Candidate for
County Superintendent of Schools; Alameda County Board of Education

Who Is Helen Foster?

Helen Foster is first and foremost an educator. She is a third-generation teacher with a Doctorate of Education (Ed.D.), who has led California teachers, school administrators and school districts in rigorously improving student achievement. Dr. Foster has taught students and trained teachers in pre-school, elementary, middle, high school, community college and university levels in Alameda County and beyond. Her knowledge of education and the needs of students in districts across Alameda County through teaching, training and consulting include San Lorenzo, San Leandro, Oakland, Alameda, Dublin, Livermore and Fremont Unified School District.

Helen's work as a science teacher, Kodaly-based music teacher, parent, school principal, three-term school board trustee, and university faculty member (School of Education) defines her work and knowledge of the Alameda County Office of Education (ACOE). She has championed the cause for transforming the ACOE from its current status, to the premier COE in the Bay Area and California. Helen believes that ACOE has missed many opportunities, in the last 16 years, to improve teacher and administrative training and to provide research-based and research-tested intervention training to teachers and classified staff. In addition, ACOE has failed to develop economies-of-scale that benefit employees in education across Alameda County. For example ACOE could have, in consultation with the California Association of Joint Powers Authorities (CAJPA), significantly improved healthcare options and lower costs for teachers, classified and management staff in districts and community colleges across Alameda County had they spearheaded a JPA amongst Alameda County districts and community colleges. This has not been done. Santa Clara County Office of Education and Contra Costa County Office of Education have provided outstanding training and meaningful and productive collaboration opportunities in Common Core, Intensive Interventions, English Learner strategies, technology applications and other state-of-the-art professional development while Alameda County Office's offerings have been meager at best. As Alameda County Superintendent of Schools, Dr. Foster will bring strategic, collaborative and cutting-edge change to services delivered by Alameda COE. She will make sure that every training presented or hosted by ACOE is state-of-the-art, important, and worthy of each teacher's (or classified, or management's) valuable time. Helen has her Chief Business Official (CBO) as awarded by the State of California. She will work diligently to insure that ACOE funding is spent carefully and efficiently to support all educational constituencies across Alameda County.

Educational Training

Helen Foster was born in California and raised in the Bay Area and in suburban Maryland outside of Washington, DC. She has a B.A. from University of Michigan in Speech and Drama, a B.S. equivalent in Chemistry from Eastern Michigan University, an Master of Science in Public Health degree in Environmental Engineering from University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, a California Clear Teaching Credential from Cal State East Bay, and a Masters and a Doctorate of Education from St. Mary's College of CA. With her Chief Business Official (CBO) training awarded under California SB 352 funding, her leadership and fiscal expertise in the following areas will be utilized to shore up the efficiency and services of ACOE:

• Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF)
• Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP)
• Long-Term Budget Planning
• Fiscal Oversight, Solvency, & Monitoring
• Categorical Programs Management
• Charter School Accounting
• Charter School Attendance Accounting
• Budget Development & Monitoring * California's K-12 School Finance System
• Charter Funding System Fundamentals
• Charter School Auditing Process
• Special Education Finance
• Facilities Financing Fundamentals
• Personnel & Labor Relations
• Risk Management & Benefits
• Cash Flow Management

Dr. Foster has 12 years of teaching experience in preschool, elementary, middle and high school, and as a faculty member at community college and university level. As a successful site administrator, as measured by improvement in student achievement, Helen has 14 years of experience as an middle school principal, elementary principal, and high school vice principal. Her experience as Manager of Human Resources Classified and Director of Human Resources Certificated, have endowed her with an empathy and advocacy for due process-related assurances for all employees in the educational arena. In addition, Helen has experience in management consulting, private industry, government and as a business owner. Her ability to actively lead, listen, research, analyze and work collaboratively with all stakeholders to arrive at the best decisions to benefit students, employees and parents has been demonstrated time and again.

Priorities, Goals and Vision

As an educational leader and consensus-builder, Helen sees a big piece missing from the current dialogue about Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in terms of its application to students who are 2 or more years below grade level. Common Core does not address the need for these students to "catch up" to their grade-level peers by receiving fast, effective, and intensive intervention support before they can access Common Core grade level curriculum. The reason this is so important is that our students are supposed to gain their education in general education classrooms, not spending years is pull-out or intervention settings.

The Federal government and states such as California decided to implement Common Core curriculum because students across the USA continue to fall behind other countries in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) achievement. High STEM achievement is an indicator of a highly-skilled workforce, and there is wide-spread belief that Common Core will address that need and move our education structure and delivery from the 19th century to the 21st century and beyond.

As a scientist and engineer, Dr. Foster knows first-hand, the importance of high STEM achievement. She will fight for funding and training for STEM across Alameda County by tapping government, public and private sources, with emphasis on student internships, technological support and infrastructure, STEM competitions and university mentorships and collaboration. With UC Berkeley, Lawrence Livermore Lab, Lawrence Berkeley Lab and many other STEM-related global leaders within Alameda County, Helen vision is to secure funding and develop networking for K-14, ROP and community college education in Alameda County with STEM providers around the Bay Area so our schools provide the very best training and opportunities in the state and nation.

As a classical musician and Kodaly-trained teacher, Helen is a leading advocate for supporting and restoring music and arts programs across Alameda County. As an out-of-state high school applicant to University of Michigan, she would never have been accepted had she not had the opportunity to play the viola throughout her K-12 schooling. As opposed to supporting the 3 R's, Helen supports the 3 A's + Academics, Arts & Athletics. Each child has unique gifts and interests. If our public education is to tap those interests to help each student evolve into a socially-responsible, well-educated and productive member of society, Helen's belief is that we need to provide a wide-range of opportunities for those interests to germinate. Dr. Foster is committed to supporting and enhancing those opportunities and to insuring that adult education expands to meet the needs of adults who, through lack of resources or opportunity, were unable to fulfill their education in the K-12 arena.

Dr. Foster will fight to heighten security in schools across Alameda County. Whether the threat is from gun violence such as Columbine or Sandy Hook, or from predatory adults where a mandated reporter missed an opportunity to report child abuse or neglect, she will enhance the training and implementation throughout Alameda County. Helen will spearhead the development of training videos with an on-line assessment, to insure that all public school employees are trained in mandated reporting and recognizing child abuse and neglect. In addition, she sees a need for sexual harassment and blood-borne pathogen training videos for all employees, which to date, are only available at a cost from insurance brokers. She believes ACOE has a vested interest in providing these videos at low or no cost to educational institutions in Alameda County, and at a cost to schools, districts, and city governments outside of the county, to recover the cost of development.