December 2016

Mr. Darwin Prater Spiller-President

Dr. Duana Kindle-Past President

Ms. Ishii Tavarez-Vice President

Mr. Michael Thomas-Treasurer

Mrs. Charis Hunt-Recording Secretary

Ms. Tara Eldridge-Chaplin

Mrs. Tamesia Chatman-Corresponding Secretary

Ms. Angela Guesby-Parliamentarian

Mrs. Fannie Albert-Financial Secretary

Mr. Walter Smith-Historian

The RAABSE Executive Board completed their Board Retreat in November. The board was able to collaborate on the future of this wonderful organization. They look forward to sharing all of the great ideas and vision with the RAABSE members!

During our December RAABSE meeting, we signed up for committees, reviewed our Board Retreat and received a great presentation on "Taking Care". Mrs. Adindu from Stults Rd. Elementary presented ways that we can take care of others. Mrs. Chatman from Merriman Park Elementary presented on ways that we can take care of each other and Mr. Spiller presented on ways that we can take care of ourselves. Thank you to all who presented, we definitely left with great information! We are going to continue to have our membership challenges, so invite someone to our next meeting and you could be a winner! Congratulations to Mr. Thomas for winning the membership challenge of our December meeting!

Finance public schools to meet 21st century learning needs, including our growing and diverse student population:

• Ensure adequate funding for increased demands and standards for students.
• Fund targeted student interventions that have proven effective for teaching and learning, especially K-2 reading resources.
• Reserve public funds for public education by rejecting plans that would divert public monies to private entities.
• Preserve the defined benefits plan for retired educators and ensure financial stability of the retiree health care system.

Promote and protect research-based student learning fundamentals:

• Stop high stakes snapshot testing and ensure the nature of effective age and developmentally appropriate student assessments.
• Ensure nature of effective assessments—criterion-referenced, formative, multi-year, varied, ongoing.
• Restore access to voluntary, effective, full-day PreK programs.
• Give children a learning chance. Limit class size in K-4 (22:1). Extend class size limits to PreK (18:1).

More than 700 educators from across the state of Texas gather annually for the TABSE State Conference to attend professional development sessions and educational workshops.

Educational leaders from throughout the state are planning the 2017 Texas Alliance of Black School Educators' (TABSE) 32nd Annual Conference which will be held in Houston, TX at the Hyatt Regency February 23-26, 2017. This year's conference theme is Their Lives, Their Future, Their Education...MATTER. The TASBE Conference will provide excellent learning opportunities designed to meet the needs of every educator.

The regular registration period ends December. 31, 2016.

Click HERE to register for the conference.

TABSE:

Texas Alliance of Black School Educators is an affiliate of NABSE. TABSE is committed to improving the educational achievement of African-American students by increasing the participation and expansion of Texas affiliates. TABSE further believes in identifying and promoting those activities, which are designed to sensitize the public at-large and educators, specifically to the needs of African-American students in academic and non-academic areas of development.

NABSE:

The National Alliance of Black School Educators is the nation's premier non-profit organization devoted to furthering the academic success for the nation's children-particularly children of African descent. Now in its 46th year, NABSE boasts an outreach to more than 10,000 preeminent educators including teachers, administrators, superintendents as well as corporate and institutional members. Found in 1970, NABSE is dedicated to improving both the educational experiences and accomplishments of African American youth through the development and use of instructional and motivational methods that increase levels of inspiration, attendance and overall achievement.

Do you have any news that you'd like to share with the RAABSE organization? We'd love to hear about any future events, news or spotlights! Please submit them to Ishii Tavarez by the end of each month.