Six candidates are running for three seats for school board. The candidates had one debate, which was an hour long. You can read a transcript of that meeting, or watch the video, here.
About a month ago, I wrote to all of the candidates with the following prompt.
I'm a WCSD parent and I'm trying to evaluate all of the candidates for WCSD School Board to decide who to vote for.. Ideally I'd like to write something about who I am voting for and share it.
I am sure you get a lot of requests like this, and I am sure you are busy, so maybe - have you filled out any questionnaires from any local groups? Could you just forward your answers from those?
I am particularly interested in answers regarding
- Grade inflation
- How to teach kids things - whether it's important to know your times tables for example.
- Testing and measurement
- Getting to school safely
- Bullying
- Ventilation/HVAC/Far UVC
- Attendance
- Evaluating teacher performance and compensation
Here is what they wrote back. The candidates appear in a random order each time you load this page.
Jump to a candidate:
I want grades to mean something. An A should reflect strong mastery of the material, not simply completion of assignments. But I also don't think we should judge students or teachers from one test. We should compare classroom grades with objective measures of learning and look for inconsistencies. If grades are going up while mastery is going down, the Board should want to understand why.
This would be a good Board level question: Are changes in WCSD report-card performance consistent with changes in independent measures of student achievement?
Students need both understanding and fluency - memory & conceptual understanding. I want a child to understand what multiplication means, but I also want that child to know the multiplication facts without having to reconstruct them every time. Foundational knowledge and critical thinking aren't competitors. Strong foundational knowledge makes higher-level thinking possible.
WCSD says it uses ongoing internal assessments as well as statewide assessments including CAASPP, ELPAC, DIBELS and others. The objective shouldn't be more tests. It should be better information. I'm not interested in testing children simply for the sake of testing them. But we have to measure whether students are learning. I would want a balanced system using teacher assessments, classroom performance, standardized measures and growth over time. The purpose of measurement isn't to punish people. It's to identify what's working, what's not working and where students need additional support. Measurement should lead to action.
Getting a child safely to and from school is part of providing a safe educational environment. I would want the district working closely with the City, parents and individual schools to identify dangerous crossings, traffic bottlenecks and recurring near misses. We should use actual data and parent observations to identify problems before someone gets hurt.
I think most of us have experienced bullying to some degree, or we've seen someone we care about go through it. We know how painful it can be, especially when it continues over time. For a child, bullying isn't something we should dismiss as just part of growing up. It can affect them emotionally, hurt their confidence, personal development, affect their grades and attendance, and in serious cases lead to lasting emotional problems.
Having an anti-bullying policy isn't enough. Students need to feel safe reporting bullying, parents need to know where to go, and the district needs to respond consistently and promptly. I would want to understand not only how many incidents are reported, but whether they are resolved, whether problems recur and whether students actually feel safer.
As a parent, what matters to me is that when a child says they're being bullied, we listen and take it seriously. We need to understand what's happening, involve the parents, address the behavior, and then follow up. It's not enough to say the situation was handled. We need to make sure the bullying actually stopped and that the child feels safe coming to school again
Indoor air quality affects health, attendance and potentially learning. I would first make sure our HVAC systems, ventilation and filtration are performing properly and that we have objective information about classroom air quality. I'm also interested in emerging technologies such as Far-UVC, but I would want independent evidence on safety, effectiveness and cost before deploying new technology. Innovation is valuable, but it should be evidence-based.
Attendance is one of the clearest early-warning indicators we have. If a student isn't in the classroom, learning becomes much harder. But I don't want us simply counting absences. I want us to understand why a child isn't attending. The intervention for illness may be completely different from the intervention for bullying, anxiety, transportation problems or disengagement.
Great teachers should be recognized, supported and retained. Evaluation should be meaningful, fair and based on multiple measures—not one test score. It should identify excellent teaching, provide useful feedback and professional development, and address persistent performance problems when they occur. Compensation also has to be competitive enough to attract and retain excellent educators while remaining financially sustainable.
Thank you for taking the time to reach out and ask these questions. I hope this helps you with your decision on what I stand for. I really appreciate it. These kinds of conversations are important, and I value hearing what is on your mind and what matters to you and your family.
