It was very gratifying to have so many of you at the meeting inJanuary. It helps with all of the work we do to have so manymembers at the meetings to see what is going on and where weneed help. Everyone is so good about helping that it lessens thework load on the rest of us.

I hope everyone enjoyed the wonderful luncheon that we had forthe January meeting. The soup and salads were very good. Thiswas the first time we had tried any thing like that and I hope ev-eryone enjoyed it as much I did. I think it was a success and ifyou are a hostess for a month and would like to try somethingdifferent like a special theme, give it a try!!

Now that the holidays are over, I’m hoping that everything willquiet down somewhat. We do have the Community outreachday coming up on March 18th. Everyone who hasn’t been to oneshould come for at least a little while to see what a wonderfuljob Vera and Renny do putting it together. If you would like tohelp set up for the event contact either Vera or Renny.

Please keep track of all of the hours you work, they help with theyearly reports.

Thanks again for all of the work all you do and all of the timeyou put in that makes our club such a success!!

Message from the Prez....

Silver City Woman’s Club The Power of Women THE INFORMANT

Lucinda Maddox, President

http://silvercitywomansclub.org/

silvercitywomansclub1909@gmail.com

What’s Missing (or Overlooked) in Schools and States

Ninety percent of Title I schools—those receiving federal funding for a high percentage of low-income students--do not offer computer science (CS) courses, and those that do are more likely to cover keyboard-ing and Microsoft applications than true software engineering, such as mobile app and web development. Re-search shows that 98 percent of all CS majors report exposure to the field prior to college, and when studentsare exposed early on, interest in the field increases dramatically.There is little incentive for schools and districts to include technology courses. There are few high school state re-quirements, no prerequisite mandates to enter college, and basic course materials are expensive to purchase andmaintain. Compared to white and Asian students, African-American and Latino learners have far less access toCS classes or after-school programs. White and Asian learners, for instance, are between 1.3 and 2 times morelikely to attend school with a robotics club.

There’s also no coherent set of curricula and pedagogical resources to inform instruction as for other subjectssuch as literacy or mathematics; some refer to CS education as the “wild west.” The field evolves so quickly thatit’s difficult even for computer scientists to define its contents and delimit boundaries. This leads to vastly differ-ent experiences for students nationwide and causes engineering courses to be ephemeral, exiting schools if fund-ing is reduced or if qualified teachers leave the school.

Few incentives currently drive teachers to commit to teaching software engineering, as schools and districts gen-erally don’t prioritize this coursework. Technology professionals also have many career options other than teach-ing. Those interested in teaching will see more resources and support in other core subject areas that requirestandardized testing or at more affluent schools.

An often overlooked barrier is belief systems: teachers' unconscious biases about their students, dominant-group students’ assumptions about their peers, employers’ beliefs about women and people of color, and stu-dents’ beliefs about themselves can discourage girls and underrepresented minorities from pursuing careers inSTEM. African-Americans and Latinos are also less likely to know an adult who works in the technologyindustry, making it difficult to envision oneself in technology.

According to more than 20 years of research and field studies, we know students' true intellectual and cre-ative capabilities are masked in situations of "stereotype threat" -- awareness of negative stereotypes associatedwith their "group" (male/female, majority/minority race, etc.). This inhibits students' performance on complexor creative tasks, interest, confidence, and feelings of belonging.

What Now?It’s clear the scope of the problem is broad. But we have many ways to improve, including federal and state poli-cies that enable schools and districts to prioritize technology coursework so that all students, particularly those inTitle I schools, receive quality CS education. These policies should be developed with careful consideration ofother student learning requirements around core subjects, with attention to change management issues.

In the short and medium term, schools and STEM advocate organizations should develop strategies to help exist-ing teachers become excellent CS teachers, including professional development around the role of unconsciousteacher bias. In the long term, one can expect that as these courses are prioritized and accompanied by robuststandards, curricula, and teacher professional development, CS teaching will emerge as a viable path. This willempower underrepresented students and families to thrive in the fourth industrial revolution.

Sabina Bharwani is the Managing Director of Innovation Strategy at Teach For America and the Founderof Hello World Tech Studio, a computer science/ engineering enrichment initiative that supports K-12 stu-dents.

