Tell me more about the School Board election process

[Anonymous]

Davis needs to win.

She is the only moderate in the bunch.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At this point our likely at large members are moon, mcelveen, and mcdaniel or davis.

Agree and I would vote for Davis for some diversity of viewpoint. It’s also a little creepy how Kyle McDaniel, a former aide to Pat Herrity, has repackaged himself as a left-of-center Democrat like he’s the second coming of Laura Jane Cohen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At this point our likely at large members are moon, mcelveen, and mcdaniel or davis.

Agree and I would vote for Davis for some diversity of viewpoint. It’s also a little creepy how Kyle McDaniel, a former aide to Pat Herrity, has repackaged himself as a left-of-center Democrat like he’s the second coming of Laura Jane Cohen.

No way I'm voting for any Republican.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At this point our likely at large members are moon, mcelveen, and mcdaniel or davis.

Agree and I would vote for Davis for some diversity of viewpoint. It’s also a little creepy how Kyle McDaniel, a former aide to Pat Herrity, has repackaged himself as a left-of-center Democrat like he’s the second coming of Laura Jane Cohen.

No way I'm voting for any Republican.

Davis is an independent and McDaniel is a former Republican. Sometimes it’s hard to keep up with the shifting affiliations.

[Anonymous]

It seems like only Sizemore-Heizer, Anderson,Frisch and maybe Meren will be there next year

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why doesn’t McElveen run for the seat Tholen is vacating if he lives in the Dranesville district? Who is running for that seat?

Robyn Lady. Lives in Herndon, but worked in student services at Chantilly for many years.

Robyn was my boss for 12 Years. I definitely will hold her to high expectations, although being a great admin doesn't necessarily translate to being a good school board member. Most staff at Chantilly liked her a lot. She did have very strong opinions regarding current FCPS leadership, and was often a vocal advocate for Chantilly at the district level, although whether or not Gatehouse listened is a different story. We had significant disagreements politically but I always respected her ability to get things done.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why doesn’t McElveen run for the seat Tholen is vacating if he lives in the Dranesville district? Who is running for that seat?

Robyn Lady. Lives in Herndon, but worked in student services at Chantilly for many years.

Robyn was my boss for 12 Years. I definitely will hold her to high expectations, although being a great admin doesn't necessarily translate to being a good school board member. Most staff at Chantilly liked her a lot. She did have very strong opinions regarding current FCPS leadership, and was often a vocal advocate for Chantilly at the district level, although whether or not Gatehouse listened is a different story. We had significant disagreements politically but I always respected her ability to get things done.

Chantilly isn’t in Dranesville. Is she going to be a “vocal advocate” for Dranesville schools or just for FCPS staff?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At this point our likely at large members are moon, mcelveen, and mcdaniel or davis.

Agree and I would vote for Davis for some diversity of viewpoint. It’s also a little creepy how Kyle McDaniel, a former aide to Pat Herrity, has repackaged himself as a left-of-center Democrat like he’s the second coming of Laura Jane Cohen.

No way I'm voting for any Republican.

Davis is an independent and McDaniel is a former Republican. Sometimes it’s hard to keep up with the shifting affiliations.

McDaniel sounds good to me as a moderate. No way to Davis since she supports book bans in school libraries rather than the current process of allowing professional librarians to select books, people to challenge books, and most importantly parents to monitor what their own kids read if they have such strong beliefs.

I have positive associations with Moon and like that he could help bring some order to the board chaos with his experience, but will have to think more on that.

Still thinking about a third.

Mostly, I hope people look into candidates themselves instead of just following the endorsement of FCDC that brought us horrible members like Keys Gamarra and Omeish.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At this point our likely at large members are moon, mcelveen, and mcdaniel or davis.

Agree and I would vote for Davis for some diversity of viewpoint. It’s also a little creepy how Kyle McDaniel, a former aide to Pat Herrity, has repackaged himself as a left-of-center Democrat like he’s the second coming of Laura Jane Cohen.

No way I'm voting for any Republican.

Davis is an independent and McDaniel is a former Republican. Sometimes it’s hard to keep up with the shifting affiliations.

McDaniel sounds good to me as a moderate. No way to Davis since she supports book bans in school libraries rather than the current process of allowing professional librarians to select books, people to challenge books, and most importantly parents to monitor what their own kids read if they have such strong beliefs.