Thank you again for reaching out and for being engaged in our schools and our community. I hope to earn your vote Nov 3!
Feel free to visit my website for more information about me and my campaign positions. rodforwcsd.com
All the topics you're curious about are important, but we also need a cohesive board that can communicate clearly and thoughtfully. Otherwise, I worry we won't be able to continue moving the district forward. I am the daughter of a retired public school teacher and the only candidate who has subbed in our classrooms. I have spent thousands of hours in public schools working alongside teachers. Because of that, I tend to bring a different perspective. Happy to discuss anything in more detail or answer any other questions you might have. You will find that I genuinely enjoy talking about our schools. :o)
Grades should reflect what a student knows and is capable of doing. Grades should not be artificially inflated, but I also don't think a single grade should judge a student's overall ability or potential. I also want to be really careful when grading students on participation, not every introvert wants to participate, nor should they be forced to.
For me, I want to ensure we are looking at consistency between teachers and school sites. Families and students should understand what mastery (you will hear me talk about mastery a lot) looks like, how achievement is being measured, and whether grading practices are reasonably consistent across classrooms, grade levels, and sites. If students receive high grades but district and state assessments show significant mastery gaps, that is data we need to evaluate more closely.
Absolutely, emphatically YES! Conceptual understanding and foundational knowledge/skills work in tandem. Students need to understand conceptually why/how multiplication works, but they should know their multiplication facts so those facts don't become another obstacle/hurdle as they advance in math. WCSD's mathematics philosophy actually reflects both goals: developing conceptual understanding and fluency. I think we should make sure our classroom practices accomplish both.
My feelings are the same regarding reading, writing, vocabulary, and spelling (English Language Arts). There are things students need to understand deeply, and there are foundational skills and knowledge they simply need to know. I am happy to go into greater detail here, if you really want to hear me on my soapbox. ;o) I believe our ELA curriculum is our most important opportunity right now.
We have to measure whether what we're doing and if the interventions we have in place are working, but that doesn't mean I believe in an overwhelming amount of testing. No single assessment tells us everything about a student. I firmly believe that the first and best tool should be teacher observations followed by curriculum-based assessments, district benchmarks, and CAASPP scores.
More importantly, what we do with the data matters. WCSD already collects a significant amount of data. I want us to use that data not only to look at whether students are meeting standards, but also where they started, whether they are growing, where achievement gaps exist, and whether curriculum and instructional investments are moving the needle. We need strong intervention and support for students who haven't yet reached mastery, while also providing greater depth, complexity and enrichment for students who have. Our goal shouldn't simply be getting every student to the same benchmark. It should be ensuring that every student is challenged, supported and making meaningful academic growth from wherever they begin.
I also think we should look at growth, not simply proficiency. A student who begins the year at/or above grade level and ends the year at that same level may still be proficient, but we should be asking whether that student was appropriately challenged and engaged. Every student deserves to make meaningful academic growth, including those who have already reached benchmark standards.
Fortunately, our new superintendent actually talks about this a lot, we need to see students as individuals and know their unique story. Yes, they are part of the big picture, but each student has a unique set of needs.
(This is another soapbox of mine, can you tell?)
Getting students safely to and from school is a shared responsibility involving the district, families, city/county, WC PD, Sherif, and our broader community. From the district's perspective, I would want us to continually evaluate pick-up/drop-off procedures, traffic patterns, pedestrian and bicycle safety, and crossing guard needs. (I've seen it all at WH and it's scary)
We have opportunities here.
Every student deserves to feel safe at school. WCSD already has policies and reporting procedures addressing bullying, harassment, discrimination, and cyberbullying. Those policies matter, but how we implement the policies matters even more.
I would want to know: Are students comfortable reporting problems? Are reports investigated promptly? Are families kept informed? Are patterns being identified rather than incidents being viewed in isolation? And are we addressing both the behavior and the underlying school climate?
We should also distinguish between conflict, unkind behavior, and persistent bullying so that our response is reflective of what actually occurred. But when bullying does occur, students and families should have confidence that it will be taken seriously and that we have uniform and consistent policies and procedures to rely upon.
