Arlington School Board candidates

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That is exactly my impression of Zoraya (though she seems like a sweet personable person). I am concerned about the level of attention that she will give APS. She is in it as a stepping stone to the next political position. She is definitely not invested (or really interested in) school issues. Kathleen by far is the only qualified person and gets my number 1 vote. I am voting for Chen as #2 because at least he cares deeply, willing to investigate and get into the weeds (can't see Zoraya doing that). Also, he is willing to dig into finance and management of APS using the latest know-how from corporate America. That is exactly what we need at this time. It will complement the rest of the board. As for Larry, I don't think he will be able to provide the leadership initiative and innovation needed at this time.

The last thing on a school board I want is a “corporate” perspective. School systems are a public good, not a business. You’re sounding like you support charter, private and lab schools. Chen doesn’t have the experience to be on a public school board. It’s a shame we have such lame candidates this year that Chen’s even a contender.

Agree. It's so arrogant that Chen thinks he can come in and fix APS (without any understanding of it!) because of his corporate experience. Reminds me of Trump.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zuraya Tapia-Hadley has no APS volunteer experience. She’s a federal lobbyist. Does she want to be on the SB as a stepping stone to higher office?

Interesting input. That's exactly what Garvey did and she was effing terrible on the school board.

Her platform is the most middle of the road saying nothing of substance.

I know more about her endorsements than her actual platform. She's gunning for higher office. I don't even get the impression that she cares much about APS.

Has anyone asked her what her long term goals are?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That is exactly my impression of Zoraya (though she seems like a sweet personable person). I am concerned about the level of attention that she will give APS. She is in it as a stepping stone to the next political position. She is definitely not invested (or really interested in) school issues. Kathleen by far is the only qualified person and gets my number 1 vote. I am voting for Chen as #2 because at least he cares deeply, willing to investigate and get into the weeds (can't see Zoraya doing that). Also, he is willing to dig into finance and management of APS using the latest know-how from corporate America. That is exactly what we need at this time. It will complement the rest of the board. As for Larry, I don't think he will be able to provide the leadership initiative and innovation needed at this time.

Larry is criminally underrated. Innovation? He's the only teacher in APS that has gotten administration approval to use ChatGPT as a learning assistant and has an approved training for students on its effective and ethical use. He's also the only one calling for a recruitment program at GMU and beyond. As it stands Fairfax schools is the only one actively recruiting teachers there. As for leadership, if you want, I can copy/paste all the leadership posts he's held in the APS arena.

It’s a terrible idea to recruit teachers from GMU. The school doesn’t require SAT or ACT scores and it is giving automatic admission to Kids from certain high schools (without even applying) as long as they have 3.2 GPA. The standards have fallen through the floor at this school and you are going to get mostly low quality recruits. This is a delusional blank slatist mindset. Anyone who believes that talent does not matter and that every person can trained to be a great teacher is not living in reality. Not everyone is capable of being a good teacher and we are doing our kids a major disservice by recruiting from schools that have no standard for admissions to ensure students have basic competency.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That is exactly my impression of Zoraya (though she seems like a sweet personable person). I am concerned about the level of attention that she will give APS. She is in it as a stepping stone to the next political position. She is definitely not invested (or really interested in) school issues. Kathleen by far is the only qualified person and gets my number 1 vote. I am voting for Chen as #2 because at least he cares deeply, willing to investigate and get into the weeds (can't see Zoraya doing that). Also, he is willing to dig into finance and management of APS using the latest know-how from corporate America. That is exactly what we need at this time. It will complement the rest of the board. As for Larry, I don't think he will be able to provide the leadership initiative and innovation needed at this time.

Larry is criminally underrated. Innovation? He's the only teacher in APS that has gotten administration approval to use ChatGPT as a learning assistant and has an approved training for students on its effective and ethical use. He's also the only one calling for a recruitment program at GMU and beyond. As it stands Fairfax schools is the only one actively recruiting teachers there. As for leadership, if you want, I can copy/paste all the leadership posts he's held in the APS arena.

