TWELVE YEARS OF BOARD SERVICE
I served twelve years on the Alameda Unified School District Board of Education.
Those years included difficult budgets, changing state and federal education policies, major facilities decisions, enrollment changes, local funding measures, and continuing efforts to improve student achievement.
Throughout my Board service, I also maintained a public website. My purpose was simple: I wanted the community to have access, whenever possible, to the same information I was using to understand issues and make decisions.
The website also became a place to share what I was learning about serving on a Board of Education. As I researched subjects such as California school finance, student assessment, facilities planning, and effective governance, I tried to make that information understandable and accessible to others.
Looking back, that effort reflects an approach to governance that I still believe in today: learn as much as possible, share information openly, ask good questions, and give the community meaningful opportunities to understand the decisions being made on its behalf.
MAKING SCHOOL GOVERNANCE UNDERSTANDABLE
One of the first things I learned was that serving on a Board of Education is different from managing a school district.
Individual Board members do not independently direct staff or operate schools. The Board acts collectively to establish policy, approve budgets, oversee district leadership, set expectations, and provide public accountability.
I created a section of my website explaining those roles because understanding what a Board member can—and cannot—do is important to evaluating Board decisions.
That distinction continues to shape my view of governance today. Board members should be actively engaged, well informed, and willing to ask difficult questions while respecting the responsibilities of the superintendent, administrators, and educators who operate the district.
MAKING BOARD DECISIONS ACCESSIBLE
During my first eight years on the Board, I created recaps of Board of Education meetings so community members who could not attend could still understand what the Board was discussing and deciding. At the time, the district did not yet provide the kind of online access to agendas, documents, and meeting information that exists today. My goal was to make Board decisions more accessible—not simply by reporting how I voted, but by sharing the background, competing considerations, and information that helped shape those decisions. I believed then, as I do now, that public information is most useful when people can understand it and use it to participate more meaningfully in their schools.
Explore Board Meeting RecapsUNDERSTANDING SCHOOL FINANCE
California school finance can be difficult to understand, yet state budget decisions can have immediate consequences for local students and employees.
I created an extensive section of my website devoted to district finances because I wanted to understand—and help others understand—the relationship between state funding, district revenues, expenditures, reserves, enrollment, staffing, and local financial decisions.
One particularly difficult experience came during the 2002 state budget crisis. With the possibility of significant midyear reductions in school funding, our Board agreed to issue precautionary layoff notices to all teachers in order to preserve maximum flexibility while the state's financial outlook remained uncertain. The decision attracted national attention.
Ultimately, the anticipated reduction in state funding did not produce the local budget cuts we feared, and the layoffs were not necessary.
That experience reinforced how challenging it is for a local Board to make responsible decisions when state revenues and education funding remain uncertain. It also taught me that Board members need to understand the underlying school-finance system—not simply the numbers presented at an individual meeting.
THINKING LONG TERM ABOUT FACILITIES
The closure of the Alameda Naval Air Station in 1997 marked the beginning of a major transition for our community. In 2000, the City of Alameda took control of the former base and renamed the area Alameda Point. Those changes created significant questions for the school district about land, facilities, enrollment, and how the long-term development of Alameda Point might affect Alameda’s schools.
I tracked many of those discussions on my website because facilities decisions often extend far beyond the term of any individual Board member.
Another example involved the district headquarters. The Board made an unpopular decision to relocate district offices to a leased facility. Later, an opportunity arose to purchase that facility. I advocated purchasing it at that time because I believed ownership provided greater long-term value than continuing to lease.
The purchase did not happen then. The district ultimately acquired the property years later at a higher price.
That experience reinforced an important lesson: governing boards sometimes need to look beyond the immediate political or financial discomfort surrounding a decision and consider what is likely to serve the district best over many years.
UNDERSTANDING STUDENT ASSESSMENT
During my Board service, the federal No Child Left Behind Act significantly changed how schools were evaluated and how student achievement data were discussed.
Terms such as Adequate Yearly Progress, achievement gaps, standardized testing, and school accountability became increasingly important to Board discussions.
I created a section of my website devoted to student assessment because I wanted to better understand what the data were telling us—and what they were not telling us.
Assessment information can help identify differences in student performance, reveal areas requiring attention, and provide one measure of whether educational strategies are working.
But no single test score can describe the full quality of a school or the abilities of an individual student.
That experience taught me the importance of using data as a tool for asking better questions rather than allowing a single measure to become the definition of educational success.
LEARNING IN PUBLIC
Looking back, perhaps the most important aspect of the website was that it documented a learning process.
I did not begin Board service already understanding every aspect of California school finance, student assessment, facilities planning, or education governance. I researched those subjects because I needed to understand them to make responsible decisions.
Whenever possible, I shared what I learned.
I believe that is an important quality in public service. Board members should bring experience and judgment to the job, but they should also remain curious enough to recognize what they do not know, willing to learn from people with expertise and different perspectives, and prepared to explain how they arrived at their decisions.
Experience matters. So does continuing to learn.
EXPERIENCE — AND TIME AWAY
Twelve years away from the Board have provided another kind of perspective.
Education has changed. Technology has changed. The ways people communicate and obtain information have changed. Artificial intelligence is now creating questions that would have been difficult to imagine during much of my previous Board service.
But the approach I would bring to those questions is familiar.
Understand the issue. Seek out expertise. Listen to the people affected. Make information accessible. Ask good questions. Consider long-term consequences. And involve the community before important decisions become irreversible.
Those lessons from my previous Board service are among the reasons I believe meaningful community conversation is so important today.
JOIN THE CONVERSATION
The issues facing Alameda schools today will be different from many of those I encountered previously, and no Board member begins with every answer.
I welcome your questions, experiences, concerns, and ideas about what Alameda schools need now and how our community should prepare for what comes next.