Why are you running for CCSD Trustee? What is your vision of success for this role? 

I am running for CCSD Trustee because it is a position with potential to positively impact ALL the kids within the district and the communities in which they live. My vision of success aligns with the current board vision: “all students progress in school and graduate prepared to succeed and contribute in a diverse global society.” However, action needs to extend beyond these words. Resources (teachers, funding, support programs) need to be properly allocated to ensure each student has equal opportunity to succeed. Once provided this equal playing field, students (and their families) must be held accountable to being a part of the learning team.

How do you define student success? What experience do you have and what role do you intend to play in advocating for student success?

Student success is measured in their ability to become a productive part of the community upon graduation from the public school system. Whether that be through continuing education or entering the work force, they must be prepared to thrive to the best of their abilities.

My experience in shaping student success has primarily been as a consistent volunteer in youth mentorship programs in schools around the country, within the schools of my children, and for 10 years as a youth sports coach.

Additionally, I have had the opportunity to serve on school organizational teams (SOT) at the elementary and high school levels within District E. In these roles I have been able to learn and participate in the critical processes of utilizing test data to drive informed decisions, and in budget approval processes at the school-level.

As a board trustee my role would be to ensure that student success lies at the root of every issue we address and decision we make. My ONLY agenda is to drive student success through community engagement and collaboration with the rest of the board.

On the 2022 National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP), fourth-grade students, in Nevada, scored 6 points lower in math and 7 points lower in reading when compared to 2019. If elected, how can you use your position to ensure Nevada stops following this national trend and starts leading the way for student outcomes?

We can and must do better. It isn’t surprising to see that scores dropped since 2019 considering the impact of COVID on learning habits, student attendance, and student progression. That said, it is critical that the community join together to make education a priority. This starts at home! Even with the best teachers, the best infrastructure, the best funding, if families don’t prioritize education for their students and don’t get their kids to school there is little room for success.

I would prioritize community engagement to see what we, as the board, could do to help make student success a priority in their homes. This is truly a team effort and without buy-in from families the whole team struggles.

What, if any, barriers currently exist to educational excellence and equity for every student? If elected to the Board of Trustees, how will you help eliminate these barriers?

– Lack of community engagement: board trustees are responsible to make themselves accessible and available to the communities they serve. Through these engagements they can properly represent the concerns of those who elect them and make valuable input to the board as decisions are shaped to benefit the whole district.

I would be available and responsive to District E and would utilize frequent engagement to effectively represent our community.

– Poor attendance: while attendance numbers improved slightly over the last year they are still unacceptably high. When kids miss school, they start a domino effect of not being able to understand new material because they missed the previous material, which then has negative mental health impacts and builds negative feelings about school. Additionally, as educators work to bring the absent students up to speed, resources are directed away from the kids who are already prepared to continue learning.

The responsibility of getting kids to school and/or enforcing their attendance lies at home. It is not ok for caregivers to enable absenteeism. As a board member I would continue and increase focus on programs that identify chronic absenteeism as early as possible and intervene with families to figure out solutions.

– Teacher recruiting and retention: The recent pay increases for teachers were long overdue. While these increases are a great step in the right direction, particularly in recruiting new talent, there are still problems to address to ensure we retain existing talent. Most notably, paying existing educators based on the education level they achieved prior to the new policy. It is outrageous that a brand-new teacher could be hired and make more than an experienced teacher with an equivalent academic qualification. Retention is in trouble!

I would work with the board, proactively, to ensure our educators are compensated appropriately. It shouldn’t require union action or a strike to ensure our teachers are properly taken care of.

What do you believe are the top three most persistent challenges facing the CCSD Board of Trustees? What is an example of a bold approach you would propose to address one of those challenges?

– The board consistently gets distracted from focusing on student success. Whether this be from disagreements amongst board members, lack of tact and respect between the board and community, or poor accountability…they are all distractions.

I would work with the board to develop a system that prioritizes issues based on direct impact to student success. Every issue, every discussion, every action item would begin with intent toward a specific student issue and scored on significance. This would help establish a prioritization that maintains a focus on student success and pushes distractions down the priority list.