It’s a terrible idea to recruit teachers from GMU. The school doesn’t require SAT or ACT scores and it is giving automatic admission to Kids from certain high schools (without even applying) as long as they have 3.2 GPA. The standards have fallen through the floor at this school and you are going to get mostly low quality recruits. This is a delusional blank slatist mindset. Anyone who believes that talent does not matter and that every person can trained to be a great teacher is not living in reality. Not everyone is capable of being a good teacher and we are doing our kids a major disservice by recruiting from schools that have no standard for admissions to ensure students have basic competency.

We need to implement a policy banning APS from hiring any new teachers that have an SAT score below 1100 and provide 50k hiring bonuses payable over 5 years for teachers with an SAT score of 1300+

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Zuraya Tapia-Hadley has no APS volunteer experience. She’s a federal lobbyist. Does she want to be on the SB as a stepping stone to higher office?

Sadly she lost my vote at lobbyist. I find that lobbyists are reactionary and are boxed in with a specific POV. Not great on a school board where there are so many competing interests.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zuraya Tapia-Hadley has no APS volunteer experience. She’s a federal lobbyist. Does she want to be on the SB as a stepping stone to higher office?

Sadly she lost my vote at lobbyist. I find that lobbyists are reactionary and are boxed in with a specific POV. Not great on a school board where there are so many competing interests.

I was so turned off that she's marketing herself as a public policy professional to try to hide the fact that she is a LOBBYIST.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That is exactly my impression of Zoraya (though she seems like a sweet personable person). I am concerned about the level of attention that she will give APS. She is in it as a stepping stone to the next political position. She is definitely not invested (or really interested in) school issues. Kathleen by far is the only qualified person and gets my number 1 vote. I am voting for Chen as #2 because at least he cares deeply, willing to investigate and get into the weeds (can't see Zoraya doing that). Also, he is willing to dig into finance and management of APS using the latest know-how from corporate America. That is exactly what we need at this time. It will complement the rest of the board. As for Larry, I don't think he will be able to provide the leadership initiative and innovation needed at this time.

Larry is criminally underrated. Innovation? He's the only teacher in APS that has gotten administration approval to use ChatGPT as a learning assistant and has an approved training for students on its effective and ethical use. He's also the only one calling for a recruitment program at GMU and beyond. As it stands Fairfax schools is the only one actively recruiting teachers there. As for leadership, if you want, I can copy/paste all the leadership posts he's held in the APS arena.

It’s a terrible idea to recruit teachers from GMU. The school doesn’t require SAT or ACT scores and it is giving automatic admission to Kids from certain high schools (without even applying) as long as they have 3.2 GPA. The standards have fallen through the floor at this school and you are going to get mostly low quality recruits. This is a delusional blank slatist mindset. Anyone who believes that talent does not matter and that every person can trained to be a great teacher is not living in reality. Not everyone is capable of being a good teacher and we are doing our kids a major disservice by recruiting from schools that have no standard for admissions to ensure students have basic competency.

Hmm. I'd say many teachers who have gone to colleges with the higher standards you expect aren't necessarily good teachers. Credentials aren't everything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That is exactly my impression of Zoraya (though she seems like a sweet personable person). I am concerned about the level of attention that she will give APS. She is in it as a stepping stone to the next political position. She is definitely not invested (or really interested in) school issues. Kathleen by far is the only qualified person and gets my number 1 vote. I am voting for Chen as #2 because at least he cares deeply, willing to investigate and get into the weeds (can't see Zoraya doing that). Also, he is willing to dig into finance and management of APS using the latest know-how from corporate America. That is exactly what we need at this time. It will complement the rest of the board. As for Larry, I don't think he will be able to provide the leadership initiative and innovation needed at this time.

Larry is criminally underrated. Innovation? He's the only teacher in APS that has gotten administration approval to use ChatGPT as a learning assistant and has an approved training for students on its effective and ethical use. He's also the only one calling for a recruitment program at GMU and beyond. As it stands Fairfax schools is the only one actively recruiting teachers there. As for leadership, if you want, I can copy/paste all the leadership posts he's held in the APS arena.

It’s a terrible idea to recruit teachers from GMU. The school doesn’t require SAT or ACT scores and it is giving automatic admission to Kids from certain high schools (without even applying) as long as they have 3.2 GPA. The standards have fallen through the floor at this school and you are going to get mostly low quality recruits. This is a delusional blank slatist mindset. Anyone who believes that talent does not matter and that every person can trained to be a great teacher is not living in reality. Not everyone is capable of being a good teacher and we are doing our kids a major disservice by recruiting from schools that have no standard for admissions to ensure students have basic competency.

