October Red Pencil 2014

The Red Pencil                

Newsletter of Watauga County Retired School Personnel

Vol.XV, No.2  October 2014_______­­­­­_____________________________ntn1066@hotmail.com

October Meeting

When:                  Thursday, October 16, NOON, $10, check made payable to Watauga County NCRSP

                       Where:                 Deerfield Methodist Church

Why:                     To share time with each other AND to hear from local businessman, philanthropist, and all-around good guy John Cooper about the restoration of the Appalachian Theatre

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.  We’ll also be happy to take plastic bags, medicine bottles (again!), and old phones to recycle - and don’t forget all the lovely, noisy,loose change you’ve been collecting for the Scholarship Fund.  Read on in this newsletter for information about a very special raffle we’ll be conducting at our meeting.

If your caller has not reached you by October 11, phone Margaret Sigmon, 264-2036,  to make your reservation.  Remember that we’ll be selling take-home meals for $5.

  At the end of every meeting, a small crew of volunteers sets to work clearing our tables, putting away the salt and pepper shakers, washing silverware, and cleaning the kitchen.  It’s not glamorous, but it’s necessary, and helping will make you feel really, really good.  Volunteering after a meeting doesn’t make you a member of the every-meeting-clean-up crew, but it means you’ll be greatly appreciated while you’re there.  If you can, please stick around after the October meeting for a little friendly KP.

People Pieces

--- --- --- --- ---

Margaret Sigmon would like to send a special thank-you to the callers who gather us for our meetings.  They do an incredibly important job and they do it VERY well!

    President’s Message

            As your new president, I want to thank everyone for attending our August breakfast meeting. The meeting was well-attended and we were all were captivated by our program speaker, Dr. Joseph Bathanti. Our thanks go to Mary Dooley for selecting him as our speaker.

            John Cooper will be our guest speaker at our October luncheon. He has been a driving force in the restoration of the downtown Appalachian Theater and he will give us a first-hand report on the progress.

            October is also the month when early voting begins and mid-term election campaigning is in its final weeks. When you go to the polls and look over your election ballots, don’t forget that NCAE has endorsed two statewide candidates, Sue Counts and Jim Sponenberg. Sue is running for the NC House District 93 seat and Jim is seeking the NC Senate district 45 seat. We cannot continue to lose ground in education as we have in the last two years and our state representatives have done little to make public education a priority. The budget does not respect educators and we need to reverse this course at the polls.

            In one final note, North Carolina NCAE members can celebrate two recent victories. The first victory refers to a court ruling in favor of NC public school teachers and the NCAE, deciding that it was unconstitutional to eliminate teachers’ career status. The second victory was a lawsuit challenging private school vouchers. The courts ruled in favor of the 1.5 million public school children, deciding that school vouchers are unconstitutional. Hooray for our organization. Let us be informed and find candidates who support NC public education.

                                   

                                                                                                            Lee Stroupe

   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!  Remember that 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.  

New members:  Larry Ball, Marilyn Welch, Patty Blanton, Cheri Harmon, Linda Seamster, Judy Brown

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

Watauga Unit of NCRSP                              Proposed Budget for 2014-2015

Income

            Local dues based on 50 members @ $8.00                                 400.00

            Local dues based on 60 members @ $10.00                               600.00

            Total dues income                                                                   1000.00

            Other estimated income                                                                         200.00

                                                                                                           1200.00

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 & supplies                                           550.00

            Officers' Expenses

                        State Convention                                                          300.00

                        Workshops, etc.                                                                         200.00

            Total Officers' Expenses                                                          500.00

            Miscellaneous (Memorials, gifts, TLC)                        150.00

            Committee Expenses                                                                100.00

            Total Miscellaneous                                                                 250.00

Total Expenses                                                                                     1300.00           

Quick reminder about the budget:  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. 

