Poetic SOS E-mail to All California School Districts

Here's a copy of the E-mail that started it all:

Dear Superintendents, Principals, Webmasters, School Board Members, Teachers, School Librarians, other School District members, parents, and friends:

I am contacting you because I'm looking for assistance in forwarding this e-mail to parents in your School Districts. I know each of you knows more about this subject than I. However, I am hoping that a note from an ordinary parent in Concord might inspire parents who haven't yet written, despite your district's & the PTA's best efforts to encourage them to do so. I have repeatedly heard that elected officials need to hear from parents about how they feel about the cuts to school funding ... so, I'm asking for your help in getting the word out to the parents of California so that they will write paper letters to the Governor and tell him that we want him to fully fund education. Please let your elected officials know how the funding crisis is impacting you and your children from a personal standpoint.

Before I go on, I want to say that I'm receiving a tremendous response from individuals throughout California. All responses have been positive & each response makes me more determined to try & help get the word out. I'm hearing from Superintendents, School Board Presidents, Union Presidents, Teachers, parents, PTA members, & many others.

Each tells a tale about another district in our state that is facing problems due to the School Funding Crisis. Some districts facing difficulties or trying to cut large (e.g. millions) sums of money from their budgets (or cut programs), include Mt. Diablo Unified School District, Acalanes School District, Alameda Unified School District, Larkspur Unified School District, & South San Francisco Unified School District. Many others have mentioned they are working on major advocacy campaigns due to their districts' funding crises.

So, I know (and I know you already know) that this budget crisis is definitely statewide, AND I really want your help in getting the word out to parents so that they know it's NOT just unique to their own local district. Hopefully, it will motivate them to start writing their elected officials. It has certainly motivated me! I added Larkspur to the list of districts in trouble after seeing information on their website a few days ago. It's another "BIG RED FLAG" to me because it further shows how widespread the problem is.

I'm calling my massive statewide e-mail campaign "POETIC S.O.S." (Power Of E-mail To Inspire Californians - Save Our Schools.) The action items for parents are:

Forward this E-mail to Everyone,

Write and mail paper letters or send postcards to your elected officials (Please ... think of me sitting here sending ump-t-ump thousand e-mails manually through California and harder still, first finding the e-mail addresses to send them to. Please take the time to write at least one letter to your officials. Thanks!!!)

Send me comments about how the school budget crisis is impacting you so that I can try to get something into the media about how this is impacting your kids, your schools, etc. throughout the state. I'll also send a follow up letter to our elected officials. I promise to keep comments anonymous! School Districts, teachers, Board members, etc. please send me comments about this too!!!

For California School Funding - Your Help is Needed


Thanks, Sherry Williams

PS. With YUBA County, I completed my 1st goal. It's February 22nd and I have now sent this note to every county that I could possibly reach and every school district in each county within the State of California!!! Please keep passing it on for me, Yuba County!

FYI - I obtained your E-mail addresses by searching through websites for school districts on the Internet. I finished sending this note to about 400 districts throughout the state of California on Tuesday February 15th using a list of California School Districts with web servers as my starting point. Since my efforts were well received, I went back and used the Ed-Data website to look up districts by County Offices Of Education to attempt to pass this note on to all 1,000 school districts in California.

I've seen a lot of excellent information on the web about the budget crisis & it's impact on schools. I liked the website for Castro Valley Unified School District, a
website from Alameda School Board President Mike McMahon, a webpage on the site for the Association for California School Administrators (ASCA) , & the California PTA Advocacy website. These have wonderful information that I think parents would be interested in. To see these & and many more informative websites,click here: www.poeticsoskeyresources.blogspot.com.

The one common message I have seen on school websites throughout California is that the funding crisis is impacting California school districts everywhere.

Thanks for any help that you may be able to provide.

PS. Let me know if you are passing this note on. Suggestions & feedback are welcomed. If this note could just be passed on as widely & as quickly as "joke" e-mails make the rounds on the Internet, we could really help to inform parents throughout California about the School Funding Crisis.

Here's what I've been sending out via the Internet followed by a copy of my letter to Governor Schwarzenegger (to see the letter, click on www.poeticsosgovernorletter.blogspot.com ). I do think that this approach is helping to motivate other parents. At the bottom of my origninal note, I included some quotes that I have received back in response to the e-mail copies of my letter. My hope is to use the "power of E-mail" in a positive way to help with the school funding crisis. To see these quotes, click on www.poeticsosresponses.blogspot.com Again, my thanks...

Note To Parents:
Please pass this on to everyone you can think of. Please write paper letters or postcards to your elected officials and let them know how you feel about the cuts to school funding!!! Also, pls e-mail this note to all of your friends. If we all work together, we can make a difference! By the way, I am a REAL person in Concord. I'm NOT an Urban Legend.

My daughter is a 5th grader in a Concord public school and my son is an 8th grader in a Pleasant Hill public school. I only started really getting involved in trying to help with the school funding crisis a few weeks ago when I realized how dire things are in the Mount Diablo Unified School District (MDUSD). However, since then, our tiny group of motivated parents from Monte Gardens Elementary has actually been able to land a bit of media coverage (Channel 4, Channel 7, KGO, LA Times, Contra Costa Times). This has gotten us more excited about and motivated about trying to help with the school funding crisis. So far, I've sent copies of my letter below to the Governor, Senator Boxer, Senator Feinstein, Senator Torlakson, Assemblyman Canciamilla, Rep. Tauscher, President Bush (with an added note about the recent Federal cuts to Education Funding), Superintendent McHenry, the MDUSD School Board, the Contra Costa Times, and to as many parents as I can possibly think of. (For your convenience, I'm including the mailing addresses for each of these officials at the bottom of my e-mail.) I'm also starting to pass it on to contacts in other school districts since even though my letter is specific to Mt. Diablo Unified School District's funding crisis, funding is impacting districts throughout the state of California and I'm hoping my letter might inspire a few people to write letters of their own.

Thanks for any help that you may be able to provide in forwarding my note.

Sincerely,

Sherry Williams, One Mom from Concord

E-mail: PoeticSOS@aol.com

Note To Elected Officials - In 1 month, a Mom worried about her childrens' and all other childrens' education in California can look up over 2,000 E-mail addresses for individuals in all school districts in the state of California; send more than 2,000 E-mails; learn about "categorical funding", "No Child Left Behind", "Proposition 98", "The Legislative Analyst Office's Website"; attend School Board Meetings; help with homework; care for her family; write letters to officials; network with individuals involved in education throughout the state of California; drive kids to schools far from home; attend Girl Scout and Boy Scout functions; and, with no prior web experience, set up a website. I hope you are beginning to hear how important education is to the parents and children of California!!! Many Moms and Dads had already been working on education funding issues long before me... but, now there are more of us and we all want education to be fully funded in California.

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