January 13th Members Meeting

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Lynda Aiman-Smith

NM Legislative Session 2017 – Bills Introduced in the First Week

The number one priority of the NM legislature will be fixing a $69 million hole in our current year’s budget. Youmay remember that the special session called on Sept 30, 2016 did result in bills that plugged what was seen asthe deficit hole then, mainly by “sweeping” money from the Tobacco Settlement Fund, diverting money that wasintended to go to educational materials, diverting money that was supposed to head to the Retiree Health CareAuthority, by pulling unspent monies from some Capital Outlay budgets, and finally by cutting the budgets of anumber of state agencies.

Well, turns out those moving-around of funds and belt-tightening in the fall were not enough to make up forcontinued dismal revenues in our state. Therefore, several bills have been introduced to address New Mexico’ssolvency dilemma:

Senate Bill 111, would require all FY 2017 balances of the Insurance Operations Fund, the Fire ProtectionFund, the Fire Protection Grant Fund and the Law Enforcement Protection Fund to revert to the General Fundrather than carry forward for spending in FY 2018.

Senate Bill 112, Capital Outlay Project Change, would scoop back into the General fund any unused SeveranceTax Bond project funding to the General Fund, even on Capital Outlay projects that were authorized last legisla-tive session. This could end up to be very disturbing for municipalities, since there has been an ongoing painfuldelay process of getting the actual state agreements, even on clearly shovel-ready programs. So municipalitiescould see Capital Outlay funds that had not been spent only because of NM agency delays being yanked away.

Senate Bill 113, would provide authority to reduce agency operating budgets, thereby reducing General Fundappropriations for the current fiscal year, would transfer cash balances in certain funds to the General Fund, andtransfer remaining tobacco settlement fund cash balances to the General Fund. This could result in over $100million increase in General Fund balances. This might sound fine, until you look deeper and realize one of thetransfers includes $4 million from the Enhance 911 Fund. The funding for the professionals and equipment tohave dispatchers answering 911 and other emergency calls are already so tight as to create potential crises.

Senate Finance Committee Substitute for SB 114 reduces the school districts’ and charter schools’ 2017 stateequalization guarantees by $49.3 million, transferring those funds to the General Fund. All four bills have passedthe Senate and are now in the House. Identical bills were introduced in the House, House Bills 4, 5, 6 and 7,which are still winding their way. Of course, these actions only plug the current deficit.

Still to come – developing a budget for the coming fiscal year. The state is looking at least a $360 million short-fall, so we should expect some contentious battles.

Other bills that caught my eye as I was reviewing what has happened in less than a week since the legislature wasconvened are ones that raise money for road repair and maintenance; place an interest cap on “payday loans”and bills on Broadband Infrastructure.

Gas Tax to Help Roads -- Introduced and heading toward committees are two bills. Senate Bill 95 “Gas TaxIncrease and Distribution” would raise the gasoline tax from $.17 to $.27 per gallon with $.05 to the state and$.05 to local governments. It would also increase the special fuels tax from $.21 to $.26 per gallon. From theHouse, Bill 63 “Local Option Fuel Tax” would authorize a locally imposed $.05 per gallon tax on gasoline. Thiswould be subject to referendum, which means that our local government would have to propose such a tax, andthen we as local citizens would vote on it.

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New Mexico hasn’t raised its gas tax for more than 20 years, and over those two decades the value of the dollarshrank to about half of what it was worth then. This means in the state we are still trying to build and maintainroads on a continuously decreasing amount of money. One senator who has already spoken solidly in favor ofraising the gasoline tax is Senator John Arthur Smith, D-Deming. Despite his reputation of being a “conserva-tive” Democrat, Senator Smith acknowledged that a popular sound-bite of proclaiming “no tax increases” in thecurrent state of our state is not a responsible action toward the citizens.

Capping interest rates on payday loans – Senate Bill 15 and House Bill 26 both seek to cap the interestrate on low-volume “payday loans” to 36%. Silver City has ten (10) such small-amount, high-interest lenders –all actually part of giant financial corporations headquartered outside of our state. Notice how visible they areon HWY 180 – with names like Courtesy Loans, Fastbucks, Sun Loan, LoanMax. These businesses loanamounts between $300 and $2500; and they do so at extremely high interest rates. The average loan is for$500, and it gets rolled over (renewed) an average of three times. Such a borrower of this small amount of mon-ey will end up paying, on average, 450% interest to use the money less than three months. Other states havetaken legislative actions on these egregious predatory loans, and New Mexico should too. However, the paydaylending lobby is active at the Roundhouse (of course they are, they extract millions of $$$ of profit from our cit-izens). We will see how events unfold.Broadband Infrastructure – our rural region lags painfully in developing Broadband Infrastructure (e.g.access to high speed internet). House Bill 60 amends the Local Economic Development Act (LEDA) and ex-pands the definition of “economic development project” or “project” to include infrastructure for rights-of-wayfor the placement of new broadband telecommunications network facilities. Senate Bill 24 adds broadbandtechnology infrastructure to the definition of “services” under the Infrastructure Development Zone Act. HouseBill 113 requires the state’s Chief Information Officer from the Department of Information Technology to devel-op and maintain a statewide, multipurpose, high-capacity scalable telecommunications and broadband networkto meet the demand of state agencies, political subdivisions and educational institutions. This would affect ourregion because we are the home of WNMU, which would be included in this network.In summary, the legislative session is just underway, but legislators hit the ground running to try and deal witha horrible revenue shortfall. Since it is a 60 day session there is a lot of slogging ahead. More in next month’sLegislative Update.

