To say that the start of 2025 has been challenging is quite an understatement. Many people, including members of our GCC family, were adversely affected by the recent wildfires. Over fifteen of our colleagues, which include retirees, as well as over two dozen students lost their homes. If this were not bad enough, the new federal administration has been creating significant uncertainty in many areas including our professional world of education through a flood of executive orders.
Despite these challenges, I want to focus on hope. Spring is a season of hope. We must have hope and believe in making a positive difference through our actions so that we can be motivated and stay motivated to work towards outcomes that benefit the greater good.
I am hopeful because I work with hardworking and caring individuals every day. During difficult periods, I have seen that our strength is in our compassion and our ability to come together as a community. When our GCC family was affected by the wildfires, we united around the shared value of our ethics of care. Our Guild leadership immediately and consistently met with the administration and the leadership of the Senate and the CSEA. Our ASGCC also played a critical role. Every decision was based on ensuring our colleagues’ and students’ safety and wellbeing. The Guild and the District, as well as the CSEA and the District, worked swiftly to write and sign MOUs to protect our employees who had been impacted by the wildfires. The Fire Emergency Leave language was especially important for our part-time faculty sisters, brothers, and siblings who were impacted by the wildfires as they often have less accumulated sick leave than their full-time siblings.
Even though we often wish that we could do more to help during a crisis like the one we recently faced, it was uplifting that we came together as a community to provide support for our GCC family members. The College reached out to all the employees and students in impacted areas. Support through gift certificates for Ralphs, Target, and DoorDash were provided as well as vouchers for temporary housing. Our incredible GCC Cares program also provided much needed assistance to our students. Moreover, the GCC Foundation Office raised about $600,000 through the generosity of members of our GCC family and beyond to support students and employees impacted by the wildfires.
As a proud member and current president of the Glendale College Guild, AFT 2276, I felt fortunate to be in a position to help coordinate the efforts of our parent union, the California Federation of Labor, as well as the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, in providing monetary and other forms of support for our union siblings.
My hope is that we continue to build on the effective collaboration that was utilized to address the wildfire emergency and expand on it to work to protect what we hold dear regarding public education. Most of us who work in public education are committed to the mission of education, which we understand to be vital for a well-functioning society.
It is through our efforts that students develop the knowledge and skills to become effective members of our society not only in the economic realm but also in the social and political realms. In fact, our democracy, as imperfect as it is, can only survive and improve with a critical mass of informed and active members of society.
We must all do our part no matter how big or small to benefit our society. Here, unions play a vital role. As we say, when the unions are strong, our communities are stronger. On March 4, 2025, our CFT, in collaboration with the American Federation of Teachers, participated in a National Day of Action, where educators and our allies held thousands of events and activities across our nation to protect public education. Members of the Glendale College Guild along with students, classified professionals, and an administrator, attended the March in March on March 4, 2025 in Sacramento. The events and activities that took place on March 4, 2025 are just the beginning of our effort to protect what we hold dear. It is my hope that, like in the case of the wildfires, we will effectively organize and build coalitions to serve the greater good. As the saying goes, “united we stand, divided we fall.” For the sake of the current generation and future generations, we cannot afford to fall.
Richard T. Kamei
March 5, 2025
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