Candidate for
Member, Governing Board; San Bernardino City Unified School District

I'm passionate about education and believe that we need to provide our children a strong foundation in our public schools that will enable them to succeed in our highly competitive global economy. As the eighth-largest school district in California, the San Bernardino City Unified School District has the potential to be the premier public-school system in California, and my goal as your representative on the Board of Education will be to see that vision come true. You need a trustee you can trust -- I am that trustee.

REDEFINING "SUCCESS" -- AND ACHIEVING IT

I believe student success is measured not by a child's capacity to bubble in answers to multiple-choice questions with a No. 2 pencil, but rather by a child's ability to apply acquired knowledge to real-world problems and experiences. We must de-emphasize the overbearing focus on standardized testing and restore creativity and relevance to our curriculum and instruction. History, science, art, music, and technology education are just as important as reading, writing and arithmetic -- and for so many of our kids, those are the classes where education comes alive. We must expand our offerings in the area of vocational education, recognizing that not all of our graduates will attain a college education and giving our students the tools they will need to immediately enter the workforce with a diploma from the San Bernardino City Schools.

We must support programs like the California Cadet Corps, the visual and performing arts, and athletics at all grade levels -- and integrate our core curricular subjects into these programs. These are the programs where our students are engaged in leadership opportunities and meaningful experiences that tie together the knowledge they have acquired in their core subject classes. These are the programs, quite frankly, that will keep our kids in school and keep them interested in learning. These are the programs which, properly supported and properly executed, will do the most toward increasing student learning.

BILINGUAL EDUCATION FOR ALL STUDENTS

Our country, and Southern California in particular, is a melting pot of cultures and languages. The reality of San Bernardino is that neither English nor Spanish is a "second language," and neither language should be treated that way by the public schools. I am passionate about our district's successful dual-language immersion program and believe strongly that every child growing up in Southern California should be fluent in English and Spanish. I will seek to expand our dual-immersion program to all of our campuses, because we must educate all of our students in both languages and encourage each student to master fluency in English and Spanish. We must do this for all of our students, in all of our schools, in all grades, from kindergarten through grade 12.

COMMON SENSE AND LOCAL CONTROL

We need to be fiscally responsible, not just in our current time of crisis but equally during future times of prosperity. I will examine the District's budget with a fine-tooth comb, and insist that every expense be justified in terms of its direct, provable benefit to student success.

No family who is unable to afford the basic expenses of life -- food, clothing, the light bill -- goes out and buys a second house. But that is exactly what our district is doing: making drastic cuts to our operating expenses while embarking on an ambitious program of new-school construction during a period of declining enrollment. This defies logic. The Board of Education must budget our district's limited resources in a sensible, responsible, and fair manner. It must defend its right as the district's governing body to determine where its money comes from, how much it receives, and how we spend it.

We must restore common sense to our district's operations and leadership. To the extent that current laws and regulations prevent us from using common sense, we need to work to change those laws and regulations. There are too many fingers in the public-education pot, and I believe local school boards need greater control of both their expenses and their revenues. I will work with my elected colleagues in Sacramento and in Washington to make those changes happen.

I don't pretend that any of this will be easy, or that it will happen quickly. But these are the things we must do in order to take the San Bernardino City Schools to new heights, and these are the things I pledge to do as your representative to the Board of Education. I will work with the teachers, the classified employees, and the administrators of our district and seek to implement changes that will allow them to best serve our students. I will encourage our students to play a role in shaping the future of their school district by electing a student member to the Board as provided for by law. I will insist that the parents of our students stay involved in their children's education and encourage them to provide their feedback on how we can help their children succeed. I will visit all of our campuses regularly and hold frequent, informal meetings where students, parents, employees and community members can provide feedback. Together, we can all work together to build a world-class school system. I look forward to your support. Please visit my Facebook campaign page and click the "Like" button. Thank you!