For CTA Vice President David A. Sanchez, being bilingual means getting the union's critical messages about public education to an even wider audience in our diverse "majority minority" state.

 

In speeches and in CTA radio ads on Spanish-language radio stations, Sanchez calls for family involvement in education, providing adequate resources for all students, and for preserving smaller class sizes - especially in minority communities, where studies show students benefit most from more one-on-one instruction.

 

Elected CTA vice president in early 2003, Sanchez brings a record of accomplishments to the post. During his two terms as CTA secretary-treasurer, he improved and standardized the financial reporting system for the union's chapters and Service Center Councils, testified in Sacramento on class size and other vital legislation, and campaigned for the successful statewide school bond, Proposition 47, in 2002.

 

His passion for the state's schools of greatest need is heard in the Spanish media interviews he does about CTA's ongoing fight for these schools, where language barriers, poverty and lack of state resources can deny kids a fair chance to succeed. He strongly believes that students from poor neighborhoods should get an education that's as good as the one received by kids in wealthier areas.

 

His knowledge about education comes from teaching more than 20 years in the classroom - and from his parents, whose careers as educators inspired him to carry on a rich family tradition.

 

In the Sanchez family, teaching is in the blood. Since 1980, David has been a teacher for the Santa Maria-Bonita School District in Santa Maria, Santa Barbara County, and also worked as a community college instructor.  He still calls Santa Maria home.

 

His mother, Amparo D. Sanchez, is a former teacher of the year who retired after teaching elementary school for more than three decades in San Luis Obispo County.

 

His late father, Dr. David J. Sanchez, for 23 years headed the Department of Ethnic Studies and Multicultural Education at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo.

 

His CTA experience includes several years on the Board of Directors representing a coastal region that included about 20,000 teachers. He also served as a delegate to the CTA State Council of Education, the union's primary policy-making body, and served on many Council panels, including its Ethnic Minority Affairs, State Scholarship, and Martin Luther King, Jr., Memorial Scholarship committees.

 

He holds a bachelor of science degree in early childhood education from Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo, and also earned a bilingual cross-cultural multiple subjects teaching credential from Cal Poly. His master's degree in education is from the University of La Verne in Los Angeles County.

 

California Teachers Association

P.O. Box 921, 1705 Murchison Drive

Burlingame, CA 94011-0921

Phone: (650) 552-5305

FAX: (650) 552-5007

E-mail: dsanchez@cta.org

David A. Sanchez

Vice President