Retiring but always here!  Roger and Linda Harwood are retiring as our much-loved and much-appreciated “decorators” after many years of making our meeting places attractive.  We thank them over and over and over for their generosity and hard work.  Thanks, Roger and Linda!

In Memoriam

The Watauga Unit of NC Retired School Personnel extends its sympathy to the family of long-time member Herbert Hampton.

NC Foundation for Public School Children – a BIG raffle coming in October

2014 Holiday Giveaway – Purchase a Ticket for a Chance to Win $5,000 Cash!

The NCFPSC 2014 Holiday Giveaway will benefit the Foundation and specifically the Children’s Fund. Please help by selling and purchasingtickets for the chance to win some exciting prizes:

Giveaway Prizes:  Grand – $5,000 Cash;    2^nd – $2,500 Cash;    3^rd – $1,000 Cash;     10 at $100 Cash

Any Person, Group, or Organization who sells 100 tickets will be entered in a separate drawing for $1,000 cash!

Ticket Prices:  1 ticket = $5      4 tickets = $10     10 tickets = $20

Drawing takes place December 5, 2014. Winners will be notified by phone and/or email. Winners will be posted on the website December 8, 2014.

NOW, we’ll be selling raffle tickets for this worthy enterprise at our meeting in October: 1 for $5, 4 for $10, and 10 for $20, and if we sell 100 tickets, our unit will be entered in a drawing for $1000 – all while doing truly good things for the children in our schools.  To learn more about the work of this organization, go towww.ncfpsc.org.

  Keeping Up with the Computer Age

1.  Remember to check our local blogspot, http://wcrsp.blogspot.com/, for the latest issue of The Red Pencil, photos of the most recent meeting, news of the members, and links to important information.
2. Go to www.ncrsp.org for legislative updates, information about NC retirement, supplemental insurance, and lots of retirement links. 
3. Send a quick note to your humble editor, Nanci Tolbert Nance, at ntn@skybest.com to insure that you receive The Red Pencil by email and save our unit more than $5 per year for your subscription.

   A young man shopping in a supermarket noticed a little old lady following him around.  If he stopped, she stopped.  What’s more, she kept staring at him.

She finally overtook him in the checkout line and said, "I hope I haven't made you feel ill at ease; it's just that you look so much like my late son.  I know it's silly, but if you'd call out 'Good bye, Mom' as I leave the store, you would make me feel so happy." 

After she went through the checkout and was on her way out of the store, she turned back for a moment and the young man called out, "Goodbye, Mom."

The little old lady waved and smiled back at him.

Pleased that he had brought a little sunshine into someone's day, he went to pay for his groceries.

"That comes to $121.85," said the clerk.

"WHAT?  I only bought 5 items!"

The clerk replied, "Yeah, but your mother said you'd be paying for her things, too."  

VOLUNTEER SERVICES:

Candace Hall would like us all to remember that we’re completing and submitting our volunteer hours forms BY THE MEETING this year.  Bring this form for just September and October to our meeting on the 16^th.

NCRSP Community Participation - Volunteer Hours  2014

Name  __________________________

Category

Jan

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

Total

Education

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

Other

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

x

                        Total Hours in All Categories for September and October only    ________

August 2014 Red Pencil

The Red Pencil                

Newsletter of Watauga County Retired School Personnel

Vol.XVI, No.1 August 2014__________________________________________ntn1066@hotmail.com___

August Meeting

           When:               TUESDAY, 19 August 2014, 9AM

                                              Registration, payment of dues to begin at 8AM

           Where:             Deerfield Methodist Church

           How much:       $10, check payable to Watauga County NCRSP,

                                             for a buffet country breakfast catered by George Wellington

          What:              getting together on the first day of school, welcoming new retirees, and enjoying the pleasure of each other’s company, with a very special speaker, former NC Poet Laureate Joseph Bathanti

If your caller does not contact you, call Margaret Sigmon at 264-2036 before 8 PM on Saturday, the 16th of August, or email her at margaretsigmon@bellsouth.net.  NOTE NOTE NOTE that our meeting is on TUESDAY!  Don’t forget to put your golden apple pin on your lapel, either!

