Austin ISD place 6 | Early Voting Starts April 26th | Volunteer Today For Change

Bridge the achievement gap :

We need to support innovative ideas like additional pay for urban teachers, alternative choices such as career and technical training, and more common sense learning like personal management.

In my 10 years of experience working with central Texas students, I have seen students from every socio-economic class who did not want a college experience. Schools invalidate those ideas, creating behavioral problems. As your representative on the school board, I will support career and technical programs to give students honest choices for success.

Personal management skills are critical for success as individuals. I support bringing  common sense education for at-risk students to understand personal finance, time management, and entrepreneurial skills.

Teachers deserve more pay by cost-cutting, not raising taxes

Quality education begins with caring and loyal teachers. I believe that teacher salaries should be fair and comparable with prevailing wages in the local private sector. I believe that salaries and wages should be based on the value an employee adds to an enterprise, not what class or group to which they belong or their length of employment. I support merit-based pay, discretionary bonuses, and incentive pay for urban teachers.

As a school board member, my fiduciary responsibility is to the voters of Austin. I believe we need an honest and transparent appraisal of tax rates before we rush to raise salaries by raising taxes. My belief is teacher salaries need to increase, but there may be an opportunity to accomplish this by cost-cutting measures within the existing budget.

Healthcare should be as affordable as possible for all employees and their families. When I am elected, I will support an honest and fair appraisal of family medical health benefits as compared to the private sector. I believe the board should provide comparable benefits in an effort to recruit and retain the highest possible quality of educators and staff.

We need more input from students, employees, and taxpayers

As I interact with District staff, I have seen that some employees don’t feel like they have access to the Board. As elected representatives for all Austin taxpayers, we should introduce more opportunities for input through townhalls, social media, and attending community meetings. Because we are all in this together, everyone deserves a voice!