Watauga County Retired School Personnel

The Red Pencil

Newsletter of Watauga County Retired School Personnel

Vol.XVI, No.2 October 2015_______ _____________________________ntn1066@hotmail.com

October Meeting

When:Thursday, October 15, NOON, $10, check made payable to Watauga County NCRSP

Where:Deerfield Methodist Church

Why:To share time with each other AND to hear from Watauga County Superintendent of Education, Dr. Scott Elliott. Please come!

With:non-perishable food for the Hunger Coalition. This month, let’s load down that long table in the Fellowship Hall with INDIVIDUAL SIZES of fruit, heatable meals, cereal, and everything else for the more than 400 backpacks our schoolkids take home every weekend, don’t forget all the lovely, noisy, loose change you’ve been collecting for the Scholarship Fund.. And don’t forget the plastic bags and medicine bottles!

If your caller has not reached you by October 10, phone Margaret Sigmon, 264-2036, to make your reservation. Remember that we’ll be selling take-home meals for $5.

AND, if you have time, please plan to stay for just a few minutes after the meeting to help Margaret clean our meeting space.

President’s Message

As summer warmth gives way to cooler days and our mountain landscape sheds its green foliage to provide us its October brilliance, it is time to join together for our autumn NCRSP luncheon.

Schools are in full swing and our legislature has finally reached a budget agreement giving us a few positives i.e., restoring our teacher assistants and driver education and increasing beginning teacher salaries. Unfortunately, the assault on North Carolina’s public education system has not stopped. Funding for students and teachers continues to decline. North Carolina is currently spending $877 less per student than in 2009 and 70% of our teachers will receive no salary increase. They will receive a one-time $750 bonus that does not count towards retirement. NC struggles to keep experienced teachers while the poverty rate of school age children climbs to 25%. We retirees will receive no Cost of Living Increase (COLA), a real disappointment after our state treasurer said publically that money was available for this purpose.

Since the education news from Raleigh has not been encouraging, we look forward to some positive news from our recently hired superintendent, Dr. Scott Elliott. He will be our featured speaker for our October program. He will share what is happening in the Watauga County Schools. We are fortunate to have Dr. Elliott as our superintendent and we wish him well as he begins his second year serving our county. These are his remarks taken from his welcoming on the Watauga county school web site:

“ Our circumstances include both great strengths and notable challenges, but I would not trade the talents and resources of the Watauga County Schools and this community for those of any of the 114 other districts in NC. If we all work together to focus on providing great teaching and learning in our schools, we can offer life changing education for our students. Let’s not settle for anything less.”

I share his views that I would not want to trade the resources of Watauga County schools for those of the 114 other units in the state. We are fortunate to live in a beautiful part of the Blue Ridge Mountains and we are fortunate to have a wonderful workplace to educate our children. Whether it is our geographic isolation, our exceptional staff, our exceptional community, the university advantage or all these reasons, we have advantages over other units that foster educational excellence.

I am grateful to our Watauga NCRSP unit as a bright spot in the northwest part of NC, working to support local education. Thank you for all you do to support Watauga schools. I look forward to seeing you at our October meeting.

Lee

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People Pieces

Congratulations to prospective NCRSP member Cheri Harmon, now Cheri Harmon Craver, on her September marriage to long-time beau Jim Craver.

And more congratulations to Susan McKay, who celebrated finishing her chemo treatments by taking a three-week trip to Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands!

Happy recovering to Sue Aldridge, doing nicely after knee surgery in early September.

Kudos to Dot Barker, who survived an unannounced and unwelcome visit from raccoons IN HER HOUSE. Ask her for all the scary details.

Representing us at the NCRSP regional meeting on the 16th of October will be Janice Burns, Bill Winkler, Lee Stroupe, Dot Barker, Barbara Hunsucker, Betty Wells, and Mary Linda Dooley. They’ll do us proud!

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In Memoriam

The Watauga Unit of North Carolina Retired School Personnel sends its deepest sympathies to the families of Betty Elliott, Charles Isley, and R.G. Shipley, three of our most valued members.

In the past year, our unit has lost eleven members. When a death occurs in our membership, we transfer $25 from our treasury into the scholarship fund in memory. Please remember that contributions in memory or in honor of our colleagues are always appropriate. Make your check to WC NCRSP and send it to Dot Barker. Put the name of the person in whose honor/memory you are contributing on the memo line.

LISTEN UP!!!