Every year we say the same thing about our first meeting, but it still matters and you can really help “the staff” by being ready when you arrive to:

1.      pay your dues.  You’ll find more about the amount later in this newsletter, but you know by now that your dues are noted on your mailing label on this issue of the RP.  Bring a check in that amount made out to NCAE.  Remember to pay particular attention to the article about dues later in this newsletter;

2.      contribute to the Scholarship Fund.  The sum of $5 is a suggestion, but we’re happy to be the recipients of your generosity in any amount;

3.      drop all the lovely, noisy, loose change you’ve been collecting into the little watering cans at your table;

4.      tote medicine bottles (AGAIN!) for the Hunger Coalition, and

5.      bring food staples (pasta, beans, rice, canned veggies) for the Hunger Coalition,  as well.

REMEMBER that we are not collecting school supplies this year.  Instead, you contributed nearly $800 in cash and supplies at our May meeting and your generous donation went to help the Back 2 School Festival held at Watauga High School on the 9^th of August.

President’s Message

 As your new Watauga Unit President, I am looking forward to the next two years. We will start off 2014-15 with breakfast on Tuesday, August 19th which is the first day for our Watauga County students, the same day ASU begins the fall semester.  Expect traffic on the roads!

  As retirees, we make up 12,000 out of 60,000 NCAE membership which includes both certified and noncertified employees. We have 97 local units and we just celebrated our 50th anniversary in 2011.  When we see the dismantling of the strides our organization has made in the last 53 years, it is difficult to be positive regarding the outlook for NC public schools.  We have to look to our mission statement to remind us of our focus.

     The mission is to be the premier statewide association for all retired education personnel, acting collectively to enhance retirement and health care benefits and to serve the community and its educational needs. 

The statement asks us to concentrate on three things:  1. protecting the State Health Plan;  2.  keeping the Teachers and State Employees Retirement System secure; and 3.  enabling volunteerism in public schools by our members.  

 We haven't forgotten the hundreds of teachers, teacher assistants, administrators and support staff who are working together in our county and across our state to make 2014-2015 another successful year with our students. As we celebrate the start of a new school year with breakfast and social time, we as NCRSP members are challenged to continue to strengthen our membership. We provide encouragement and support to each other, knowing that facing the challenges before us will require that we work together.   During this upcoming year, we will keep our eye on the mission statement and continue to support our local school community. We are truly on this road together.

                                                                                                Lee Stroupe

   Need a Lift?

If you or anyone you know needs transportation to one of our meetings, please call Beth Carrin at 264-9227 and she will make arrangements.

NCRSP Meeting Dates, 2014-2015

All meetings will take place at Deerfield Methodist Church.  With the exception of the Tuesday 9A meeting on August 19, all meetings are on Thursday and begin at noon.  Please mark your calendar now to avoid conflicts with doctors’ appointments and other events.

August 19, 9A  Deerfield Methodist Church

October 16, 12N  Deerfield Methodist Church

17 October, 10A  1-B Regional Conference,

Spruce Pine Volunteer Fire Department

(reminder: Director of new Region 1-B is our own Bill Winkler)

December 18, 12N  Deerfield Methodist Church

March 19, 12N  Deerfield Methodist Church

May 21, 12N Deerfield Methodist Church

We Appreciate our Callers

The members of Watauga County North Carolina Retired School Personnel receive a call before each of the five annual meetings reminding them of the meetings and confirming their attendance.   Our volunteers make many phone calls and leave many messages on answering machines.  If you find a message on your machine, returning that call is EXTREMELY important so that the callers can get their lists to Margaret Sigmon by Saturday before the meeting day.  We must give a total number  to George Wellington on Monday so he can do his grocery order. If you do not receive a call about the meeting, please phone Margaret Sigmon at 264-2036.