was born in Silver City and grew up inHurley and Silver City. I am the oldestof 6 siblings.

I graduated from WNMU in 1977 with aBachelor's degree in Psychology and So-ciology. I have been employed in a vari-ety of fields but spent the majority of mycareer working at Gila Regional MedicalCenter. I have been married to my hus-band, Mark, for 11 years. Our "kids" aretwo very spoiled cats. I love animals,house plants, and things with hearts. Ialso enjoy baking, sewing, crafts, andreading. I spend a lot of time with myparents who live one block away. Mymom and I love to go bargain shoppingtogether at yard sales and thrift stores. Iam a member of the Silver Stompersline dancing group. I look forward tocontributing to the endeavors of theClub and making new friends.

MARYLEE BELL

My family includes my son and daughter, and granddaughter; and my husband, Sam(and his kids).....and my cat, named Morris. Sam and I are "Urban Farmers", inasmuchas we keep bees and chickens, grow wine grapes, and raise vegetables on our property(about five blocks west of the Silver City Woman's Club building).

I retired from my mortgage company, Hometown Mortgage of New Mexico, eight yearsago to pursue other passions; namely, cheese and wine making.... and executing theperfect loaf of bread. Now, it seems, I feel compelled to dabble in anything and every-thing else, that's Fermented. Kombucha, kefir, kvass, sauerkraut, pickled fruits andveggies of all kinds (even fermented honey!) are challenges I must meet.Although I have never been a joiner, of any organization, I decided it was time to trysomething new. Perhaps I may become a "contributing member of society", again - itcould happen.....JUDY RUEBUSH

Donna Sebastian is one of many retirees who moved to Silver City to finda quieter lifestyle. She spent more than fifteen years searching for theright place to move. Once she found Silver City, it took her only three daysto make the decision to move and put a down payment on a house. At last,she could escape the chaos of southern California. To date the only thingshe truly misses is a full service car wash.

Prior to retirement Donna was in education as a teacher and an adminis-trator. When asked what she taught her reply is students from kindergar-ten to community college.” Donna has a BA in Anthropology and a MA inSchool Administration.

When she retired, Donna went back to school to earn a degree in FashionDesign because sewing has always been her avocation. Designing andmaking garments is still a great interest. Like her teaching career thatspanned twelve plus grades her interest in fiber also includes everythingfrom garment construction, quilting, fiber arts, knitting and more.

Ever curious about her surroundings Donna also likes to travel and hasvisited 28 countries on five continents, 37 of the United States, and 29 Na-tional Parks and Monuments. Donna has also planned many road tripsand adventures for her friends. The place she enjoys the most is alwaysthe last place she visited.

Donna looks forward to meeting and working with the woman of the Sil-ver City Woman’s Club.

DONNA SEBASTIAN

Silver City Woman’s Club GFWCNMMeeting MinutesJanuary 13, 2017

Number present: 32 List includedCalled to order by President Lucinda Maddox. We began by saying the Collect, The Pledge of Allegiance and NewMexico Flag Salute.

Introductions: Carol Brocks, a long-time member is back. Guests: Marylee Bell, a new member; Donna Sebas-tian & Judy Ruebush, new members.

Cynthia Nañez gave a report on the Life Quest, Early prevention, which serves 250 families in Hidalgo, Luna andGrant Counties.

Jenny Ferranti and Dianna Perea gave a report for First Born in Grant County.

The Baby items brought in by the SCWC members will be divided between the above two organizations and theGila Regional Medical Center (hospital).

Cecelia Bell moved the MINUTES of the November 2016 meeting be approved. The motion was seconded. Themotion passed and they will be filed.

