League of Women Voters of Ohio Education Fund
Hamilton County, OH November 8, 2005 Election
	Lynn P. Larson Answers Questions Candidate for Board Member; Wyoming City School District

Questions & Answers

1. What are your Qualifications for Office? (50 word limit)

I bring a strong commitment and belief in our community's excellence in educating our children. My financial education and career experiences, communication skills, problem solving initiatives and planning capabilities are strengths that would serve our Board of Education and are evidenced by long-standing community volunteerism and leadership.

2. What plans do you have to address your top three priorities? (100 word limit)

1. Change the perception and mystique of how the Board operates by providing greater access to board members to listen to community concerns. Use email, community forums and informal access before agenda-managed board meetings.
2. We will always need our community tax dollars to augment state funded education. Long term alternative funding can be realized through growing the Wyoming School Foundation's Endowment. But currently, our only choice is controlling expenses by continuing to seek cost saving initiatives especially in employee benefits and collective purchasing.
3. Support our administrators and educators as they challenge themselves and our students in the educational process.

3. What will you do as a Board of Education member to increase parental involvement in your school system? (100 word limit)

We are fortunate to have extensive parental involvement.

Continue to communicate educator's needs and matching them with the readily available parental resource. We already do this well through open houses, PSA, Wyoming Boosters, and teacher involvement with the parents. Encourage parents and students to make use of Internet access to student's homework and grades. Use email (individual and mass) to keep the dialog flowing directly with the teachers, administrators and parents.

4. As a candidate, how can you improve community relations with residents?

Improving community relations will require the entire board to place a greater value on community input. Three times each year facilitate forums for residents to talk and board members to listen. Discussion topics could highlight finances, curriculum, or facility changes along with resident's topic of choice. Use email for joint and individual communication with all board members. Streamline and create reader friendly publications reworking "Know Your Schools". And finally, allow board meeting attendees' time before the agenda structured meeting to informally give input and freely discuss concerns.