Our really important callers for the 2014-2015 year are

Jackie Adams

Sue Aldridge

Wanda Bentley

Beth Carrin

Nancy Cooke

Eula Mae Fox

Candace Hall

June Mann

Mary Hazel Mast

Susan McKay

Joyce Sherrill

Betty Wells

We thank them for taking their time to make sure we know about meetings and have other timely information.

Extremely Important Information about Paying Your Dues

No matter how long you have been a member of the Watauga Unit of NCRSP, some of this information about dues is new and important.  Please read carefully.

If you paid your dues by check last year, your dues amount is printed in the upper right corner of your mailing label.  Please bring this amount to the August meeting with your check made payable to NCAE.  ***Please note this change: all dues checks should be made to NCAE rather than to our local unit as in the past.***  If you are unable to attend the meeting, you may mail your check to Dot Barker, 451 Poplar Hill Dr., Boone NC 28607.  If you receive your newsletter by email, you may check with Dot, dot24@bellsouth.net, about your amount.

If your label has PR (Payroll Deduction) or EFT (Electronic Funds Transfer) printed on it, you have chosen to have your dues deducted from your retirement check.  Do not write a check for your dues if you see PR or EFT on your label.  You certainly will, however, want to write a check for the Scholarship Fund.  These checks can still be made out to Watauga Unit of NCRSP.  If you want to change your method of paying dues, please see Dot for the appropriate forms.

New retirees and membership prospects will not find a dues amount on your mailing label.  If you retired after July 1, 1999, your annual dues are $111.  If you retired between July 1, 1985 and July 1, 1999, your annual dues are $65.  

***If you have notified Dot that you do not plan to rejoin NCRSP and if you have been paying your dues by payroll deduction or EFT, you MUST ALSO notify the state office in Raleigh in writing.  The address is NCRSP Membership, P.O. Box 27347, Raleigh NC 27622-7347.***

Our unit has an Associate Membership plan for noncertified personnel – assistants, secretaries, cafeteria workers.  The Associate Membership is $10 for nonvoting membership in the local unit only and includes our newsletter, The Red Pencil.  Associate Membership does not include membership in the district, state, or national organizations and is available only for noncertified personnel.

If you have any questions about dues, please call Dot Barker at 264-3621 or email her atdot24@bellsouth.net.

2014-2016 Officers

Watauga Unit

North Carolina Retired School Personnel

President                                  Lee Stroupe                              lstroupe@gmail.com

Vice Pres/Pres. Elect                Mary Linda Dooley                    mdooley999@gmail.com

Sec./Treas.                              Dot Barker        264-3621          dot24@bellsouth.net

                                                Bill Winkler                               winklerbr@gmail.com

Honorary Parliamentarian          Robert G. Shipley                     bshipley@nc.rr.com

Legislative Comm. Chr.             Bill Watterson                           wataugateacher@yahoo.com

Membership Comm. Chrs.         Roland, Barbara Moy                moyrf@appstate.edu

Memorials                                Susan McKay                           mckayinboone@live.com

Community Participation chr.      Candace Hall                           mcandacehall@gmail.com

Scholarship                              La Verne Franklin                      franklin160954@bellsouth.net

Decorations                               Linda and Roger Harwood          rlharwood@bellsouth.net

Meeting Arrangements              Margaret Sigmon  264-2036      margaretsigmon@bellsouth.net

Remembrance                          La Verne Franklin                      franklin160954@bellsouth.net

Historian                                   Janice Burns                             burnsjn@bellsouth.net

Red Pencil Editor                     Nanci Tolbert Nance 963-8892 ntn@skybest.com

                                                                                                ntn1066@hotmail.com

Webmaster                               Lee Stroupe  264-1276              lstroupe@gmail.com

Contributions/Suggestions/Email Edition of The Red Pencil, anyone?  Change of email or snail mail address? 

ntn@skybest.com or snail mail to

Nanci Tolbert Nance, P.O. Box 188, Blowing Rock NC 28605

News of Our Members

We mourn the deaths of three of our members this summer and extend our sympathies to the families of Daisy Adams, Margaret Agle, and Catherine Ross.  In their memories, as is our custom, our treasurer has transferred $25 in each name to the Scholarship Fund.

