Databus Issue: 2004 4 10/01/2004
President’s Message
Oswaldo A. Galarza CETPA PresidentStatewide Initiatives
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The K-12 education community is impacted regularly by statewide initiatives. Increasingly, these initiatives herald changes that rely on technology departments for successful implementation. Many of the reports that school districts and county offices are required to complete are a direct result of one or more past statewide initiatives. Most statewide initiatives offer tangible benefits to students, schools, school districts, parents, community members, and many others.
One such initiative is the California School Information Services (CSIS). One of the main goals of CSIS is “to enable the accurate and timely exchange of student transcripts between districts and post-secondary institutions and to assist school districts to transmit state reports electronically to the California Department of Education, thereby reducing reporting burden on district staff.” Another data-intensive initiative that is now part of the California Ed Code is CALPADS.
Every district and every technologist has been affected by one statewide initiative or another. Some initiatives entail complex data requirements. It is not uncommon for K-12 technologists to participate directly in the formation of data requirements associated with initiatives.
Not all efforts have positive results for the K-12 community. The recent elimination of funding provided through the CPUC’s California Teleconnect Fund (CTF) is an example of misguided and uninformed efforts. Given the significant impact of new legislation on the K-12 technology community, it is imperative that CETPA members remain abreast of statewide initiatives. To this end, the CETPA board is focusing this publication on providing updates on initiatives that are important to us all. CETPA and its members are on the front line of understanding the impact of these initiatives on K-12 technologists and the education community as a whole. One recent initiative that we have brought to your attention is SB1276, which aims to restore $18 million for the Teleconnect Fund Discount Restoration for Schools. This initiative is sponsored by Senator Bowen. Over the last few months I, on behalf of the CETPA board, sent a number of letters to legislators and the Governor requesting that the CTF funding be reinstated. I am hopeful that the CETPA letter was one of the many letters sent by CETPA K-12 technologists.
The 50 percent discount provided by the CTF offsets district costs and allows us to maintain data connectivity to every school and classroom in the state. Without these discounts, many districts will find themselves terminating phones and Internet access at a time when new statewide initiatives, state law and ed code require an increasing amount of communications capacity and infrastructure. To eliminate the funding support for the digital freeways and streets that lead to our schools in these difficult financial times is incomprehensible. CETPA will continue to focus on statewide initiates and share this important information with its membership so that you have the opportunity to get involved and better understand the impact that many of these initiatives have on our jobs.
