(Photo: Leslie De Rose (left) and Jennifer Schacher)
Editor’s note: This is part two of a series of interviews with candidates running for seats on the Pajaro Valley Unified School District Board of Trustees. In this story, Trustee Area 5 incumbent Leslie De Rose discusses her campaign, and challenger Jennifer Schacher looks to bring “new leadership.”
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Leslie De Rose
De Rose has held the Trustee Area 5 seat since winning the election in November 2006.
Her tenure includes helping the district weather the 2008 economic recession, which included enacting numerous budget cuts and layoffs, and then restoring many of those programs and positions as the economy rebounded.
De Rose and her fellow trustees have been on the receiving end several times of vitriolic criticism by teachers who came to meetings accusing the district of paying its educators too little.
She also voted in May to give teachers a salary increase.
“There’s never a dull moment, but it’s very satisfying knowing that you have done good things for our students,” she said.
De Rose, who ran unopposed in the 2012 election, said she has enjoyed watching the results of her work on the board being implemented in the district.
“It is very satisfying personally to see initiatives I supported that I know are important to the community come to fruition, and see our students’ success because of them,” she said.
When she was elected, De Rose said her first initiative was to finish Pajaro Valley High School, which has lacked a promised athletic field and performing arts center.
After several delays, workers are now preparing to break ground on the project.
De Rose said she wants to see all the district’s schools using the same curriculum and programs.
“What we have seen in the past is good programs that were adopted, but not fully implemented,” she said. “We have to be consistent across the district.”
While Measure L — the $150 million bond passed in 2012 — is allowing the district to play catch-up on a mountain of construction, repair and upgrade projects, it is not enough to finish all the needed work, De Rose said.
She hopes to help the district find a way to complete deferred maintenance projects throughout the district, many of which are structural problems at aging buildings.
“There is so much more to do, and Measure L is not going to last forever,” she said.
De Rose said one of her proudest accomplishments came early in her tenure, when in 2008 the board approved a $300,000 contract for an energy manager, an initiative school officials hoped would provide long-term savings.
Such a proposal was a tough sell for a community in the midst of the 2008 recession.
In approving the contract, De Rose said she was asking her constituents to trust that their decision would be based on careful study of the issue.
“We absolutely scrutinized the contract, and it was evident to me that the contract would pay for itself,” she said.
Since then, the district has saved about $5.8 million, De Rose said.
“I think that is evidence of how much attention I give to these important issues,” she said. “I’m willing to make these difficult decisions not just on instinct but fact.”
De Rose said she is hoping to bolster rules set last year by state pesticide regulators, which among other things prohibit pesticide application methods within a quarter-mile of schools during weekdays.
During the same year, PVUSD moved to ban the on-campus use of Roundup weed killer.
She now hopes to convince local growers to utilize organic farming methods.
“(The agriculture industry) is what supports our community,” she said. “We all have to live and work together, and organic farming is a great way for us to coexist in a small space.”
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Jennifer Schacher
Schacher, who has two young daughters, describes herself as an “active mom” who participates in their schools.
She was room parent for her older daughter’s class at Watsonville Charter School of the Arts, and has volunteered in her younger girl’s preschool class.
Schacher also volunteers at Watsonville Police Activities League, where she teaches science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics, a group of subjects frequently grouped together under the acronym STEAM.
School districts across the nation are embracing that amalgam of subjects, as educators introduce Next Generation Science Standards into their teaching.
Schacher said that STEAM meshes perfectly with the exploratory nature of the young brain.
“Let’s face it, that’s the direction education needs to go,” Schacher said.
She said that most trustees have held their seats for several years, and that Jeff Ursino is the only one on the board with school-aged children. That, she said, is an important aspect for someone tasked with oversight of a school district.
That in-the-trenches knowledge, she said, allows her to keep her finger on the pulse of what is happening in the classroom.
In discussing her decision to challenge incumbent Leslie De Rose, Schacher cites a “lack of leadership” in the current trustees.
“I feel it’s time to bring new leadership to the board,” she said.
Schacher formerly worked as office manager for a plastic surgery office, where she said she learned how to balance a budget. She studied early childhood education, biology and earth science in college.
She participates in volunteer beach cleanup days with her daughters, and helped with relief work for Hurricane Andrew, which hit the Bahamas and Florida in 1992.
“I’ve always been very active in my community,” she said.
If elected, Schacher said she would look into changing board procedures, which she said currently dampers public participation during meetings.
She explained that many people, particularly children, are intimidated to speak during the public meetings.
“People need to feel welcomed,” she said. “They need to feel their voices are heard.”
This speaks to Schacher’s philosophy of involving the community in decisions about education, she said.
“You want your kids to have the best education possible,” she said. “And that can’t be done with a supervisor and seven trustees. You need the help of the community.”
Schacher said she also wants to increase the district-wide use of early intervention programs aimed at bullying and building life skills.
The district took a good first step in hiring a grant writer last year, and should capitalize on that success by hiring another one, she said. PVUSD should also offer grant-writing workshops, she added.
That would lessen the workload of teachers – many of whom write their own grants – and bring in more money, Schacher said.
“That would be another way to get things done for the district,” she said.
While giving teachers a raise earlier this year will ease cost-of-living woes, the district should work with city and county lawmakers to help make housing more affordable for educators, Schacher said.
Many are commuting from far away to their PVUSD jobs.
“They can’t even find a rental because none are available,” she said. “All that should be discussed before it becomes a problem.’’
