Our world is not the same as it was 20 years ago and it won’t be the same in the next 20 years. How we view safety is an ever-evolving topic, but it is a critical one to ensure every single student cannot just reach their academic goals but do so in a safe environment.

To ensure every students’ safety, I will immediately focus on the following elements of safety:

• Identify and hire a firm to work with to conduct an overall safety assessment of the current security posture of the District and develop a strategy to improve the ways we approach safety and to better prepare our schools, staff and students.
• Implement additional physical controls in all facilities including detective, deterrent and monitoring to mitigate potential risks
• Students must feel safe and have a sense of belonging to learn and grow successfully. It is important to ensure our teachers have the necessary training and tools to strengthen the sense of community within our District—both inside the classroom and out. I will focus on teachers receiving training to help our students build relationships and support emotional learning.
• Evaluate our capabilities to properly address the mental health needs of our students and plan for improvements where any gaps are identified, including additional staffing and other resources.
• Ensure methods exist for students and employees to report potential concerns confidentially or ask questions in an anonymous fashion. We must build a community that is aware of potential issues and empowered to protect one another.

BHS has several advantages over other school districts in our state and in the nation. We have an extremely supportive community who is actively engaged with our student body, invested in their success, and dedicated to enabling our learners to grow. Secondly, our community has invested considerably in our efforts—in terms of time, energy and certainly from a financial perspective with the recent bond passing. Lastly, our school district’s per-pupil allowance from the State of Michigan is greater than many other similar districts.

It is imperative to ensure our students are not just doing better than average or simply not falling behind, but that we are seeing the return on our investment and ensuring our children excel at all levels. Where we are not, we must ask the important questions: why, what, where, how, when and take steps to address quickly. Several of our metrics have shown a decline or simply have not improved over the years. I will work to analyze the data at a deeper level, provide insights to promote thoughtful conversation and partner with our educators and our community to achieve excellence.

To produce the academic results our District deserves, I will prioritize the following:

• Identifying root causes for gaps in academic performance and establishing realistic goals, metrics to support progress and better reporting on all datasets
• Standardizing our curriculum throughout the District by using methods, exercises, activities and other resources which have proven successful in our District. Where one elementary school succeeds using a resource, we should share that success with all
• Ensure support for different learning styles exists to ensure equity exists and all students are able to reach their academic goals
• Challenge advanced learners in their areas of interest by introducing additional learning opportunities, focusing on students’ strengths and building from their passion

Our Board is in critical need of a leader who will perform their duties in the best interest of all community members. To ensure our learners reach their potential and to improve the future for our community, our Board needs a leader who will make the right decision in the best interest of our students every time.

I will act as that leader and provide the vision, guidance and passionate support that we deserve. I will focus on:

• Establishing transparency by proactively alerting the community to critical items requiring Board consideration and including all perspectives in the decision-making process
• Establishing respect for our community, teachers, staff, administration and fellow Board members in all dealings and displaying behavior we would be proud of our students exhibiting
• Working to actively engage the community regularly, through additional events, surveys and requesting feedback from study sessions and board meetings
• Committing to following through on communication, with every member of our community and showing care and attention to their concern