Accomplishments

The work that I have done around core issues makes me the candidate best positioned to be a strong, knowledgeable advocate for a fair and supportive learning and work environment.

Reimagining The CEA

Social Justice Unionism has been a core priority of mine throughout my time as CEA President. Most recently, we Reimagined the CEA to be more inclusive, to be more intentional about diversifying our leadership and to align our leadership structure with our mission statement. This process involved months of planning, a weekend retreat, and then months of follow up to actually implement this vision. Much of the structure is in place and now we have to make it happen.

A key focus of my first term was the creation of the Educators of Color Coalition, Supporting the application and implementation of the Nellie Mae Building Equity Bridges Grant, and revising our CEA Bylaws to include social justice as a third pillar of our mission. One of my first actions was to initiate the Educators of Color Coalition which has worked tirelessly for nearly three years to support educators of color. Through social events, facilitated discussions, surveys and presentations we have gotten on the district's radar and are building power. The most recent focus is the creation and supporting of the Employee Resource Groups, which are currently race-based affinity groups.

The CEA supported (wrote most of) the grant to the Nellie Mae Foundation with which we are currently uncovering root causes of systemic inequities in Cambridge. We have been working for just over a year now, and have built a tremendous network of educators, scholars and caregivers. We plan on building on that success to advocate and support systemic change to address what we have uncovered.

Educator Empowerment

During the pandemic, it became that much more clear that many central administrators do not understand the value of shared decision making and labor management collaboration. This ultimately led to the vote of no confidence in the Superintendent and School Committee. Out of this came strong educator led initiatives, particularly in the Superintendent's Advisory Committee and the OSS Advisory Committee.

Pushback on District Policies

I have made progress in a few areas where the district has not done what is the best interests of our educators. We clarified and streamlined the sick leave bank processes and included childbirth as a reason to access the sick leave bank. We have made progress with regards to how the district implements their discipline processes after numerous conversations and grievances, we won an arbitration because the district hired some elementary interventionists as Extended Term Substitutes instead of as teachers to reduce costs and minimize their commitment to these important educators.

Membership Database Improvements

We have and continue to modernize our membership database. This allows us to keep much better track of our more than 1500 members with information, including contact information in one place - we no longer have to correct changes in multiple locations. We now have automated systems to check out lists against the lists from the district and MTA which means that we can more systematically know when someone is hired and becomes an eligible members, and to make sure we are collecting and paying dues properly. We also have structures in place to support the charting of buildings so that we can support engagement of all members.