from the Pasadena Education Network
Pasadena Education Network (PEN), Invest in PUSD Kids (IIPK), and the Pasadena Educational Foundation (PEF) are co-sponsoring a free non-partisan* informational program to help voters who support public education better understand their options on the California ballot this November.
“The Education Voter: How voting for Propositions 30 or 38 (or both) can impact California’s Public Schools”, will take place on Thursday, October 11, 7:30-9 PM at All Saints Church (Sweetland Hall), 132 N. Euclid Ave. in Pasadena. The program is free and open to the public.
Presenters will include representatives from the League of Women Voters, which endorses Proposition 30, the PTA, which endorses Proposition 38, and Educate Our State, which advocates a “Yes” vote on both measures.
Featured presenter Kimberly Tso, a writer and economics educator, will give the audience a closer look at the two tax proposals, teaching some basic tax vocabulary and concepts while using Propositions 30 and 38 as examples to illustrate how progressive taxes can be used to support public education. Tso, who has a Masters of Public Policy from Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, will facilitate a brief audience exercise in which participants can practice responding to common statements made about tax proposals for education, and get more comfortable explaining their own stance on the two propositions.
“My personal mission is to provide people from all walks of life with the tools they need to participate in economic policy decisions,” says Tso, whose “women, economics and values” blog reflects her experience as a founding board member and lead trainer of Just Economics - a collective of women activists, organizers, ethicists and economists that works to make economics accessible, engaging and empowering.
“The intent of this program is to help participants understand the competing arguments* and make their own informed decisions,” says PEN Board President Chris Brandow. “PEN’s bylaws prevent us taking a position on statewide ballot initiatives, but our mission is all about helping parents make well-informed choices.”
Participants will have an opportunity to discuss the exercise and ask questions of Tso and the other presenters.
“We cannot afford to have voters who care about education stay away from the polls because the choices are too confusing,” says Invest in PUSD Kids Board President Steve Cole. “Supporters of public education are concerned about what could happen to our schools if our votes are split and neither Prop. 30 or 38 pass in November. But it’s hard to sort out the campaign rhetoric and figure out what we as parents can do to prevent this happening.”
PEF President George Brumder agrees. “There is a huge amount at stake in this election. We all want to make informed decisions on November 6th, and this program will help us do that.”
(* Ed. note: we note that, while the gathering calls itself nonpartisan, there are no speakers scheduled to oppose the tax increases.)
