents in grades 5 through 8 in California - we are writing to respectfully request two actions from the California State Senate and California State Assembly:

1. Protect Proposition 98 funds

2. Find other sources of revenue to stem the budget shortfall rather than further cutting essential programs for California 's students

While California does have serious funding issues, sacrificing the education of the young people in our state to reduce expenses is not the answer. Students in grades K-12 did not create this crisis, and they should not have to pay for it by enduring a reduction in the quality of their public school education.

As you may know, even before the pending difficulties arose, the Editorial Projects in Education Research Center 's (EPERC's) 2008 Quality Counts review gave California a grade of D+ for school finance. California invests $1,892 less per pupil than the national average and $5,000+ less per pupil than New York , New Jersey , Vermont , and the District of Columbia . In fact, 46 states and the District of Columbia invest more in their students than California does. (Numbers adjusted by EPERC for regional cost differences.)

California schools operate on a shoestring. As the keepers of the 2008-09 state budget, we ask that you protect the nearly 6.3 million children in your fiscal care who cannot afford private schools by safeguarding Proposition 98 funding and seeking other revenue streams to address the deficit. The future of these children and - as they will become the state's leaders of industry, academia and public service - of California itself depends on your actions.

Sincerely,

California middle grades educators attending the California League of Middle Schools Annual Conference, February 28-March 2, 2008, in Sacramento , California