OK, that was shouting and I know shouting isn’t polite. On the other hand, I really need your attention. The Red Pencil is only as useful to you as you allow it to be. In a world filled with “stuff” bombarding all of us all the time, information overload is not just possible; it’s well nigh unavoidable. Our little newsletter, however, can’t become just another piece of flotsam and jetsam in your life. You can’t let it. News about our programs and our schedules and activities is in here. A message from our unit president is in here. Business matters like the budget on which we’ll all have to vote are in here. What to bring to meetings, whether or not Janice Burns has made another of her legendary cakes for auction, Candace’s latest news about volunteer opportunities, even an occasional brief book recommendation or a nifty recipe are in here, and it’s all important. Please take the time to read this newsletter, and if you have comments to make about it or news you want to share through it, get in touch with Nanci Tolbert Nance, ntn@skybest.com or 828.963-8892.

A Very Special Message

On behalf of my family, I would like to thank the members of the Watauga Unit of North Carolina Retired School Personnel for the special offering made in memory of my mother, LaVerne Franklin, to the NCRSP Scholarship Fund. We have been devastated by our loss, but the many acts of kindness shown to us during this difficult time have been an uplifting blessing. The scholarship program was something she looked forward to every year and you have all fittingly honored her legacy with your contributions to North Carolina’s future educators.

Thank you kindly,

Morgan Redmond & The Franklin/Redmond/Martin Families

The Importance of Membership

If you did not join or renew your membership in NCRSP in August, October is the next best time. If you are a renewing member and a cash-paying member and have not yet paid your dues, you will find the amount of your dues in the upper right corner of the mailing label on this newsletter. Your Accidental Death Insurance policy will end on October 31 if you do not renew your membership by that time.

If you are newly retired and have not joined yet, please make your decision now to join this vital organization. You need us, and we need you, too! In fact, we need every retired educator to be on our membership roster in order to strengthen our position as advocates for retaining and improving benefits for all retired school personnel in this state. Together, we have strength.

You can pay your dues at our October meeting or mail them to Dot Barker, 451 Poplar Hill Dr., Boone, NC 28607. If you are a new retiree, your dues are $111 and can be paid by check or you can join by bank draft or credit card. If you plan to join by bank draft, bring a voided check with you. Both forms will be available at the meeting. If you have questions, please call Dot at 264-3621 or Barbara or Roland Moy at 264-8811.

IMPORTANT! New this year – checks written for dues payment must be written to NCAE. All other checks, such as scholarship or attendance at association meetings/conferences, are still written to Watauga Unit of NCRSP.

We will be voting to approve this budget at our October meeting.

Watauga Unit of NCRSPProposed Budget for 2015-2016

Income

Local dues based on 40 members @ $8.00320.00

Local dues based on 55 members @ $10.00 550.00

Total dues income 870.00

Other estimated income200.00

1070.00

Expenses

Newsletter printing (5 @ $60.00)300.00

Other printing

Postage for newsletter (5 @ $50.00)225.00

Other postage and supplies 25.00

Total printing, postage & supplies550.00

Officers' Expenses

State Convention300.00

Workshops, etc.100.00

Total Officers' Expenses400.00

Miscellaneous (Memorials, gifts, TLC)200.00

*Committee Expenses 0.00

Total Miscellaneous200.00

Total Expenses 1150.00

* Committee expenses to be taken from grant funds

You will notice that Scholarship Fund is never in our budget, because dues cannot be used for scholarships and our scholarship is funded entirely by donations. Please be generous with your donations for scholarship, with your major donations, and with your change in the little watering cans on the tables at our lunches. Remember that a donation to the Scholarship Fund is a great way to remember a colleague and to honor one.

Health Plan Changes for 2016

With the changes in our Health Plan going into place again, you will probably have questions and want more information. To make the most-informed choice, make an informed choice, you are encouraged to take advantage of the outreach event that will be in our county on Monday October 19, at 9:00AM at Meadowbrook Inn in Blowing Rock. Please call 1-800-850-1992to reserve a seat for this meeting.

ANNUAL NORTH CAROLINA FOUNDATION FOR PUBLIC SCHOOL CHILDREN GIVEAWAY ANNOUNCED

The NC Foundation for Public School Children provides eyeglasses, school supplies, and more to hundreds of students in our state. Grants from the Foundation’s resources funded literacy projects and helped parents to become more involved in their children’s schools. More than 1,600 high school students completed a Teacher Cadet course on their way to becoming future teachers.

This year, cash giveaways to ticket buyers (1 ticket - $5, 4 tickets - $10, 10 tickets - $20) include a grand prize of $5,000 cash, 2 prizes of $2,500 each, 3 prizes of $1,000 each, and 10 prizes of $100.

For every 100 tickets sold by a local affiliate of NCAE or NCRSP, the name of the affiliate will be entered in a drawing for $1,000 cash.

Tickets will be available at our October meeting or may be purchased through the website at www.NCRPSC.org.

Please note that the drawing will take place on December 8, 2015 and winners will be notified by phone or email.