My Endorsement: Montgomery County Board of Education At-Large
As many of y’all may know, I’ve been incredibly involved in the Montgomery County school board election from the very beginning. I’ve kept a giant spreadsheet of all the information about the candidates, their fundraising, and their endorsements. In fact, I had even strongly considered being a candidate for the at-large position myself, though I chose not to do so because of the sheer number of candidates and my own personal obligations.
After speaking to two of the four candidates I’d consider the prominent progressives in the race, I was reassured that our school board would be in good hands without my voice being added to the conversation. Those three progressive candidates are Lynne Harris, Sunil Dasgupta, Cameron Rhode, and Dalbin Osorio.
Unfortunately, despite each of these candidates being immensely qualified for this position in their own special ways, I can only support one. In my eyes, there is one candidate that is absolutely the most qualified and prepared to be on the school board, and I’ve written this post to explain who I’ll be supporting and voting for in the June 2nd primary.
This will be my first election ever, and I take immense pride in who I believe will be the best of the 13 candidates to sit on the school board: Lynne Harris. I’ve seen Lynne up close as an advocate in our school system, and I’m always blown away by her vision, her grace, and her passion. I want to talk about a few examples that made it clear to me that Lynne’s voice will absolutely benefit students, teachers, and parents at the school board table.
When I think of Lynne, the first thing I think of is what she’s done to support students and allow their voices to be heard and respected. Her platform is by far the most centered on student engagement and ensuring that the #1 stakeholders in our school system have a place at the board table. I graduated Northwood a little under a year ago, and was heavily involved in student advocacy for a lot of high school. I always saw Lynne, whether it was at the school board hearing where students fought (and won) to rebuild Northwood, or at meetings of the county student government where she listened to and cared about the voices of every student. Not only do we need a board member at the table that respects the student voice, we need a member that has centered it throughout her career as an education advocate.
Lynne has excelled in all of the roles she’d played throughout her career, where it’s been her time as an attorney, a nurse, or in her current role as a teacher. During a massive public health crisis, I can’t think of anyone better to take on a leadership role to guide our school system than a nurse with a degree in graduate degree in public health from Johns Hopkins who has been administering COVID-19 tests. Not to mention that Lynne truly understands the gravity that COVID-19 will have on student outcomes and equity.
This school board primary is going to be one of the most vital in a long time. I encourage everybody to vote, regardless of your preferred candidate, and make sure your voice is heard in this race. If you are a registered voter in Montgomery County, you should be receiving a ballot in the mail that needs to be mailed back by June 2nd.
I hope that you all will join me in supporting Lynne’s campaign, or at least consider her when making your decision for who to vote for! Her website is located here: https://www.lynne4students.org/.
