don't have time to waste. we need leaders with passion to help move the needle. i just want to thank you for trusting us to represent you and allow me to serve as the president of the san francisco board of education. thank you. [applause] at this time i would like to open up the election of officers. and as a reminder, a second vote is not needed for nomination. and it is not permitted to vote for yourself. you will be voting by name and if there is more than one nomination, you'll be voting by name if there is more than one nomination.

i declare nominations are now open, for the office of the board of education for the year 2012. commissioner? >> i would like to nominate norman yee. >> he has been nominated. are there any other nominations. seeing none, i declare nominations are close. commissioner norman yee has been nominated. ms. casco? >> i move that we elect commissioner yee without a vote. >> sure. unless everyone would like to vote. >> seconded. >> by acclaimation, we would like to -- put forward the

nomination. and if there is no objection, -- i would like to say that norman yee has been elected to the board of education presidency for the year 2012. i feel better. i declare the nominations are now open for the office of vice president of the board of education. and are there any nominations? >> i nominate rachel norton. >> are there any other nominations for vice president?

i declare that the nominations are closed, and that racial norton has been nominated for vice president. >> i move that we elect commissioner norton vice- president by acclamation. >> let's do a voice vote. will you announced the vote -- the votes given? >> thank you. >> no. >> no. >> ms. maufas? >> no. >> ms. mendoza? >> no. >> ms. norton? >> no. >> ms. wynn? >> that is five votes for rachel norton. >> rachel norton has been elected vice president of the

board of education for 2012. [applause] >> at this time, i will relinquish my crown and move over to where rachel sits. president yee will continue. thank you for allowing me to serve you. [applause]

>> okay. let's get started. first thing i wayt to say is i appreciate the leadership of commissioner mendoza, over the last three years, as the president in 2010 and the president last year. i hope to accomplish half of the things that you have rattled off. if i were able to do that, we have to give you a lot of credit for holding us together, in

particularly in the tough budget year, when we had to make the hard decisions. it is not always easy to have a lot of people were together for a budget that has to work for everyone. i appreciate all of your leadership, to be able to duplicate the qualities that you have brought to us. thank you very much. the best thing i could do, as commissioner mendoza stepped away, her gift to all of us, you probably cannot see this postcard, this is a little boardwalk where three people are at the edge of the border, holding a surfboard. board meeting, in hawaiian. maybe we could pretend we are in

hawaii. we have a lot of business today. the first thing on the agenda, and congratulations to commissioner norton. i will need your help. there is a new face around this stage, here. that maybe you noticed and you wonder, who the heck is that guy over there? i want to introduce him. i am sure he'd be introduced anyway. he is the new attorney, legal councel for the school district. maribel was going to lead and we were going to hire a new person. don davis, give him a hand. [applause]

>> ok. first official business. the approval of board minutes. is there a motion for the business for 2013 -- 2012? -- 2011? is there any correction? the role call? ms. fewers? ms. mendoza? dr. maurasi? ms. norton? ms. wynn? mr. yee? seven ayes. ->> presentation to the board of education, superintendent report? >> first, i want to thank -- to congratulate the new officers, and i can tell you that everyone is excited with working with both of you this coming year.

and i want to thank -- i am it ready for that meeting in hawaii. i want to thank her for making it fun this year, and we are really working hard, and i think that this was a really good team effort. the entire board is to be commended for working together. we do not pull any punches, but what is really exciting is how well we came in as professionals, working for the benefit of children. and i know in a political town, this is tough to do, but you made me proud to serve as your supervisor. i want to start the meeting, not to bomb everyone out, but i want to let you know that i am going to keep my remarks brief.

i want you to know that when you look at what governor brown has proposed, things could have been worse. i want to tell you that things are worse. taking deeper cuts into the school systems across the state, it is really derailing all of the hard work that all of us have put into developing all of these great things. this is what everyone is it -- this is the effect everyone is having in our schools. the outlook really does not look very good. in fact, this looks very bad. with the proposed budget there is no cost of living adjustment. what this does is it keeps putting us further and further behind. later on in the agenda we have proposals out there, with different things and when you look at this, what california is

doing, we have all of us practiced cannibalism. we are practicing what we cut and we fight among each other. we fight among each other instead of saying that we are the problem. the problem is in sacramento. we have another round of layoffs, and we have all played this tune many times and this is not getting better. this budget, it could even get worse. it begins with the notion that in november, a ballot initiative will go and if this will pass, this may change but all that this does is maintained the status quo. it does not take it further, and helpless to closer to where we were a few years ago. just think about this. we knew that we were going to have a significant deficit in the next couple of years but

this proposal puts the district somewhere between -- on top of the deficit we were looking at, we are looking at 15-28 million more in the deficit. you get to the place where i hope that there are good math teachers here, because how do you make things like this work? i just want to encourage everyone, that the legislative session is going. we all should be outraged because enough is enough. we will be put in a position where we are forced to name our poison. i do not like this position and i don't think anyone in the state of california should just be excepting of this. it is unacceptable to keep constantly cutting, because we are 49th in the country with expenditures per person. and this is not getting any better.

when we start this long process, and it is a long process, to give thanks lips to our employees this year is terrible. but we have to be less than honest to tell you that this is where we are headed. just think, if something happens in november most school districts in california can plan that way. but how do we plan what we do not know? the only plan that we can plan for is the worst-case scenario. having said that, we will make it through this because the only bright side of all of this terrible situation, we see the economy slowly improving. we will probably be winning that limbo competition, but sooner or later, we have to raise the bar and start demanding more for our children.

