In solidarity with teachers sitting-in in Sacramento, lobbying
legislators throughout the state and tabling on college campuses,
Winograd will call voters to support tax extensions to keep teachers on
the job.
"Did you know California faces a state of emergency? I'm Marcy
Winograd, teacher and congressional candidate, asking you to help me
save our schools," will be the message voters hear when they receive a
series of calls from the Winograd for Congress campaign.
Statewide, 20,000 state teachers and health and human service
professionals just received pink slips. In the Los Angeles Unified
School District, 5,000 teachers face lay-offs.
Winograd teaches English at Crenshaw High School in South Los Angeles,
where 19 teachers received pink slips. "That's half of our English
department," said Winograd. "What a travesty that in one of the richest
nations in the world, we are starving our schools - getting rid of
teachers, increasing class size, and closing summer school. Why is it
that our nation always has money for war, but never for education?
Investing in our youth is investing in national security."
To support the week-long emergency actions, Winograd will join teachers
on the picket line in Los Angeles, phone bank to voters in the 36th
District, speak to classes at El Camino College in Torrance, and conduct
radio interviews about the budget crisis in our schools. The actions are
designed to pressure Republican lawmakers to pass tax extensions to help
balance the budget.
"It is wrong to balance the budget on the backs of my students," said
Winograd. "Our young people deserve a quality public education. For
some, it's literally a matter of life and death because we know that
students who drop out of school too often drop into a life of crime -
and eventually to prison. In Congress, I will make funding education a
national priority, so we can fully staff our schools and provide our
students with an exciting and relevant curriculum."