To our email numbers we happily add  R.G. Shipley, who is living in Raleigh with his son, Bob.  We have Bob’s permission to get in touch with Mr. Shipley through his email address,bshipley@nc.rr.com, on his cell, 828.963-0522, and at Bob’s address, 4113 Huckleberry Dr., Raleigh NC 27612.

We are also delighted to share the good news of the continuing recovery of Lera Randall.  The latest is that she is at home in Boone!  We appreciate Richard’s updates.

NCRSP – Strength in Numbers

At the beginning of a new school year, do you know any prospective members of our unit, new retirees who would benefit from membership and add energy and another perspective to our group?  If so, please let them know that we need them and they need us.  What do they have to lose if they don’t join?  Subscriptions to  Panorama and NCAE News Bulletin, FREE accidental death and dismemberment insurance up to $7,500, lobbyists representing retirees’ needs, free hearing screenings, member discount cards for discounts at over 150,000 locations/businesses – and all for as little as $6.75 a month on payroll deduction, that’s what – and more. 

New retirees have received a letter from our unit.  At the bottom of the letter is a coupon for breakfast at our first meeting of the year.

If people ask you exactly what we do, please tell them that in addition to meeting five times a year for fellowship and information, we also donate money and supplies to the Back2School Festival; collect children’s books for Santa’s Toybox; collect food, medicine bottles and plastic bags for the Hunger Coalition; give cell phones to OASIS and to our troops overseas; and provide services to our members that include Christmas gifts for our shut-ins and transportation to meetings.

Volunteer Hours , Our Continuing Struggle 

PLEASE understand that this is no time for modesty.  Every single day, you do something for someone else.  You visit friends in nursing homes, you help to write a newsletter, you work in a community garden, you sing in your church choir, you meet with like minds on a library board or an arts board or a church board, you provide flowers for meetings, you volunteer to take a friend shopping, you’re a substitute grandma in an elementary school class, you work at the polls for elections, and you do a hundred other things.  Part of our reputation with headquarters in Raleigh is based on our volunteer hours.  Please pitch the modesty and tell us LOUD and PROUD about all the wonderful things you do.  Remember that caring for a family member doesn’t count, but almost everything else does!

Something new is here:

This year, in an effort to be more accurate in our reporting, new Community Participation chair Candace Hall and your executive board are asking that you bring a volunteer hours form to EVERY meeting.  You’ll find a form in each Red Pencil so there’s no need to make copies for yourself.

The first report will be due at our first meeting, and that will be the most difficult one for you to do since it will include all the volunteer hours you’ve accumulated this year, from January to August.  After that, the process will be a piece of cake.    You’ll complete a form to cover September and October and turn it in at the October meeting, one to cover November and December and turn it in at the December meeting, one to cover January through March and turn it in at the March meeting, and one to cover April and May and turn it in at the May meeting.  If you know that you are not coming to a meeting, you may mail the form to Candace Hall, 229 Ivy Dr., Boone NC 28607.  Again, a form will be included in each Red Pencil.  We will also try to have blank copies for you to fill in at each meeting.  If you are receiving an electronic version of the newsletter, you may highlight the form, copy it into a blank document, and print it for yourself.  Please take the time to complete this form; Raleigh really wants to know how busy we are!

            

NCRSP Community Participation Volunteer Hours 2014-2015

Name: _________________________________

Category

Jan

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

Jun

Jul

Aug

Sep

Oct

Nov

Dec

Total

Education

XX

XX

XX

XX

Other (not familial)

XX

XX

XX

XX

        Total Hours in All Categories, January-August only ________