Treasurer’s Reports for November and December 2016 will be filed for audit.Reports attached

Gourmet Delights, Holiday Baskets and Sweet Sale – Renny Hutton: First we must give Vera MacGregora big thank you for making the Sweet Sale such a profitable success. Customers who filled out surveys were im-pressed by the baskets and the food offered. They were also impressed with the organization and how much funit was to be there. The majority of customers read about the event in the SC Daily Press. Report attached

Membership report -Carolee Cross announced that our new member, Marylee Bell, makes our paid enroll-ment 60, New Mexico’s largest GFWC! We have had 11 members sign up since June 2016.

Building Rental – Linda Maddox: We only have the building rented on January 14, 2017 and February 4, 2017for a 70th wedding anniversary. On February 7, 2017 there will be a School Board Election. On March 7, 2017 willthe Silver City election.

Kitchen – Susie Salars: The kitchen did make a profit on our Christmas dinner. The Kitchen Committee will beserving 70 people on January 14, 2017.

Conservation – Lequita Lett turned in four and a half pounds of aluminum pull-tabs.

Community Outreach – Vera MacGregor: Community Outreach Day will be held at the SCWC Building inMarch. We plan to host 30 organizations. We have 17 so far. Because we did not get a grant, we will only servefruit and snack bars.

Distribution of school supplies will take place on Saturday, July 29, 2017, from 10 AM to 2 PM. We will give tofamilies instead of giving to the schools. The supplieswill be given in bags (or backpacks if we receive a grant), packed according to grade level.We will be making fewer, but larger donations for the 2017-2018 fiscal years. Organizations will be asked to fillout a one page application to help us decide who we will get the donations. Report attached

See’s Candy – Susie Salars and Deby Maldonado: The sale was very successful, but not all of the candy wassold. You can still buy some after this meeting. Report attached

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From previous page

Publicity – Renny Hutton: 309 people saw the location of the SCWC on our Website via Google Maps, 205people saw information about SCWC on our Website via Google Search. Renny acknowledged that WNM Com-munications gave a special donation to our Sweet Sale and will be listed on our Website.

Old Business:If we have a Golf Tournament, it will be our 4th Annual. But we need a Chairperson. Most of the work hasbeen done. We have 62 signs made. We just need someone to contact those 62 businesses for their support. Thisshould be done by March, before they have allocated their donation monies. The date of the Tournament shouldhave been made last week. Carolee Cross will make the reservation and will help the new chairman when she is intown. Someone is needed.

Jeannine Jenks has said that she would head the New 2 U Sale in August, IF she has a co-chair who will consid-er heading it in 2018. If she does not have a co-chair, she will not chair it in 2017.

New Business:The Board has recommended changes in the Standing Rules to make them coincide with our practice of sendingBoard minutes by email and Monthly minutes in the Newsletter.The recommendation was approved. Report attached

The Board has recommended that we buy metal shelves for use in our new Conex for more organization; the costwill be limited. This recommendation passed.

Our large coffee pot will need to be replaced in the near future. Renny was asked to research one with a goodprice. She said she would.

Cecelia Bell moved that we adjourn the meeting. The motion was seconded and passed.

AdjournJeannine Jenks, Recording SecretaryJanuary 2017

GFWC MEMBER DISCOUNTS

INSURANCE BENEFITS-VPI Pet InsuranceVeterinary Pet Insurance® provides affordable pet health coverage from preventive care to sig-nificant medical incidents. GFWC members are eligible for a 5% discount (or more for multiplepets) which makes this peace-of-mind protection even more affordable. Find out why VPI is the#1 choice in America for pet insurance. get more information.PHONE: 1-877-PETS-VPI /877-738-7874Mention you’re a member of GFWC and get a discount

AVIS RENT A CAR

You can save up to 25% off your next car rental while experiencing the comfort and reliabilitythat come with renting from Avis. With 4,800 locations in over 140 countries, there’s always anAvis nearby to help you with your car rental needs. To rent a car, visit Avis or call toll free at 1-800-331-1212. And remember to use your B155149 Avis Discount number (AWD): B155149 to en-joy these special savings.PHONE: 1-800-331-1212Use promo code: AWD # B155149

Peggy Lucero 2/21Joan Eng 2/17Judy Ruebush 2/1

Lynda Aiman-Smith 2/28Susie Salars 2/24 Donna Sebastian 1/29

Don’t get ALL weird about gettingolder! Our age is merely a number ofyears the WORLD has been enjoyingUS! unknown

“The longer I live the morebeautiful life becomes”

~Frank Lloyd Wright

The GDHB 2016 Sweet Sale was a big success because we had cooperation and help from the members, localbusinesses and the event committee.

