League of Women Voters of California Education Fund
	Santa Clara, Santa Cruz County, CA November 4, 2008 Election
	Candidates Answer Questions on the Issues Trustee; West Valley-Mission Community College District; Trustee Area 3

The questions were prepared by the Leagues of Women Voters of Santa Clara County and asked of all candidates for this office.     See below for questions on Experience, Board's Role, Goals Click on a name for candidate information.   See also more information about this contest. 1. What experience and training would you bring to this office? Answer from Kathi N. Tran: With her unique perspective as a former student leader and student board member, Kathi has the invaluable experience of knowing students issues first hand. She is a skilled problem solver who is able to look at multi-faceted problems and make decisions based on the long-term benefits to the community. She will be a wonderful Board member. Answer from Adrienne Grey: My career over 30 years includes management positions in Finance, Information Systems, Manufacturing Operations, and Materials/Procurement. I currently work with Symphony Consulting delivering supply chain management solutions to local high tech companies. My natural interest is understanding and improving processes and systems that may interfere with people performing their jobs effectively. Often, competing priorities of various stakeholders cause conflict that ends up adding unnecessary time, cost, and stress to the work environment. I enjoy helping individuals and teams identify ways to minimize barriers that may be hindering group performance. I look forward to putting my strong analytical and facilitation skills to work in addressing complex district issues. Answer from Frank Jewett: I will bring nearly 20 years of business and community service to the office, in order to build better community through leadership. My focus will be to bring my leadership training from business, indusry problem and the Naval Reserves to effectively problem solve, provide effective communication to students, staff, faculty and the community regarding the needs issues and concerns of the district. My demostrated leadership in the passage of funding that provided $235 Million Dollars in funding for classrooms and campus revitalization provides me with valuable experience to be an effective Board Member in a second term on the WVMCCD Board of Trustees. My ability to be an effective problem solver, effective communicator, effective listner and over 19 years of business experience provide me with skills to play a leadeship role in the building of better community through supporting student educational achievement,and faculity and staff professional achievement. 2. What do you see as the role of the Board in labor negotiations? Answer from Adrienne Grey: The Board is responsible to set parameters for labor negotiations and monitor their progress. I would seek to foster an open and collaborative relationship with and between district bargaining units, senates, administration, community stakeholders, and the Board, to promote constructive dialogue and to fashion win-win solutions wherever possible. Answer from Frank Jewett: The Board of Directors serves as the policy making body and set the direction and helps to facilitate the execution of the direction of the district. The role is labor negotiations is to carefully weigh all the options, wants, desires and aspirations of all the parties involved and act with the highest and best interest of the District in mind. The Trustees must answer to the Public regarding the effective usage of District resources for the highest and best use. As a Trustee you must determine stategies to ensure that staff, faculty and management are dealt with in the highest and most professional manner during negotiations. Negotiations should be managed so that all parties issues are addressed with fairness and equity. 3. What are your goals for the college? Are students, faculty and staff currently meeting those goals? Answer from Frank Jewett: The goals for the district are the following: -Develop partnerships between students, faculity and administration of the District to achieve mutual objectives, developing "Best Practices Models of success. The District is working on a number of areas to improve it success overall. I want to continue to help and support the suceess plan. -Expand and improve business and community partnerships. The district needs greater resources in order to reach more partners. I plan to assist in increased funding in order gain inceased partnerships for greater District awareness and support. Create data base to establish Alumni Association to incease support for academic achievment. Due to costs the district has not developed a data base -Continue to Develop alternative funding streams to incease staff, faculity support to support student achievement. -The process has begun through the District Advancement Foundation which is charged with procuring community and grant funding for the District. -Establish long term financial plan for the District in order to provide long term fiscal managment and ongoing funding to meet the continued needs of the District and the Silicon Valley Community. -The fiancial planning is taking place, but has not been fully implemented. -Serve as a leader for the ongoing and efficent use and allocation of educational resouces. http://www.frankjewett2008.org Answer from Adrienne Grey: My ideal vision is a well-funded pair of campuses providing a diverse community with the finest education possible, in an environment where students, staff, faculty, and administration feel respected and rewarded for their efforts. Achieving this long-term vision depends on, 1) sufficient enrollment to stabilize income from tuition and the state per-pupil funding formula, 2) fostering community and business alliances to develop additional revenue opportunities, and 3) tapping faculty and staff ideas on how best to improve processes to produce revenue and reduce operating costs. The recently approved 2008/09 district budget includes $9M in one-time funding to offset a projected deficit. Balancing the budget will be a significant challenge in uncertain economic times, with our state's ongoing fiscal health an unforeseeable variable. We must pull together to manage through unpleasant realities, with an eye toward protecting the core mission, values and goals of the two colleges. Responses to questions asked of each candidate are reproduced as submitted to the League.  Candidates' responses are not edited or corrected by the League. The order of the candidates is random and changes daily. Candidates who did not respond are not listed on this page.