Faculty Rep Profile
Mary Cardoso
Carriage Elementary
Mary Cardoso's parents emigrated from the Azores Islands to the Modesto area where she grew up on a dairy farm along with her ten siblings. Having so many brothers and sisters didn't feel out of the ordinary. It seemed normal to her as many people in the Portuguese-Catholic community had large families. She continues to view it as a true blessing...so many built in friends and supporters. While growing up she always enjoyed school and loved to play teacher with her friends and siblings. When Mary was in high school she thought about becoming a teacher, but was dissuaded by a student teacher who said there were no jobs in teaching. She went on to college to pursue other interests.
She graduated from CSU Sacramento with a degree in Journalism and spent several years after graduation working as a department manager at Macy*s. While there, she decided to pursue her lifelong interest in teaching, so she went back to school and received a Multiple Subjects Credential. Later Mary went back to school and earned a Master's Degree in Education along with a Reading Specialist Credential.
Mary has been working fulltime in the San Juan Unified School District for 15 years and all of those years have been spent teaching at Carriage Elementary. She's taught 3rd grade for the past 10 years and the other 5 years were spent teaching grades K-3. Prior to working at Carriage, Mary taught ROP courses and was a guest teacher in the San Juan Unified School District.
In her spare time Mary enjoys traveling to the Azores with her family. She also enjoys spending time with her dog Kiwi who occasionally comes to school with her and has been adopted by her students as the class pet.
Being a union representative is important to Mary because she wants to be a voice of support for the teaching profession. She believes in being a part of the decision making process and being an advocate for teachers and students.