New CSBA officers and directors take office
Published: December 15, 2009
Frank Pugh, a veteran community college professor and longtime Santa Rosa City Schools board member in Region 3, took office as CSBA’s president during the association’s Annual Education Conference and Trade Show in San Diego earlier this month.
In remarks to CSBA’s Delegate Assembly, which met Dec. 2-3, and during the Dec. 3-5 conference itself, Pugh made it clear that he’s armed for a year of passionate advocacy on behalf of California public schoolchildren.
“As we begin a new year of challenges, I will be throwing a few hand grenades and starting a few fires,” Pugh vowed.
“This is what I need you to do: Be in the face of your elected officials every time they vote for a bad bill,” Pugh continued. “It’s time to hold people accountable. I will be counting on your help this coming year to move our education agenda forward.”
Pugh will guide CSBA through a year of continued threats to the state’s financial investment in public education. He said that association’s suspension of its traditional practice of honoring selected lawmakers for their support of public education underscores the vehemence of its unhappiness with the lack of political leadership in Sacramento.
“It would be nuts to give an award this year,” Pugh said, to the cheers of CSBA delegates. “Our legislators sat on their hands and watched this train wreck.”
Pugh succeeds Paula Campbell, a trustee with Nevada City School District in Region 4. Campbell, who visited schools in each of CSBA’s 21 geographic regions during her term as president, said that despite the unprecedented budget reductions forced on California schools in 2009, the state’s K-12 educators are finding innovative strategies to help children reach their full potentials.
“At every school I visited I encountered staff who wanted to show me their unique programs,” she said. She told Annual Conference attendees that she has cherished her year as president and thanked them for their support. “It has absolutely been an honor,” she said.
CSBA’s Delegate Assembly confirmed Martha Fluor as the association’s president-elect. Fluor, a member of CSBA’s Board of Directors from Newport-Mesa Unified School District in Region 15, has been a school board member for 18 years. She’s pledged to continue devoting her “time, energy, commitment and passion” to helping California public schools meet the daunting challenges they face.
Delegates also elected Mary W. Boger, president of the Glendale Unified School District board in Region 23, to the office of vice president. Boger, who is serving her second four-year term on the Glendale board, has been twice elected to the Delegate Assembly and is a graduate of CSBA’s Masters in Governance program.
Boger said she is eager to educate the public about the crisis facing California public schools and to advocate for children in the state and national capitals.
“It’s not just the money, it’s an investment in the children of the state,” Boger told delegates. “If we don’t do that, we won’t be able to turn this economy around.”
Directors-at-large
Delegates re-elected Emma Turner, director-at-large, Black, from the La Mesa-Spring Valley School District; D. Shelly Yarbrough, director-at-large, American Indian, from the Val Verde Unified School District; and Sara Wilkins, director-at-large, county, from the Madera County Office of Education.
New directors
Delegates in five CSBA regions re-elected incumbents to the association’s Board of Directors, including Bob Berkowitz, Del Norte County Unified School District in Region 1; Chris Ungar, San Luis Coastal Unified School District in Region 9; John B. Walker, Ventura Unified School District in Region 11; Don Sedgwick, Saddleback Valley Unified School District in Region 15; and Robert Cruz, Charter Oak Unified School District in Region 23.
Four regions’ delegates elected new members to the CSBA board: Cindi Clinton, Novato Unified School District in Region 3; Laura Rich, Menlo Park City Elementary School District in Region 5; Laura Canciamilla, Pittsburg Unified School District in Region 7; and Carol Skiljan, Encinitas Union Elementary School District in Region 17.
Cathie Bustos, from the Madera County Office of Education, joins CSBA’s Board of Directors in her capacity as president of the California County Boards of Education.