I have positive associations with Moon and like that he could help bring some order to the board chaos with his experience, but will have to think more on that.

Still thinking about a third.

Mostly, I hope people look into candidates themselves instead of just following the endorsement of FCDC that brought us horrible members like Keys Gamarra and Omeish.

School libraries should reflect community standards. Right now we have school employees deciding sexually graphic materials are appropriate for middle school kids and their decisions are reviewed by a panel handpicked to validate those decisions. Let’s not pretend it’s a rigorous, independent process.

The last thing we need is another 12-0 Democratic board. You admit Keys Gamarra and Omeish were horrible, but part of the reason they seemed so bad was that no one else on the School Board was reining them in or seriously challenging them. That’s why we need members like Davis - not so that they can necessarily dictate the agenda, but so they can disrupt the echo chamber.

I haven’t ruled out McDaniel but the main thing he seems to believe in is getting himself elected. I’m not quite sure how you go from being a top aide to Pat Herrity to a “progressive” getting endorsed by the likes of Laura Jane Cohen unless you’re just an opportunist.

[Anonymous]

I haven’t ruled out McDaniel but the main thing he seems to believe in is getting himself elected. I’m not quite sure how you go from being a top aide to Pat Herrity to a “progressive” getting endorsed by the likes of Laura Jane Cohen unless you’re just an opportunist.

I see McElveen in a similar light. He really wanted to be Chairman of the Board of Supervisors as his next political office and did not win. So, he is going back to School Board. That is not his goal.

[Anonymous]

I understand the desire for “someone to disrupt the 12-0 Democrats” but in practice, we had that with what’s her name in Springfield the board before this one and all she did was throw bombs from the sidelines. I guess it would have been good for some viral YouTube clips when someone brought out the sexually explicit books though.

[Anonymous]

Here is a question:

If the parent had gone directly to the school librarian, would she have been listened to?

If she had written a SB member, when there have been any action?

"Gender Queer" had no place in a school library. Had it not been there, there would not be so many books being challenged.

Librarians appear to have little common sense.

There is a difference between "banning books" and limiting what is in school libraries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here is a question:

If the parent had gone directly to the school librarian, would she have been listened to?

If she had written a SB member, when there have been any action?

"Gender Queer" had no place in a school library. Had it not been there, there would not be so many books being challenged.

Librarians appear to have little common sense.

There is a difference between "banning books" and limiting what is in school libraries.

There is a book challenge regulation that spells out the challenge process. There is a regulation on how librarians build collections. It’s not about seeing something on Fox News and then screaming at the school board a la Langton. Follow the process if you think there is a problem. And parent your own kid, not mine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The parties pick who appear on their sample ballots. And then most people in Fairfax County do not use their own critical thinking and then just vote the D sample ballot.

ha
+++++10000

I worked the polls. We had a woman go through the trash can to find a sample Dem ballot. (She had picked up a GOP ballot and had already signed in at the registration table and was not allowed to go out without starting all over.) She had no idea who she wanted to vote for. She also was not smart enough to figure out to just vote "opposite" of the GOP ballot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is a question:

If the parent had gone directly to the school librarian, would she have been listened to?

If she had written a SB member, when there have been any action?

"Gender Queer" had no place in a school library. Had it not been there, there would not be so many books being challenged.

Librarians appear to have little common sense.

There is a difference between "banning books" and limiting what is in school libraries.

There is a book challenge regulation that spells out the challenge process. There is a regulation on how librarians build collections. It’s not about seeing something on Fox News and then screaming at the school board a la Langton. Follow the process if you think there is a problem. And parent your own kid, not mine.

Honestly, I have to laugh at this for several reasons:

1. The current challenge process consists of people handpicked by FCPS validating the decisions made by people employed by FCPS. If you think that's a good process, you should at least want to have people from the community representing a wider variety of views participating in that process. With another 12-0 Democratic School Board, that's not going to happen

2. The "parent you own kid, not mine" line comes from people who are happy to police the speech of, and throw the book at, other parents' kids, not theirs, so long as they can justify it as designed to promote "equity" or a "caring culture." It's just any type of restraint or discretion when it comes to sexually explicit materials that turns them into Libertarians.