Every student in Columbus City School District deserves a quality school that is fair and inclusive. Students deserve learning environments that feel welcoming, safe, and happy. CCS staff deserve the same. The environment we live, work, and attend school in has a huge effect on our psyche and our ability to learn and reach our true potential. I’m running to ensure we keep a strong focus on our facilities and the environment we send our children and staff to each and every day.

CCS deserves leaders who will fight for their students, staff, and community at the local level, at the state level, and beyond. We know that things like school funding and certain legislation may reach beyond the school board’s immediate control, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be vocal about our district’s needs and call out bad actors who threaten our public education. Our school board members must lead the messaging and advocacy efforts to ensure that each student, parent, staff member, and member of our community can have their voice heard and knows what is being done to our public education system. We must stand up and fight back against book bans and threats from outside actors who want to disallow our schools from teaching honest, high-quality education grounded in truth, facts, and diverse perspectives. Public funding must remain within the public school system. We cannot allow the legislature to siphon it away and weaken our public schools.

CCS has some good programming already to encourage post-graduate career opportunities but the work cannot stop here. As our society evolves, and the interests and needs of our students change, we must be prepared to evolve with it. We must continue conversations with local higher education institutions and continue to build relationships with those who will train and hire CCS graduates, placing them into family-sustaining jobs right out of the gate! As a union attorney who has worked with various workforce development programs, Sarah understands the opportunities that currently exist and has many ideas for the future.

Sarah believes that equity must be top of mind for school board members, for school administrators, for teachers, for staff, for elected leadership, and for our community. We as a district must intentionally allocate our resources, instruction, and opportunities in an equitable manner and we must ensure that discriminatory practices, prejudices and beliefs be identified and eradicated. Our school board must work to eliminate the predictability of success that is currently correlated with race, gender-identity, sexual orientation, wealth, zip code, immigration status, etc.

ALL staff deserve to feel supported, respected, safe, and appreciated on the job. Our school district does not run without the day-in and day-out labor of our staff. From our teachers, to our school bus drivers, to our classroom aides, to guidance counselors, school nurses, cafeteria staff, janitorial staff, maintenance staff, office staff, extra-curricular leaders, mentors, and beyond, we must respect those who pour into us and listen to and provide for their needs. Retention and respect must be top of mind for all school district leaders.

Our school board must listen to those who have a vested interest in the success of our students—including our parents! Our parents deserve the up-to-date information they need to ensure their child’s success, the tools they need to assist, and they deserve a school board that actively seeks out their input and experience.

Sarah believes that every child and family in our district is deserving of learning conditions that foster intellectual curiosity and social and emotional wellbeing. As the largest district in the state, our power lies in our diversity and our network of teachers, parents, staff, and community members vested in the success of our schools. Our school board should uplift our various neighborhoods and diverse communities and encourage learning at all levels—inside the classroom and outside—because it will make our students better global citizens and community members.