– There is a lack of community engagement outside regularly scheduled board meetings. Leading up to my decision to run for school board I tried to reach multiple trustees and never got a single response. Additionally, having been on school organizational teams (SOT) for two schools, not once did my trustee try to engage. How can a trustee represent the community they are elected by if they aren’t reachable?

I would ensure communication lines to me were always open and that I would make the bold move to answer them. Additionally, I would attend SOT meetings across District E on a regular basis to build relationships and foster great communication.

– I have observed a lack of tact, respect, and focus between the board and the public. This goes both ways. As the elected body, the board must set the tone of transparency, integrity, and service. If these tenants are maintained, there is no reason the public should not reciprocate with tactful, respectful, student-focused conversations.

I would lead the way in setting the example for the proper way to treat people. If things begin to take a turn away from professionalism and student success, I will utilize my calm-under-pressure approach to refocus the situation.

In January four appointed members were added to the Board of Trustees. How will you leverage the expertise of these appointed members to best serve students? Do you think the appointed members should be voting members? 

The recently selected appointees bring an awesome amount of experience, particularly from a teacher and administrator perspective. Any time the board can become more informed through the experiences of those who operated so close to the front lines for so long, it’s a win for the students. Thhe contributions that I’ve seen from the appointees to this point have been positive and it’s wonderful to have such experienced members of the community volunteer their time in the interest of driving student success.

That said, I have two concerns with making the appointed members, voting members. First, an appointee, by nature of how they earn their seat, is only accountable to the entity that appoints them versus to the constituents. Second, increasing the number of voting members can lend to divisiveness, thus distraction from being able to focus on student success. If we proceed down a path of adding voting members to the board, it should be through the election process.

Research suggests that more than 50% of a board meeting should be focused on student outcomes. How would you ensure the board allocates this amount of time to student outcomes?

There needs to be a system to identify and weigh how each issue or topic brought before the board drives toward strategic outcomes of student success. More heavily weighted, clear drivers of outcomes should be prioritized while those that do not lead toward that end must be postponed and/or sent back out for clarification of intent.

I would work with the other members of the board to hold the board president accountable to set and enforce this prioritization.

If elected to the Board, how would you approach challenging conversations and/or criticisms that might arise from fellow Board members, stakeholders, and the broader community?

Challenging conversations must be met head-on. Every person by virtue of their status as a parent, caregiver, educator, or member of our community has a different perspective based on their own experiences, successes, and struggles. Through deliberate and productive community engagement, these challenging conversations can drive positive change.

Criticisms must always be handled tactfully. Amongst board members, there is no room for public criticism of other board members. Stakeholders and the broader community are of course entitled to their criticisms, and I welcome them knowing that any decision I make or support will be in the best interest of the students.

What key indicators would you use to assess the performance of CCSD’s Superintendent? How would you hold the Superintendent accountable?

My military training and experience taught me to always work from the target backwards, meaning you must know what you want to achieve if you are going to figure out a way to get there. This is referred to in the teaching community as backward planning.

With that, in coordination with the other board members, strategic imperatives need to be updated to reflect things that are specific, measurable, and achievable. From these well-defined strategic imperatives, we would be able to define performance-based indicators that would be used to assess the performance of the Superintendent. If, despite appropriate feedback, the Superintendent does not meet the required performance they would need to be evaluated for removal from this critical position.

In a recent survey, 77% of Nevada residents agreed that parents should be able to send their children to the public school they feel is best for their child, even if it is outside of their neighborhood. Do you agree? Please explain your reasoning.

The district needs to do more to raise the standard of struggling schools to reduce the desire of parents to send their students outside of their respective zones. I interpret this data point as Nevada residents saying that they should be able to choose the best schools for their children. Of course they do. I do not think the solution is allowing parents to send their students to whatever school they want. Moving the students is a band-aid fix. Improve the district…improve the schools…improve overall student success.

The following question was submitted by a current public high school student: How will you ensure students are put at the forefront of the decision making process as a member of the Board of Trustees, and what accountability measures would you put in place to make sure this happens? 

Every issue, topic, and decision needs to start with an intent that clearly states the tie to the desired outcome of driving student success. If it cannot be tied to this outcome, it goes to the bottom of the agenda. As a new trustee I will work with the other board members to ensure the board president adheres to this standard.