Learn more about the Northern California College Promise Coalition (NCCPC) here.
Event Recap
On November 2nd, nearly 100 mayors, elected officials, non-profit, college, CBO, and policy partners came together at Chabot College, including LEAD Filipino Board Chair Meredith Curry Nuñez and Board Member Dr. Rowena Tomaneng. Other special guests such as Santa Clara County Supervisor Cindy Chavez, Milpitas Mayor Carmen Montano, Hayward Mayor Mark Salinas, San José City Councilmember Arjun Batra, Assemblymember Mia Bonta (AD 18), and Assemblymember Liz Ortega (AD 20) attended to speak on their support of college promise coalitions and their collective impact efforts to end poverty in California.
In this special event, organizations went through a Data for Equity Walk, where the NCCPC presented cradle-to-career education and workforce data. Check out the testimonial below from our Board Member, Dr. Rowena Tomaneng on why the Data for Equity Walk and the support of college promise coalitions are important:
“The collaboration between us in education, practitioners, educators, and with city leaders, nonprofits, industry partners, is crucial to ensure we have investments (in this work).”
Dr. Rowena Tomaneng
LEAD Filipino Board Member & President of the San José City College
Following the Data for Equity Walk, we heard from a panel of leaders on the topic Strong Economy, Thriving Democracy, and Healthy Communities. The panelists elevated the intersection of poverty and education and highlighted the critical need for collective partnerships.
At the close of the event, Assemblymember Liz Ortega delivered the Call to Action:
- Become an Education City — Pass a Resolution and use NCCPC’s Toolkit
- Commit to supporting K16 and P20 initiatives by taking one or more specific actions this academic year, (eg promote CalKids) and
- Partner with your local coalitions, CSAs, college promises, and other service providers (eg scholarships, CBOs)
Reflecting back on the event, Board Chair Curry Nuñez said, “It was powerful to see city, county, and state leaders shining a light on how interrelated access to a quality, affordable education is with ending poverty. We are making some gains in closing equity gaps, but they would be even greater if we all worked together to get every resource and dollar to every student and family who needs it. Let’s take into consideration the CalKIDS program, for example. Through our Data for Equity Walk, we saw that only 6% of California families have claimed their CalKIDS accounts when there are 3.6 million children that are eligible. Babies are missing out on a child savings account (CSA) of $175. Public schools 1st through 12th graders are missing out on a CSA of $500-1,500 depending on if they are low-income, homeless, and/or are in the foster care system. Current college students who just graduated from high school can still access their CSA dollars, whether they are at a community college, CSU, UC, or other institution. We can work together to increase that number from 6% to 100%. That’s what this conversation was about, and I’m grateful to see so many leaders excited to work towards collective impact.”
As a culturally responsive organization that cares and advocates for pursuing higher education, we are inspired to see other community leaders answering this call with initiatives in progress in their cities and school districts. We invite you all, as Education Champions, to join us in committing to one of the calls to action!