We need to implement a policy banning APS from hiring any new teachers that have an SAT score below 1100 and provide 50k hiring bonuses payable over 5 years for teachers with an SAT score of 1300+

Yes, because clearly the smarter a person is, the better they are at teaching. Or, using your criteria, the better prepped to succeed on a standardized test a person is, the better their teaching skills and effectiveness.

[Anonymous]

Larry doesn't even have the wherewithal to respond to the AGIA survey that they emailed to him weeks ago, so I don't see him as even baseline competent to serve.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That is exactly my impression of Zoraya (though she seems like a sweet personable person). I am concerned about the level of attention that she will give APS. She is in it as a stepping stone to the next political position. She is definitely not invested (or really interested in) school issues. Kathleen by far is the only qualified person and gets my number 1 vote. I am voting for Chen as #2 because at least he cares deeply, willing to investigate and get into the weeds (can't see Zoraya doing that). Also, he is willing to dig into finance and management of APS using the latest know-how from corporate America. That is exactly what we need at this time. It will complement the rest of the board. As for Larry, I don't think he will be able to provide the leadership initiative and innovation needed at this time.

Larry is criminally underrated. Innovation? He's the only teacher in APS that has gotten administration approval to use ChatGPT as a learning assistant and has an approved training for students on its effective and ethical use. He's also the only one calling for a recruitment program at GMU and beyond. As it stands Fairfax schools is the only one actively recruiting teachers there. As for leadership, if you want, I can copy/paste all the leadership posts he's held in the APS arena.

It’s a terrible idea to recruit teachers from GMU. The school doesn’t require SAT or ACT scores and it is giving automatic admission to Kids from certain high schools (without even applying) as long as they have 3.2 GPA. The standards have fallen through the floor at this school and you are going to get mostly low quality recruits. This is a delusional blank slatist mindset. Anyone who believes that talent does not matter and that every person can trained to be a great teacher is not living in reality. Not everyone is capable of being a good teacher and we are doing our kids a major disservice by recruiting from schools that have no standard for admissions to ensure students have basic competency.

Controversial take but I don't think we need a graduate with a 4.0 GPA to fill a middle school PE teacher slot. I don't think we need a genius Ivy Leaguer with a 36 ACT and a 1600 SAT to be an elementary school teacher. If an education graduate has a good academic standing, a kind heart, and a professional demeanor, we should be welcoming them from wherever we can find them. To completely shut down any recruitment outreach to a local university producing dozens of education graduates every semester simply because their admissions standards aren't high enough is the real delusion. An APS recruitment program can be more selective and the point is to be present and proactive in finding new teachers. You focused on GMU but APS has a bigger problem with recruitment in general. We are hemorrhaging teachers and our budget is tight, we need to do what we can with what we have. This doesn't mean we have to compromise the quality of our teachers; it simply means that APS needs to stop being passive and work harder.

And hey, at least Larry is calling attention to the fact that APS is lacking in a real teacher recruitment program. What should an APS recruitment program look like to you?

[Anonymous]

In an ideal world, we would get the Ivy League caliber students routinely entering education and it would be a well-respected career choice.

But that's not the current state of education in the US. The teaching profession is not valued or compensated appropriately. They have to deal with a-hole parents constantly.

We will be lucky to find good teachers anywhere - GMU or wherever. Gatekeeping will only hurt us at this point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Zuraya Tapia-Hadley has no APS volunteer experience. She’s a federal lobbyist. Does she want to be on the SB as a stepping stone to higher office?

Interesting input. That's exactly what Garvey did and she was effing terrible on the school board.

Her platform is the most middle of the road saying nothing of substance.

I know more about her endorsements than her actual platform. She's gunning for higher office. I don't even get the impression that she cares much about APS.

Has anyone asked her what her long term goals are?

No but do you really expect anything other than what she thinks you would want to hear?

[Anonymous]

Last day to vote everyone! Charles Drew Elementary School 10am-6pm

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Last day to vote everyone! Charles Drew Elementary School 10am-6pm

What is the update? Who got the endorsements?

[Anonymous]

Zuraya and Kathleen