English teacher Kimberley Gilles put off grading two piles of "To Kill a Mockingbird" essays to staff a phone bank Sunday and urge San Ramon voters to approve Proposition 30, the tax hike to help stabilize California schools and government, and a local bond measure.
Susan Canty of Los Altos Hills has been living and breathing Proposition 38, another tax measure to increase state school spending. On Wednesday she was urging Mountain View and Los Altos PTA volunteers to spread the word among members.
Teachers such as Gilles and parents such as Canty all hope to save education from potentially devastating budget cuts, but each camp is crusading for only one of two tax measures offering different tax solutions. If both Propositions 30 and 38 pass, only the one winning the most votes will go into effect.
The state's largest teachers union has dispatched platoons of teacher-campaigners, aiming for each of the state's