Community Update

Welcome to my new blog where I will share my thoughts and learnings about various topics and issues that are facing the Belmont-Redwood Shores School District.  I welcome community feedback on the topics I blog about, and in particular if you have questions or topics you'd like me to answer or research, please let me know by sending an email to amy@advancebrssd.com.  I can only meet so many people at candidate forums and individually, but I see this blog as a way to reach a broader cross-section of the community quickly.  And we can learn from each other about what matters, what's working, and what ought to be improved.  I may also include experiences from the campaigning process so that you get a better idea of what is involved - some day you too can run for school board!

I ask that we all observe the following ground rules:
* please be respectful and avoid name calling
* every opinion is welcome - don't hold back
* stick to the topic or issue in your comments

With that, I'd like to do an introduction of myself before I dive into topics/issues.  I'm a mom of 2 sons, ages 5 and 2, and I have lived in the district for 10 years (both in Belmont and Redwood Shores).  With a BS from MIT and an MBA and MS from Stanford, my career has been focused on cutting costs while increasing job satisfaction by improving business processes.  I have managed supply plans and distribution channels to ensure that customers get their products at the right time and right place.  My expertise is in formulating strategies based on analysis of data and understanding what drives the stakeholders. 

I first got involved in the school district when my oldest was only one.  I feel that our children should become world citizens and knowing multiple languages allows us to connect more easily across cultures.  In 2009-2010, I, along with a passionate group of parents led by Alyssa Herrera-Set, advocated for a Spanish Language Immersion program that would be housed at Nesbit.  Because lack of funding was highlighted as a reason to not start the program, I decided to learn more by joining School Force's Inaugural "I'm In" campaign in 2010 and reached out to local businesses for donations and hosted a garage sale fundraiser.  Although the program was not approved by the board, we have continued to coordinate opportunities for local kids through a summer foreign language book fair and summer language camps (Spanish and Mandarin).

The following year when over-enrollment issues at Central and Cipriani led to boundary change discussions, the Alternatives Committee reached out to us to learn more about how a Language Immersion Program or really any specialized program that was housed at Nesbit might be able to naturally draw students to Nesbit from across the district to help alleviate overcrowding at other schools.  I spoke to the board again on behalf of Language Immersion, and attended several heated board meetings that year that eventually led to the No Boundaries policy.

I then had a baby in Fall 2011 and disappeared from the scene for awhile.  This year, my oldest was about to enter Kindergarten, and I interacted with the district in a whole different way through the enrollment process for new families.  My son was not assigned to his neighborhood school, and I led an effort to work with the board and co-superintendents to share our concerns about what happened, to understand why things happened the way they did, and to suggest improvements to communication and decision transparency, so that families entering for the 2014-2015 school year wouldn't have to go through what we went through.

Although I'm a new parent to the district, I'm really not new to the district.  Nor am I new to volunteerism and working in the classroom.  Both of my kids went to Little Hands Co-op Preschool in Belmont, and I learned a lot about parenting, working with kids, and running a school through that program.  I care about the education of all kids, about strengthening the bonds of the community.  That is why I am running for school board.  I want to share my passion for educating children, balancing supply and demand (school capacity and number of students), and improving operational processes with everyone in the community so that together we can change the district for the better.

Thanks for reading, and if you have any suggestions for topics of discussion, please send them to amy@advancebrssd.com.  I'll keep a running list of requested topics and rest assured, I will address it at some point.