What policy change recommendations are you going to make to the Board?
Karl Machschefes
Email: machkarl@sbcglobal.net
Phone: (916) 372-8487
We need to be open to new visions and ideas, ideas that are successful in other districts. For too long board members micromanaged the district and put their personal feelings into policy instead of looking at what is good for the students, parents and WUSD.
Matt Stegman
Email: matthewcstegman@yahoo.com
Website: www.mattstegman.org
Phone: 916 281-4136
Although there may be some policies that need to be addressed, I do not have specific recommendations at this time. It seems that most of the problems facing the district do not require policy changes to be addressed. The problems we are facing stem from funding issues, or a lack of implementation and enforcement of current policies, and can be addressed by setting short and long term goals, ensuring a stable administration, and requiring that district employees implement these plans to address the issues
Sandra Vargas
Email:
sandravargas1@yahoo.com
Website:
www.votesandra.com
Phone: (916) 617-2990
I am committed to helping students excel and will work hard to:
1- Increase student achievement by setting continuously higher standards and expectations for our students, teachers, and administrators, as well as our parents and community. We need to continue to demand, not only higher and higher test scores, but more and more accountability in our schools, to ensure that we are providing our students a well-rounded education that will prepare them with the right set of skills they need for a successful future, whether they plan to pursue a career path or a college path, or both, after graduation.
2- Bring more resources to our classrooms and implement sound educational policies to help students excel. We should view our proximity to the state Capitol as an asset in our district, and “capitalize” on opportunities. We need to make sure that we successfully apply for programs and funding that we are eligible for --programs and funding that would greatly benefit our students and bring more resources and information to our district and schools.
3- Offer exciting, innovative alternatives and choices to our students, such as a college preparatory school, strong career technical and vocational programs, and K-8 academies. We should also make sure that our preschool and before & after school programs are strong and that they are serving the needs of all our students, by providing quality instructional, extra-curricular, and enrichment activities for all our children.
4- Rebuild and strengthen our existing partnerships with our community and create new partnerships within our city and region. Let’s start a positive dialogue with everyone in our community, other local educational institutions and businesses alike, to find ways to maintain and also create new long-lasting relationships and opportunities for our students. We should work with our city and county leaders to find ways to join our efforts in a comprehensive and useful manner. I cannot emphasis enough that we should continuously strive to improve our schools, because that in turn, will improve our city, and therefore, our quality of life.
5- Work hard to ensure that our district is one that inspires great pride and achievement and that it can serve as a model for others to follow. We always need to be held accountable for our actions. If we have made mistakes in the past, or make them along the way, we should always correct them right away and learn from them so that we can get back on track and help each other move forward and work towards accomplishing our biggest goal of all: offering a better future for our students and our entire community. We must set the example in our state by turning our district around, and we can do this by using our dignity, our integrity, our courage, our pride, our dedication, and our commitment to excellence to get the job done.
Email: mort@jps.net,
Phone: (916) 371-1637
I have no current change recommendations at this time. The district has been working on making the appropriate changes to Board policies during the past several years. This has been a very important and time consuming process. Many of the changes that have been made have been modeled after and sometimes taken directly from the California School Boards Association policy manual which has been passed through the Association’s legal advisors. As new policies are developed or considered, I plan to take an active role in making suggestions and improvements to them.
Dani Langford
Email: danamites@earthlink.net
Phone: (916) 372-3384
The Board has been trying to update policies with CSBA for at least the last four years and have been remiss in follow through. The top priority should be for the Board to update its current policies, set the vision for the District in line with those policies and when needed, update the policies on a consistent basis. These are Board policies and we as the Board should be reading and updating them as needed.