Young Educational Professionals sponsored by LEA

Modeled after Loudoun Young Professionals business group

Vision

The vision of YEP is to engage and empower young educators by providing them with an outlet through which they can collaborate directly with their peers, advocate for their profession and foster community involvement to benefit students and their families.

Mission

Through social activities and community service projects YEP will create a conduit to networking, involvement, and leadership for young educational professionals in Loudoun County.

History

LEA's membership committee proposed sponsorship of this group to the LEA Board of Directors in the spring of 2015. After their approval the YEP group planned 4 socials for 2015-2016 with the hope of engaging educators.

In the spirit of organizing new educators to action, service, and engagement, YEP seeks to promote interaction between novice teachers throughout the county bridging the gap between graduating Student Virginia Education Association members, VEA Sparkers, and new educators to enhance the member experience with a commitment to building a community of peers. YEP will unite and empower members to reach their full potential in the classroom, and to explore leadership potential within the association.

Goals as LEA President 

 As president I pledge to ensure that the Association is recognized as the best advocate for public education in Loudoun County.  I will work to increase active membership and involvement.  

We are the LEA, and together we can! 

 LEAD and Build Community Coalitions

• Work with parents in PTO, PTA, MSAAC and LEAP
• Create strategic Business Partnerships
• Initiate community service projects with organizations that benefit our students and members 
• Promote the LEA president as the “go-to” source for educational knowledge in Loudoun County by building strong relationships with the press through press releases and conferences

ACHIEVE with our Reps

• Work to support our Association Reps to make the LEA have a more visible presence across the school system
• Create focus groups for our certified and classified workforce
• Develop a strike force that Reps can call upon for assistance

SUCCEED with Member Involvement

• Initiate innovative ways to keep members informed (Text, Twitter)
• Promote communication methods already established
• Support member engagement and member rights
• Support education-friendly political candidates
• Increase “member-leaders” through participation in VEA and NEA training

Letter to the Editor 2013

A Call to Action for Parents

Here we go again, but this time, the School Board and Board of Supervisors have devised a new strategy to justify ideological cuts with little regard for the continued erosion of our schools. Fortunately, there is a way that you, as parents, can tell your elected officials to stop doing this. Please consider joining teachers and staff at the rally to "Fund Their Future" at the Government Center in Leesburg at 5 P.M. on Wednesday, February 27th.

Rather than targeting teacher and staff paychecks directly this time, the School Board has figured out how to fund their cuts by increasing the cost of benefits to current employees and slashing their benefits in the future.

Did you know that the proposed LCPS budget, despite reflecting modest increases, does not even cover inflation nor student growth? That's right, Loudoun, not only are your teachers being told to do more with less, but they are being told to do it for more students.

The bulk of the LCPS  budget consists of employee compensation and wages. By targeting this, the School Board will make it impossible to pay teachers here a living wage. Loudoun will become unable to attract and retain the high-quality teachers that you expect your children to have.

You've probably heard that Loudoun County has the highest per-capita income across the U.S. Why, then, can't we pay our teachers a wage that allows them to live here? How can teachers focus on the job of educating students when they must take on a second or third job in order to keep up with inflation? What will happen in your child's classroom if good teachers feel compelled to move to neighboring counties?

Parent and community support through your presence at the "Fund Their Future" rally on the 27th and by communicating your concerns about fully funding the School Board's budget directly to the Board of Supervisors will help stop this erosion of your schools.

David Palanzi is a Leesburg resident who has been teaching business and information technology at Stone Bridge High School since 2001.