Zianette Frost
Why are you running and why would you be a great person to serve on the School Committee?
I have been involved in school committee matters since Superintendent Timothy Farmer led Sharon Public Schools and am devoted towards bettering our district.
Campaign website: https://www.facebook.com/share/g/12HVG5Scg4n/
The School Committee and Superintendent work together every year to develop a $56 million budget. What went well in the past two years and where is there room for improvement?
The existing budget review process needs significant improvement, I cannot say that much about the existing process has gone well. I would like the school budget to be:
1) Explained in detail within a timely manner. Instead of reviewing the total yearly operational figures, we should deeply dive into the budget to understand each line item as well as understand the reasons for their yearly increases and understand if there are opportunities for cost savings.
2) Transparent - Sharon residents should be able to access all drafts and final versions within the district website. For the past two years, I proactively requested and shared the school budget with neighbors, through public forums like Sharon What's Up and Everything Sharon. However, one should not have to file a public record request to access the school budget. The town's money is our money. We should all have visibility into it.
3) More clear - in Row 975 of the proposed budget, you see a jump from $101,490.74 in FY23 to $1,029,514.20 in FY24 with no explanation. To account for the jump, we are to assume that Rows 976 and 977 were absorbed in Row 975 but that is not clearly stated. Additionally, we do not know how many full time employees (FTEs) this line item represents. I recommend that each row that accounts for more than one FTE, clearly state the total number of FTEs that the line item consists of.
4) Include more grant award information - aside from Row 84, I do not see any line items that are offset with additional grant funds.
The School Committee has had to make some very painful cuts in staff and programs due to budget. If there was suddenly an extra $200,000 found in the budget, how would you spend it? Choose between reducing fees, hiring more teacher's aides, rehiring teachers, or reinstating the DEI Director position.
If an extra $200,000 were found in the budget, I would apply those funds towards helping to properly pay and staff our special education program.
Name one thing the School Committee could do to improve the academics in Sharon schools.
One thing the school committee could do to improve the academics in Sharon schools is to request that the Lexile levels of the reading materials are increased for each grade, i.e. - do away with graphic novels in middle school and high school.
Social gender transition means to treat a student as a member of a different gender, for example by using a different name and pronouns. Under what circumstances do you believe it is appropriate for schools to socially transition children to a different gender without telling their parents?
Parents are asked to sign permission slips allowing children to partake in classroom snacks, movies, field trips and activities. Relevant to social gender transition, I do not believe that something with such long-term impact should be kept a secret from a child's parents.