Richard Barrera, a candidate running for California Superintendent of Public Institution, visited Yolo Middle School for a meet and greet event with Newman Crows-Landing School District teachers last Thursday.

The greeting took place inside the school’s library during the lunch period where attendees mentioned their biggest obstacles as educators. Some of the questions consisted of affordability for necessities such as healthcare, tackling rising inflation and maternity leave.

More than 20 people attended Thursday’s greeting.

Barrera’s trip to the Central Valley was part of his campaign to visit local school districts and understand the problems it is facing. He is one of 10 candidates in the running to succeed current State Superintendent Tony Thurmond.

Barrera currently serves as the President of San Diego Unified School District Board of Education and Senior Policy Adviser at the California Department of Education.

Since elected to the board in 2008, Barrera has spearheaded initiatives such as a plan to build 3,000 housing units for educators, $11.6 billion in bond measure funds to improve facilities and increases for both salaries and healthcare coverage for teachers.

According to Barrera’s campaign website, he’s pushing for the following:

● Build a strong and sustainable teacher pipeline

● Secure funding for schools through a statewide effort

● Helping local communities secure bond measures funding

● Affordable housing for educators

● Ensuring students belong in schools with expansion of dual-language programs

Last August, members of Barrera’s team reached out to María Andrade, a Spanish teacher at Yolo and President of the Newman-Crows Landing Teachers Association (NCLTA), last year to plan his visit to the area. He previously spoke with education leaders in Gustine and Patterson, Andrade said.

Upon hearing the news that he wanted to travel to Newman, Andrade found it "unique” that someone wanted to visit and understand what it’s like to teach in a rural area. She added that Barrera was the only candidate that reached out to the NCLTA.

“Because we’re so close to San Francisco, we’re so close to Sacramento [and] we are so close to even Fresno, we sometimes can be looked over by politicians,” she said. “I truly believe that Richard [Barrera] being a leader understands that being a leader, it’s not just for the big cities, but it’s for chapters in all school districts, big and small [districts].”

Teachers and district staff voice concerns to Barrera

After Barrera introduced him, Oscar Madrigal, a Spanish teacher at Yolo, spoke about some of the challenges he’s faced financially. He said he’s considered getting a second job after school to support his family.

“I know teachers that are literally wasting half of their paycheck for benefits for their family,” Madrigal said. “We’re not taking care of our younger teachers.”

Barrera, in response, said family health benefits have been the biggest issue he’s seen in bargaining, mentioning the 12-day strike held by teachers at Twin Rivers Unified School District in March.

He added that the state could be “much more helpful to local districts that are dealing with the rising costs of healthcare every year.”

Another topic brought up was declining enrollment, which was brought forth by Eduardo Davila, a counselor at Yolo. Since the 2017-18 school year, statewide enrollment has been on the decline. NCLUSD has dealt with its own decline in enrollees within the past three years, and it’s projected to continue into next year.

This in turn has been one of the contributing factors in the district authorizing staff layoffs, according to Superintendent Justin Pruett.

Davila said he believes enrollment “is a crisis in the area,” and that families are leaving NCLUSD for bigger cities or other states.

“We lose 10 kids, it’s a huge impact compared to a district that has 15,000 students,” he said.

To fund public schools, California uses an Average Daily Attendance (ADA), a model where total numbers of days of student attendance are divided by the number of days in a school year.

Barrera said it's “absurd” that the state continues to rely on ADA, and believes it does not help school districts improve their attendance.

However, if the state decides to switch to an enrollment-based model, it could cost taxpayers over $6 billion annually, according to a January analysis from the Legislative Analyst’s Office.

Cynthia Bautista, an English Teacher at Yolo, said maternity leave has been a topic of discussion between her colleagues. She asked Barrera if there’s a plan to help teachers who are starting families.

Barrera said he’s negotiated with teachers and classified staff unions for fully-paid maternity leave. He emphasized the board of education can make decisions on how to invest in its educators.

“We can choose to invest in our educators over building up a big reserve … we got those choices that are available to us as local school boards,” Barrera said.

Visit to special education programs

Following the meet and greet, Barrera visited a special education class at Hunt Elementary and went back to Yolo for an art class designed for autistic students.

The decision to showcase those classes specifically was not only made to highlight the growing need for Special Education support in the Central Valley, but how to support the students, Andrade said.

“Special education is a section of our education that is growing, but the support is not growing as fast as it should be,” she said.

With the June 2nd primary election approaching, there has not been a clear favorite in the race.

According to an April poll from Public Policy Institute of California, Barrera has received 7% support but trailing opponents Ainye Long and Anthony Rendon, who each have a 9% support.

That slim margin could be attributed to the staggering 32% of voters who are undecided on a candidate.

With less than a month away, Andrade urges voters to learn more about this race and its ramifications on local education.

“We all live in a community where there are schools and people that are being educated, a society is successful when people in the community are successful, and that comes from a good education,” Andrade said.