Unless a candidate for the Fresno High Area 5 trustee seat makes a last-minute filing — and the deadline to file is Friday — it looks like Trustee Terry Slatic won't be the only man on the Fresno Unified School Board a few months from now. Four candidates —...
Want to Join a Union? Options for Clovis Teachers Keep Growing
You might need a scorecard these days to keep track of the ever-expanding number of alphabet-soup organizations that want to represent Clovis Unified teachers. The newest to surface is Independent Clovis Unified Educators, or ICUE. Kim Mongelli introduced the organization to trustees last month, about a week after ICUE's...
Slatic to Fresno Unified Staffer: Is the Air Cooler in NW Fresno?
Fresno Unified Trustee Terry Slatic's distinctive (some might call it obnoxious) style of eliciting information was on full display at Wednesday's School Board meeting. Karin Temple, the district's chief operations officer, had wrapped up a presentation about which projects the $325 million Measure M bond issue will fund, and which...
Unfair Advantage for School Board Candidate? Or Potential Land Mine?
At last week's Fresno Unified School Board meeting, trustees nominated five citizens to a committee that will recommend how the board should go about renaming schools. The committee's creation comes in the wake of controversy over the naming and renaming of district schools. Several were fairly well known: former City...
Fresno Unified School Board Meeting or a ‘Circus’?
Fresno Unified School Board President Valerie Davis might want to think about bringing a whip and chair to control unruly participants at future trustee meetings, if Wednesday night's meeting is any example. The shouting and name-calling from audience members directed at trustees, individual conversations between trustees on the dais and...
Faculty Senate Forms ‘Non-Union’ Clovis Teachers Organization
It looks like Clovis Unified's Faculty Senate, or the district itself, might be feeling the heat over recent unfair labor practice complaints filed against the district by the budding teachers union, the Association for Clovis Educators. The Faculty Senate announced that an overwhelming majority of the senators who were on...
Fresno School Board Candidate List Keeps Growing
Former City Councilman Blong Xiong really does mean to run in April's special election for the Fresno Unified Area 5 seat, even though the Fresno County campaign website has his campaign's statement of organization slated for 2024. Xiong said Friday that when his campaign committee documents were being recorded, there was...
Fresno Unified Trustee Moves Into Westlands Water District Gig
Fresno Unified Trustee Elizabeth Jonasson Rosas is embarking on a new career as the public affairs representative for the Westlands Water District, which identified her in its announcement Wednesday as Elizabeth Jonasson. Jonasson Rosas says she's fine being identified either way. The new job could help Jonasson Rosas avoid scheduling...
Tax + Gas Dollars = Program Boosts at Reedley College, Fresno State
Reedley College got a big boost in September when Assembly Member Dr. Joaquin Arambula presented a $1 million check for the college's Aviation Maintenance Technology and Flight Science programs. The funds, contained in the taxpayer-supported state budget, will help expand job training and opportunities in the region. But specifically, it...
Pin a Blue Ribbon on This High-Performing Fresno Charter School
Anybody who has spent time at the Big Fresno Fair knows that the blue ribbon goes to the pie, quilt, tamale, or subtropical fruit deemed the best of the best. So when the U.S. Education Department hands out blue ribbons, those schools are special indeed. This year's crop of top...