How has the economy affected the San Marino Unified School District?

KP: It's been devastating. We only have a $29 million budget and we had to slate a $5 million cut based on the current economic condition in the state of California. That equates to one-third of our staff having to be cut.

This state is in terrible shape, it has been really devastating to school districts. That said, we saw this coming and we really worked way ahead of the game to plan for it. And email marketing has been absolutely critical in that effort, especially our recent success with passing the parcel tax.

We communicate with a database of nearly 8,000 people on a very regular basis. So during this tough economic time we have been able to prepare our community for what the financial crisis is in the state, how it affects public education, and specifically how it affects San Marino schools. We've communicated every week at times when we needed to, repeating information that we had said before just in case people missed it last time.

And people are very appreciative that we ...

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.