From Downtown Magnets High School

In gratitude for the union so vigorously defending me at West Vernon, thereby saving my job and my public school teaching career, I ran for the UTLA Chapter Chair position at DMHS when it was left open by a retirement. I won, and gladly took on the role of defending teachers against violations of their contractual rights.

I also became a member of the newly constituted UTLA Library Professionals Committee. From those meetings I became one of the 3 original members of the Article 30 Committee designated to negotiate with LAUSD on librarians’ issues.

Also from the LPC I became the only librarian on the ISD interdisciplinary design team tasked with building the multi-million dollar library catalog system funded by a public bond measure. I was able to utilize the experience of being a user rep on the design team at Avnet for the big mainframe distribution system.

As chapter chair I was co-chair with the Principal of a committee established by the collective bargaining agreement between UTLA and LAUSD to manage certain programs and funds at each school site.

I also joined the School Site Council which by state law administered federal funds given to the school, serving for one year as the chairman. During that year I was doing all of the above simultaneously, along with wearing the many hats involved in running my library.

#6.5 of SA6. Teaching