For the education system in West Sacramento, how do you plan to raise the standards in our schools and improve student proficiencies to make this a more desirable area for families to locate and attend our public schools?
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, parents, teachers, administrators, as well as our entire community. We are all stakeholders in our children’s education and, as such, we should continuously strive to ensure that we are providing our students a well-rounded education and the right set of skills they need for a successful future.
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 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. To compliment these options, we should also make sure that our preschool, and before & after school programs are fully serving the needs of 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 county region. Let’s start a positive dialogue with our entire community, inviting local colleges and universities and a myriad of businesses alike, to find ways to maintain and also create new long-lasting relationships and opportunities for our students.
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 must exemplify our dignity, our integrity, our courage, our pride, our dedication, and our commitment to excellence, as we continue to work hard to improve our schools and help our children succeed.
Karl Machschefes
Email: machkarl@sbcglobal.net
Phone: (916) 372-8487
We need to put the plans I have outlined in the previous answers into action. Full day Kindergarten helps better prepare children for 1st grade. They come out of Kindergarten as readers ready to tackle the world. By having magnet schools in our K-8 system including K-8 schools we give our children and parents educational choices. We let them work in areas that may be of more interest to them such as technology and the arts. By developing small learning centers we can get personalized instruction and a feeling of community as we help our struggling students and accelerate our advance learners to become all they can be.
By doing this for our children we will be a community of choice where people want to bring their families and raise their children. Where people want to establish their businesses because they have an educated work force and colleges will have a steady stream of well qualified and energized students ready to take on the world.
Dani Langford
Email: danamites@earthlink.net
Phone: (916) 372-3384
General Response to All Questions
After reading some of the other candidate’s responses as well as participating in the Southport PTA candidate forum last Tuesday, I would like to add some brief comments to my original response to this forum. As I stated previously, I have educated myself with educational laws, district policy and by-laws, and open meeting laws such as the Brown Act. I feel it is imperative to elect people that understand their role as a Board Member verses a district Administrator. My job as a Board Member would not be to run the school district, as that is the job of the Superintendent. Some of the candidate’s statements reveal that they can use their “influence” to bring much needed money to our district. Being that the Grand Jury cited our district for such offenses, we need to make sure that everything we do does not have a conflict of interest or even a perceived conflict of interest. I also remember empty promises made in past elections and I believe we need to stop that cycle. We have heard that before and it never materializes. I would ask, if money is available and you live in the community, why would you wait to run for election to use your influence to bring much needed money to our students?
It has come to my attention that there is a perception that I may not be able to be a team player with the current board. I have worked as a team with the current board in the interview process of the new Superintendent. The process was handled very professional and I would have no problem working alongside the current board as a professional team player. I also believe that different points of view help a board come to the right decision. I appreciate your support on November 7th!