All of that aside, bullying is interesting. Studies have shown that there is a correlation between reading level and bullying. If there is truly a connection there, we know where our greatest opportunity lies. I often say that when a student acts out, we must do our due diligence to find out why. Is there an underlying cause that we can mitigate on our end?
WCSD has already upgraded filtration systems throughout its facilities to MERV-13 filters (post COVID). All classrooms were also provided with air filters post COVID and I know some still use them (though not everyone does). I would support continuing to maintain and monitor those systems and incorporating ventilation and indoor-air-quality improvements into our long-term facilities planning.
Link to November 2022 meeting agenda where HVAC was discussed/voted on. Replacement occurred that following summer (June/July 2023).
First let me say that because our schools are funded based on Average Daily Attendance (ADA) rather than enrollment, attendance matters. That being said, aside from a funding perspective, attendance matters from a connection/engagement standpoint and we don't want students falling behind. But, I think we need to look beyond the districtwide attendance number and understand the reasons students are missing school.
Chronic absenteeism can have many causes: sickness, transportation issues, family circumstances, anxiety, disengagement, or other barriers. Our first response should be identifying those barriers and working with families to address them. Just for context, 25% of our students (or 1 in 4) are considered unduplicated, meaning they are foster/homeless, have lower socio-economic status, or are English Learners. This particular subset typically has higher absenteeism rates because they face barriers like unreliable transportation or parental work schedules, and this is the group our district works hardest to support in getting to school.
The goal isn't simply improving an attendance statistic; it's ensuring students are present, connected, and learning. This goes back to making students feel like they genuinely matter and are an important part of our school. They need to have their "why." For some, it's a trusted adult that they have a connection with, for others, it's an elective or a class that sparks interest. We need to make sure that students genuinely want to spend the day at school and that isn't always easy.
As the daughter of a teacher, I firmly believe that our teachers are central to everything and shape our initial impressions of WCSD. WCSD needs to attract, develop, and retain great teachers.
Teacher evaluation should include clear professional standards, classroom observation, constructive feedback, professional growth, and appropriate support when improvement is needed. That being said, we also have a responsibility to make sure that the professional development they receive is truly meaningful and what they need to help them in their profession. Teaching is constantly evolving, and the needs of our teachers are constantly evolving.
Compensation is also governed by collective bargaining. WCSD currently has a negotiated WCTA contract and certificated salary schedule. The Board's responsibility is to negotiate responsibly while balancing competitive compensation with the district's long-term financial sustainability. Our greatest responsibility right now is to work on our benefits package for teachers, honestly.
I'm a mom of two, and I want a report card to tell me what my child actually knows and where she needs help. I wouldn't assume we have a grade-inflation problem without looking at the evidence. But I do want clear grading standards that families can understand.
I want to know whether my kids are learning, not just whether they're getting through the assignments. Tests are part of that, along with their classroom work and what their teachers are seeing. As a board member, I'd ask whether the help we're paying for is actually working, and make sure families can understand the results.
Being a crossing guard has made this very concrete for me. I'd want to hear where families and staff see problems, then work with the city and district on those specific spots. The board can't fix every road, but it can make sure concerns don't get passed around without anyone following up.
If my child tells an adult she's being bullied, I want her to be taken seriously. There is no place for bullying or hate speech in our schools. Adults need to step in, follow up with the family and check that the behavior has stopped, rather than treating a report as the end of the job.
When a child is missing school regularly, my first question is why. Is the child sick, anxious, being bullied, or having trouble getting there? I'd want the school to work with the family early and address the reason, rather than just send another attendance notice.
I want good teachers to stay, and competitive pay and decent working conditions matter. On evaluation, I'd want clear expectations, useful feedback and support when someone is struggling, with follow-through if problems continue. I'd listen to teachers and administrators about what works, bargain in good faith, and weigh compensation against the full budget.
Geetha did not respond to my written questions. If she does I will share her answers here.
Heidi did not respond to my written questions. If she does I will share her answers here.
