Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Board of Education candidates participated in a student-led forum Thursday night. WFDD’s Education Reporter Amy Diaz was there and spoke with Editorial Director Bethany Chafin about how it went.
Interview Highlights
About the race in general and who's on the ballot:
"There are 16 candidates running for a total of nine seats on the board. Only three incumbents made it through their primaries: Trevonia Brown-Gaither, Alex Bohannon and Robert Barr. Bohannon was the only one not at the forum; organizers said he was attending a national school board conference.
Several incumbents decided not to run for re-election given everything that has happened over the past year with the district’s financial crisis. And that crisis is what motivated many of the new candidates to run."
On the role the financial crisis is playing in this election:
"There is still some distrust about what the district’s current financial state is, whether money is going where it’s supposed to or if the debt has really been paid off.
The candidates all talked about the need for stronger financial management and regular audits, but the main disagreement among the group had to do with whether the board should be advocating at the state level for more education funding, or if this is just the district’s mess to clean up."
On how the candidates spoke about school safety:
"A lot of candidates mentioned the importance of metal detectors and securing school entrances. Allen Daniel, Curtis Fentress and Ronda Mays also talked about mental health, stopping bullying before it escalates, and building trust with students so when they see something suspicious, they say something.
Robert Barr spoke about building stronger relationships with local law enforcement officials. And then some said they want to revise the district's code of conduct to take more of a 'no tolerance' stance."
On areas of agreement:
"Multiple candidates talked about wanting to make working conditions better to improve educator retention — lightening the load on teachers, trying to remove administrative tasks from their plate, or pay them for the extra work they do. Also, making sure they have protected planning time.
Several candidates also said they support a 'Meet and Confer' policy, which is something the Forsyth County Association of Educators has pushed for to give educators a seat at the table when decisions are being made."