Age: 41
Number of year lived in Oxford: 12 years
Family: My Wife’s name is Nora we have been married 12 years. I have four children, Kyle 19 years old, Vito 11years old, Martin 10 years old and Isabella 5 years old. Kyle graduated last year, and Vito, Martin, and Isabella all attend the Oxford Schools.
Government experience: For the past 20 months, I have served the community as a school board member.
Experience with in the Oxford school district: I co-chaired the citizens committee for the school bond issue, which built our new high school and renovated the middle school and Leonard elementary.
Occupation: Since 1984 I have worked as a Residential Builder and have a Land Development Company.
1. Why are you running for School board?
In 2003, when I first ran to serve on the School Board, my goal was community service. I was fresh off a citizens committee that was successful in passing the school bond issue and I felt I could be a good conduit between the School District and the community. This goal is still the number one reason I am running for re-election. The other goal was to see the completion of the schools construction. The construction phase is completed and our facilities are excellent. The facilities we have given our children will help them stay competitive with the surrounding Oakland County districts.
In my 20 months of community service, I have learned that the most important aspect of educating our children occurs through personal interactions of our district staff and students. My new understanding of the workings of the School Board has given me new goals. My responsibilities as a School Board member are to set high standards through personal examples and policies. For example, curriculum, personnel, community relations, financial management, and district operations are many different aspects of our school district. As a board member, I have the ability to oversee these areas, ask questions of our administrators, and vote on motions relating to these items.
2. What do you believe are the top three issues facing the school district? How do you plan to deal with them if elected?
The three issues facing the Oxford Area Community School district are stability of funding, increasing costs, and curriculum. The immediate issues are our budget cuts and passing the non-homestead millage request. The monetary issues we are dealing with are occurring in several districts in our state. The processes for resolving these types of issues are complex. If we follow a few good guidelines, and the discussion is open to the public, I am sure the outcome will be in the best interest of our children. It is important to hear all side of the issues. Up until now, the Oxford Schools have dealt with rising health care costs, retirement costs, and inflationary increases through good fiscal planning. However, cost increases and funding shortfalls are greater than previous years. To the community members concerned about the budget cuts. The process of cutting operating expenses has been occurring for many years.
The District has streamlined its purchasing practices, cut the amount of supplies, reduced staffing levels in non-teaching areas, offered early retirement incentives for teachers, ultimately the district has been doing more work with fewer resource since before the economic downturn. The school board and myself are working hard to insure that whatever cutbacks decided on will minimize the impact to the children of our district. To the business leaders in our community, I am asking for your support for the non-homestead millage request. The success of our children means you will have better employees, consumers that are more affluent and a more desirable community in the future. By voting yes to the non-homestead millage request, you are making our Schools competitive with other Oakland County Districts.
The most important issue is maintaining our educational goals; education standards are changing. The state MEAP testing and federal No Child Left Behind requirements have helped define what the expectations should be. Curriculum Frameworks is an evaluation tool, which our teachers, administrators and community use to create, assesses, review, and change, curriculum. This process has been very effective in integrating technology and changing curriculum in our District. It draws conclusions usually requiring the District to purchase new or updated material. Both technology and curriculum changes cost money on a yearly basis. It is most important that the resources needed to update education remain the highest priority.
3. What personal assets or qualification do you feel you can bring to the school board? Why should voters elect you?
I have twenty years of business experience in a competitive field. This experience has given me the ability to discern the important information in complex issues. The ability to stand alone on ideals and not be swayed by others. My best quality is to work with others to find solutions to challenges. I ask the community for their vote with the assurance I will always act in the best interest of our children.
4. How do you view the relationship between a school board and the district’s central administration, particularly the superintendent? Who is in charge?
In my term as School Board Member, I have found our central office to be very responsive to any of my requests.
Who is in charge? This is a great question. The school districts are a good civics lesson for the community. The Board of Education is an elected body that has powers from the State of Michigan. The School Board has three functions ? legislative, executive and judicial. The legislative function entails adopting bylaws and policies for the organization and operation of the Board and District. The executive powers shall by exercised by the appointment of a Superintendent. The Superintendent is the chief executive officer of the School District. The Superintendent shall enforce the statutes, rules and policies. Judicial functions say the Board assumes jurisdiction over any controversy within the District, and may hold hearings, which shall offer the parties a fair and impartial forum. The system design is to insure checks and balances for the community on the operation of the School District. During my tenure on Board of Education, this system has worked well, because the Superintendent has been able to explain the issues and resolutions to the seven-member board. It is important the community realize that individual members do not possess the power that resides in the Board of Education. An act of the Board shall be valid when approved though a majority vote. It is imperative for a School District to have an educational expert like Virginia Brennan-Kyro to explain the future needs and the directions the District will travel.
5. What, if anything, would you change or improve about Oxford Schools?
I stated in earlier paragraphs how education is always changing, and the importance of modifying our curriculum. I will continue to support our staff in making improvements to curriculum. The other issue, which I have been studying since coming to the board, is state funding of School Districts. This issue is complicated, in my opinion, the intent of proposal A and the Headlee Amendment were to make school funding more equitable and to limit Local and State taxes on citizens. Both intentions were good, but there is a downside to each of these pieces of legislation. Proposal A helped make the funding differences between the wealthier and poorest districts less severe. This sounds good in theory, but in reality, a growing community that wants to fund their schools at higher levels cannot. The Headlee Amendment is even more complex. The intent was to stop Local and State government from levying taxes at rates higher than inflation. This sounds great, but as Board member, I have found this Amendment penalizes growing communities.
6. Anything else you wish to add?
I wish to tell my constituents that our Schools become stronger when they participate. Our Schools are the largest institution in our community. The School Districts impact on the future is something you should be involved in. Get out and vote. The children of our community need you to vote for the non-homestead millage.