Wenlei directed me to watch the responses from the candidate forum. If she shares more detailed responses I will share her answers here.
These are the priorities each candidate lists on their campaign website, copied as written.
From rodforwcsd.com.
Every decision should begin with one question: Is this in the best interest of our students? Their education, well-being, and opportunities must remain our highest priority.
Parents deserve a School Board that listens and responds. I will answer questions, engage openly with families, and make sure parents know their voices and concerns matter. Transparency and communication will always be a priority.
Great schools depend on great teachers. I will support our educators with the resources, respect, and partnership they need to succeed, while making sure their voices and experience are part of the decisions that affect our classrooms.
Future school measures are critical investments in our students and schools. I will work to engage parents and the community early, clearly communicate why additional funding is needed, demonstrate accountability for every dollar, and build the broad community support necessary for future measures to succeed.
From erynking.org.
Make smart, sustainable investments in our students.
Public education is one of the most important investments we make in our community. Our schools help shape the future of our children and the future of Walnut Creek. As a Governing Board member, Eryn will work to ensure that investments are made where they have the greatest impact on students.
That means:
Every student deserves the opportunity to thrive.
Our students aren't all the same and neither are their needs.
Eryn believes our schools should provide students with the academic support, enrichment and opportunities they need to find their strengths and reach their potential.
That means:
Good governance starts with listening.
School districts make complicated decisions that affect students, families, educators and taxpayers. Our community deserves leadership that communicates clearly, listens to different perspectives, and explains not just what decisions are being made, but why.
That means:
Every student should have a chance to find their “thing.”
For one student, it might be orchestra. For another, science. Art. Technology. Theater. Middle-school electives can spark a lifelong interest.
Eryn knows firsthand how meaningful these opportunities can be. During her time with the Walnut Creek Education Foundation, she advocated for expanding opportunities for students, including additional semester-long electives at Walnut Creek Intermediate and orchestra in our elementary schools.
Our schools should give students opportunities to explore their interests.
From voteaileenong.com.
Listen. Lead. Invest. Three ways to fix one root problem: a district that doesn't communicate well enough with the people it serves.
Hear people before you decide.
Make decisions in the open.
Respect every taxpayer.
From geethaganti.org.
Reading, math, science, strong curriculum implementation, and the teacher support that makes good curriculum actually work.
“Are our kids getting the strongest possible foundation in reading, math, and science?”
Teach children how to reason before asking technology to reason for them. No hype, no panic — a parent's clear-eyed look at AI in the classroom. I lead teams that build with AI every day in biotech, which is exactly why I want kids learning to think first.
“How do we teach kids to think for themselves when AI can give them an answer in seconds?”
Make budgets, ballot measures, policies, and major district decisions understandable to busy people who are not in the education space — not just to people who already know the system.
“Can an ordinary person actually understand where school money goes?”
Mental health, movement, attention, support, and the conditions children need in order to learn — because academics don't happen in a vacuum.
“Are our kids getting enough movement, support, and time away from screens?”
From heidihernandezgatty.com.
The district completed Measure D construction projects on time and on budget, and is midway through our Measure J projects that will bring our elementary campuses to the same modern standards of our middle schools.
Our focus on careful planning and fiscal responsibility has allowed these projects to flourish in parallel with rising student achievement and a comprehensive wellness program that is a model for school districts across the county and the state.
Every student deserves an excellent education. Our community has the resources to provide this for every one of our students.
The programs that support our most underserved families raise the bar for all our students and allow our English language learners, socio-economically disadvantaged, and special education students to reach their full potential.
As a board member, I have been a strong advocate for the Early Learning Opportunities Program (ELOP) and our Wellness program which is a model across Contra Costa County.
From reelect-wenlei.netlify.app.
Superintendent Jon Campopiano is the face of our district. He needs a board that supports him, works with him, and keeps our schools stable and focused on students.
Our children are growing up anxious and online. I will push for clear, sensible rules on technology and AI in our schools, so these tools help students learn without harming their well-being.
Our district is doing well, and we can always do better. I will keep the focus on raising results for socioeconomically disadvantaged students and English learners.