Pink-slipped teacher faces uncertain future
When Staci Erlandson took a job with the local school district last year, she thought she was setting down roots in Santa Monica.
She moved from her home in Valencia to a small Santa Monica apartment and set up her fifth grade classroom at Juan Cabrillo Elementary school in Malibu.
Everything changed when Erlandson, 26, was handed a pink slip in March.
If the district’s financial situation doesn’t improve, she’ll be among 91 full-time teachers out of a job at the end of the school year.
“I’ve always thought that teaching was a very stable job,” said Erlandson, whose mother and grandmother were both teachers. “Then you get the notice and you feel discouraged.
“I knew I was going to be getting it,” she added. “But when I got the letter it was very cold, very legal. It was hard. I started crying.”
In her first and only year with the district, Erlandson assumed the role of union representative for Juan Cabrillo, a small elementary school of 327 kids that sits above Zuma Beach in Malibu. Now, she is the only full-time teacher there facing unemployment.
“Sometimes you feel alone,” Erlandson said during a lunch break last week. “But when you see everyone wearing the ribbons you feel very supported.”
Hundreds of school district supporters have been wearing pink ribbons for the past few months to honor those employees who are facing lay-offs this summer.
“I want my sister to have Ms. Erlandson. She’s nice.” — — AIMEE HAMEL Fifth grader
Vicki Chapman, a librarian in her fourth year at Juan Cabrillo, wandered into Erlandson’s class during lunch. Chapman said it’s sad Erlandson is targeted because she quickly made a name for herself at the small school by pioneering the Oceanography Club and other popular activities.
Chapman said she knows how Erlandson feels. Like more than 100 workers, librarians, and physical education and music teachers in the district, she too received a pink slip in March.
Chapman’s situation is slightly different because she has a family and provides their health insurance through her employment at the district. Chapman, whose son suffers from juvenile diabetes, said she doesn’t what she’ll do come this summer.
“My life will change drastically,” Chapman said plainly. “It’s one of those holding patterns we both feel we’re in.”
Erlandson’s only chance to keep her job is if Measure S passes on June 3. She said she’ll wait to see what happens with the election before deciding what to do next. Erlandson has thought about pursuing other teaching jobs available at private, charter schools in California.
Like Erlandson, Chapman also hopes Measure S, which would levy a $225 flat tax on every parcel of land in Santa Monica and Malibu, will pass June 3. If it does, the measure would generate about $6.5 million annually for the cash-strapped school district and many of the laid-off teachers could be rehired.
But Erlandson said there is a lot of certainty from both sides of the measure, which makes her uncertain. While the measure seems at times sure to pass, other times people seem convinced of its failure.
Opponents of the measure say the tax is unfair because it would levy the same flat fee on large businesses and renters. They say schools should find their own funding and not ask taxpayers to lift them out of the $13 million shortfall in spending from the state.
In Erlandson’s classroom things go on as usual. The politics of the election — now just one week away — seem miles removed.
Erlandson appears to stay positive. And busy. Her walls are adorned by cardboard paper cut-outs of jelly bean jars that keep track of the books her students have read. “American lanterns” hang from the ceiling, which are six-sided paper mobiles that have keywords from U.S. history.
But despite appearances, Erlandson’s class of 32 students does know about the upcoming election. And the students know that their teacher’s job is in jeopardy. They used the same word to explain the situation as Chapman did — sad.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on May 27, 2003. Read the original PDF.