with that, i know that is tough but i want to welcome back all of the students -- and we are already starting the second semester. i know that, especially as -- especially as you get older, you appreciate life more, a little bit older -- i know that life is too short. everyone in this district needs to make this year better than last year and make everything humanly possible to make certain that all of the students are ready for college or their careers by the time they graduate. this is a great school district, in terms of student achievement. we have all of the large, urban districts. nobody comes close. we will keep moving in spite of all of those challenges. i want to wish everyone a happy

new year. we are going to make it through this but we have to stand united, and we have to make some tough cuts. so be careful -- these new officers will have to roll up their sleeves. i think if we stand together as a community, we will make it through those tough times. thank you very much and have a wonderful year. [applause] >> i wanted to acknowledge a former colleague, who was on the school board not long ago. former commissioner dan kelly. [applause] moving on to the next item, recognition and resolution of commendations, we have three of them tonight and we will start with the executive board of the district english learner's

advisory committee. superintendent garcia? >> we would like to call on kevin chavez to make the presentation. >> that evening, commissioners. i have the honor of supporting the work being done with the lerner advisory committee -- and it is great pleasure we come together today to recognize the accomplishments of an incredibly dedicated group of parents. this team has worked diligently to inform and enhance the work that is being done to support our english language learners and their families. they have facilitated the general meetings, conducted needs assessments, and delivered annual reports and recommendations to the school board.

each representative has become an empowered member of the community and foster's apparent leadership at the district level. with the help of my colleagues, we would like to honor them with a certificate of recognition for their service. >> if i could see -- jackson flores. [applause] susan patel. [applause]

uni tang [applause] yeah. visa tseng. [applause] edwin yun. [applause] peggy liu. [applause] miriam lopez. [applause] lucia luna.

[applause] gloria suna. [applause] dora alvarez. [applause] [applause] cindy choi. [applause] and daisy -- [applause] thank you very much. we would like to briefly

introduce the new district learner advisory committee board. this was elected by parents of the district -- and as i call your name, can you come up please? maria -- [applause] cindy choi. [applause] maria -- [applause] rosario -- [applause] edwin yun. [applause] carla mirada. [applause] dora alvarez. [applause]

gloria cerva. [applause] carolina. [applause] amalia mendez. ana vazquez. gloria. my colleagues will read the chinese members. >> maggie pho.

[applause] thank you. >> we look forward to serving the needs of this district's english learners. the english learner students. thank you. a few words from our new president. [speaking spanish] >> hi, my name is maria rocha, and it's an honor to be chosen

to represent the english learners. >> [speaking spanish] >> so i'm looking forward to working together and all of us are on the same page so we can provide the children with the tools so they can be successful. so again, thank you for this opportunity and we're willing to work. >> once again, thank you for those that served last year and thank you for those that are

willing to serve this year. it's going to be a lot of work. congratulations. we're moving on to our next item, which is for the japanese american citizens league donation of the book "zero" to the san francisco unified school district elementary school libraries. superintendent? commissioner murase. >> one of the few things i did on the board was to recognize a civil rights activist who was recognized at the end of january. january also happens to be anti-bullying month and our hardworking staff also

distributed materials into the schools for anti-bullying month. included in that package was children's -- a children's book called "one," a book that illustrated and written by katherine otoshi, a local author, who is here today, because the japanese american citizens league will be presenting to each of our school libraries the sequel to that book, called "zero" and both of those books address bullying if the bully's perspective and the victim's perspective. i would like to introduce a representative of the japanese american league -- japanese american citizens league and the author of the book, if they could come to the podium. >> it's always a pleasure to come to the board with

something like this. in this particular case, something rather special. when i read "one" and happened to read "zero" i thought it would be a challenging task because we'd have to raise a lot of money to get both books into the system because you have a lot of elementary schools. but it turned out, when we looked at it, "one" had been distributed, so you cut my job in half. it took a while, but we were able to get the book and will get it distributed to the libraries. i'm going to turn it over to the author and illustrator and i have to say i'm very impressed by both books. >> thank you again, good evening. i was asked to say a few words about "one." "one" has to deal with the

issue of bullying, prejudice and really the power of one's voice. and i thought i would just go ahead and cut to the chase, just talk about, one thing that's always asked -- ask when i go to talk about the book, someone will always ask, why did you write the story of "one." i'll talk about the experience, it was a repressed memory from fourth grade. my parents were interned in a camp in world war ii, i was one of the very few minorities growing up in the suburbs and i remember looking around me and as kids do, sometimes you wish you were better at soccer or wish you were better at sports or whatever. in my case, i actually wished i had blond hair and blue eyes or red curly hair and green eyes.

this might seem odd but i remember at one point, catching a glimpse of myself in the mirror and being so surprised, think, wow i'm asian. it went on for a long time, that was sort of my secret. i've never talked about that until i wrote the book "one." and again, sometimes i'm asked, why did you write the story? one particular way someone asked this question, recalled a memory in fourth grade of a little girl i'm going to call ming who walked through the classroom door and i remember distinctly being very excited about ming because i was like, wow, she has the same shaped eyes as me, the same dark colored hair, the same skin color and i was excited for maybe two seconds until her name was called in roll call and she was laughed at and i thought, well, maybe it's not

so cool to try to be friends with this person anymore. it got worse the second day of school because she was -- since she was laughed at, nobody said thing. -- anything. her hair was pulled and she was pushed, surely because no one said anything, it must be ok to shove and pull the hair of this little girl. we fast forward to a whole week and she was so afraid of the rest of us that i distinctly remember when the school bell rang, she would run to the girl's bathroom stall and lock the door and stand there throughout the entire lunch period. my last memory of this little girl is of her crouching behind the school tool shed and she's crying so loud, she is screaming, because there's a semicircle of kids surrounding