The thanks and gratitude must fall on the bakers who created delicious baked goods, the set-up crew, theevent day volunteers, the hard working committee members and the biggest thanks goes to Vera. For handlinga few members negative comments, for keeping a smile no matter the issues, for the long hours, and finally forenvisioning the GROWTH of the event.

The annual event under the leadership of Vera MacGregor has grown into an amazing and profitable fundraiser.Vera’s organize the organization attitude has really paid off this year with the profit being up. Without settinggoals, holding numerous meetings including a “kick off” meeting, and developing an engaged hard workingcommittee the profits would have fallen short of expectations.

THE NEXT GOURMET DELIGHTS HOLIDAY BASKETS & SWEET SALEWILL BE HELD ON DECEMBER 2, 2017.

WELCOME to our newest member MaryleeBell, daughter-in-law of our long time mem-ber Cecilia Bell. This brings our total mem-bership to 61. Wow - we are now the biggestclub in the state of New Mexico. Way to goladies.

Remember when you are out there talking toyour friends and prospective members - duesare only $25 from now until June. Thanks toall of you for making this such a great Club.

GDHB SWEET SALE: RENNY HUTTON

MEMBERSHIP: CAROLEE CROSS

Community Outreach Committee: Thanks to all of our memberswho donated baby gifts, our annual January Baby Shower was acomplete success. Our speakers were from the First Born Pro-gram and Life Quest Early Intervention Program, and they werevery thankful for all of the beautiful baby gifts.

The Club also donated Walmart gift cards to the Cancer Centerin January and made a donation to Expanding Your Horizons.

We now have eighteen organizations signed up for our 3rd an-nual Community Outreach Day in March. If you are able to helpdistribute flyers or cards advertising the event to the public,please let either Renny or I know. To date, the following groupshave already agreed to participate: Adult Protective Services,Compassion and Choices, Department of Veterans Rural Veter-ans Coordination Program, Department of Veterans WomenVeterans Program, El Refugio, First Born Program, Girl Scoutsof the Southwest, Hidalgo Medical Services, Imagination Li-brary, Life Quest, Life Quest Early Intervention Program, NewMexico Commission for the Deaf & Hard of Hearing, PFLAG,PNM Good Neighbor Fund, St. Francis Associates, Silver AdultCare Services, Silver City Gospel Mission, Silver Regional SexualAssault Services and Silver Regional SANE.

Thank you for your continued generosity. YOU are making a dif-ference in this community.

In January besides the monthly bills theClub spent additional funds on the fol-lowing:

A> NM State Gross Receipt TaxesB> Ink for the Cannon PrinterC>Shelving units for the Conex (metalstorage container)D>Membership suppliesE>Certification of Fire Ext.F>(2) Community Outreach payments

TREASURER: RENNY HUTTONCOMMUNITY OUTREACH: VERA MACGREGOR

CLUBHOUSESCHEDULE

FEBRUARY 2017Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat

1 2 3 4Debra Casper-

Hughes -catered

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Elections

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BoardMeeting

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AGLOW

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14 15 16 17 18Pamela

Apodaca

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Mary Chavez

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February 1, 1978 – First postage stamp to honor a blackwoman, Harriet Tubman, is issued in Washington, DC

February 11, 1989 – Rev. Barbara Harris became thefirst woman bishop in the American Episcopal Churchand in the Anglican Communion worldwide.

February 15, 1921 – The Suffrage Monument, depictingSusan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Lucre-tia Mott, sculpted by Adelaide Johnson, is dedicated atthe U.S. Capitol.

February 24, 1912 – Henrietta Szold founds Hadassah,the largest Jewish organization in American history, fo-cusing on healthcare and education in the Israel andthe U.S.

February 27, 1922 – U.S. Supreme Court upholds the19th Amendment to the Constitution, which guaranteeswomen the right to vote.

February's FlowerViolet / Iris

This is a low, herbaceous plantthat comes in various shadesof blue, mauve, yellow andcream as well as several spe-cies identified as pansies andsymbolize faithfulness, humili-ty and chastity.

The word ‘violet’ is believed tooriginate from the word ‘vias’which translates to mean ‘way-side.’

Hidden messages of the Violetincluded “I’ll Always Be True”(violet) and “Let’s Take AChance” (White/Cream).