Candidate for
Trustee; Lodi Unified School District; Trustee Area 4

We have a sacred trust to educate children for success and a fiduciary duty to effectively use taxpayer monies. To be successful, the Lodi Unified School District needs experienced, common sense leadership with a vision for the future.

HEART FOR CHILDREN: I have always "had a heart" for children, especially those that have special needs or which "fall through the cracks" of the school system. That is why I worked on Stockton Mayor Johnston's Education Task Force to reduce the dropout rate and more effectively coordinate services between education, business and non-profit agencies. I have worked hard for the past four years to ensure that we find the "spark" for students to keep them engaged in school and provide both college and technical opportunities for students. I have worked tirelessly to find the money to reinvest in the classroom.

ACCOMPLISHMENTS: Taking my background in "visioning", problem solving, business operations and financial analysis I have pushed for changes that have resulted in millions of dollars in savings and/or additional funding for our students. I have lead the effort for a comprehensive approach to reduce utility bills and redirect monies to the classroom. This effort is currenlty saving over $1 million per year. I am working side-by-side with clasroom teachers and others to improve the use of technology in the District as a way to more effectively engage the students, improve learning and reach out to those students which need an alternative educational approach. Children today are much more tech savvy. We must teach students the way they learn, not the way we learned.

RESPONSIBILITY AND ACCOUNTABILITY: In order to survive, and indeed thrive, we must change how we deliver our operational and educational services. We must teach students how they learn, not how we learned. We must provide classroom teachers the tools and training they need for student achievement. Everybody from the administrators to the teachers to the parent must be not only responsible, but held accountable, for student success.

CHANGE DELIVERY OF EDUCATIONAL AND OPERATIONAL SERVICES: We must embrace technology, not be afraid of it. We must be transparent and collaborative in our processes. We must change how we deliver educational and operational services to be more effective and cost efficient. By reducing waste, we can redirect monies to student instruction.

I will continue to use my B.A. in Business Administration and 30 years of financial and problem solving experience to: reduce class sizes; reduce expenses; generate new revenue; reallocate resources for student achievement; find more efficient and cost effective ways of delivering operational services; better collaborate with the business community to ensure that students have the skills employers need; and collaborate with classroom teachers to deliver more effective education to our students.

TRANSPARENT AND COLLABORATIVE: A firm believer in transparency and the collaborative process, I organized the three Town Hall Forums which were held in March and April in Stockton and Lodi. These forums provided an opportunity for staff and the community to provide comments and ask questions directly to Board members without the formality of a Board meeting or the "filtering" which can sometimes occur in an organization.