Candidate for
Board Member; Chula Vista Elementary School District; Seat 5

Norberto P. Salazar

Office sought: Candidate for Seat #5 of the Chula Vista Elementary School District, Board of Trustees

Occupation: I am a 25 year veteran elementary (5 years) / junior high (8 years) / high school (12 years) Teacher (and Parent).

DOB: I was born July 21, 1951.

Elective Offices Held: During the June '06 Primary, I ran for and won a seat on the San Diego County Democratic Party Central Committee for the 78th Assembly District.

Community Involvement: Past President, Secretary and now Fundraising Chair for the University of California at San Diego/Chicano Alumni Association.

"The mission of the Chicano Alumni Association has always been to support Chicano and Latino students at UCSD by providing scholarships, encouraging them to achieve academic and social success, and address outreach, recruitment and retention efforts".

College Degrees and Credentials:

Class of '77, BA from the University of California at San Diego, Major in Urban Studies, Minor in Bilingual Education, earned a Multiple Subjects Teaching Credential under the Ryan Act

Class of '78, MA from San Diego State University, Emphasis in Spanish Multi-Cultural Education, earned a Bilingual/ Cross Cultural--Teaching Credential, Emphasis in Spanish

Class of '85, Special Education, earned a Learning Handicapped Teaching Credential from San Diego State University

Class of '95, Administrative Services Preliminary Credential from San Diego State University

Statement of Candidacy:

In our schools, to improve student academic achievement, we need more professionally prepared and experienced teachers, administrators, and staff, with excellent compensation packages of health & welfare benefits and wages.

In our communities, parents and students need more and better tutorial programs; and community/school health and family counseling centers that would provide for them new and appropriate resources to help them with the task of continuing their children's education at home.

Qualifications:

I'm a candidate for school board because I feel that my bilingual (I speak, read, and write fluent Spanish), bicultural (I'm a Mexican-American College-Educated Professional), immigrant (my parents immigrated from Mexico in the 1940's) background, are personal qualities and assets that can help in building consensus in our community in order to answer the question: How are we going to help our community's failing schools?

Three Most Important Issues and Solutions:

Issue 1: Innovation and Test Scores Only 20% to 30% of the students in the 4 elementary schools in Southwest Chula Vista (Silver Wing, Montgomery, Lauderbach and Harborside), are passing their end-of school-year tests in Math and English. Innovation in education calls for investigating and proportioning appropriate ACCOMMODATIONS for our student's learning, continued research that directly applies to classroom practices, and the continued sharing of best practices among classroom teachers.

Issue 2: Reform and School Board Term Limits When school board members are permitted to run for re-election, allowing them permanency on the board for periods of up to 15 to 20 years, this prevents the broader community from participating more freely in the work of improving our schools. We need new motivated and talented citizens to rejuvenate our boards into ACTION, to help solve the urgent problems of the day that would improve all of our student's academic achievement. I support term limits for school board members.

Issue 3: Stable Investment in Our Schools In good economic times, schools benefit; but in bad economic times, programs are cut and salary increases are minimal. An appropriate solution would be to save more money when economic times are good, so that these funds can tide-us-over the bad economic times.

Cell Phone: (619) 370-4219 E-mail: norberto4cvschoolboard06@hotmail.com