Meet the DSISD Board of Trustees candidates

Early voting will begin this coming week for the Dripping Springs Independent School District Board of Trustees, with four candidates vying for two open seats.

Joanna Day, vice president of the board, is running for reelection. She is joined by Olivia Barnard, Thaddeus Fortenberry and Tricia Quintero. Early voting will run from April 25 to May 3, and the final election will take place on May 7.

Each candidate in the race this year has a distinctive platform. With a background in law and experience in education, incumbent Day centered her platform around accountability, staff retention, student success and communication.

“Growing up, my teachers made me feel like I mattered - like I had a light that deserved to shine,” she said. “They helped me develop determination and a sense of purpose that stayed with me through college and beyond. All children deserve to have that kind of experience.”

Barnard, realtor and owner of Olivia Barnard Real Estate, centered her platform around student excellence, quality of education and district spending.

“I am running because it is the time in my life for which to serve,” she said. “There are some clear areas in which we can approve upon within our district… We are and will be facing issues new to school boards. These new issues are extraordinarily important to me.”

Architect and engineer Fortenberry focused his platform on different learning techniques and programs, student opportunities in STEM and foundational values, collaboration and creativity with Fine Arts.

“Strong public schools provide opportunity to all students,” he said. “Let's get back to the basics of ensuring students' success in our rapidly growing district. With a focus on creativity, math and science, I'll leverage my engineering and business background for effective, long-term decisions.”

Long-time Hays County resident Quintero established a platform around lower taxes, smarter investments and better communication.

“With everything going on in public schools today, it's critical that we add another strong, experienced voice to the DSISD board who's willing to fight for parents and teachers and protect our kids,” she said. “We cannot accept business as usual! As someone who cherishes faith, family, and freedom, I promise to be your fierce advocate.”

While each candidate’s central platform differs, each has also addressed known district issues, regarding staff retention, rapid growth and communication.

“I think the biggest and most urgent issue right now is staffing… that’s certainly not independent to our district,” Barnard said. “What we need to look at is our educators who are leaving. Why are they leaving? Do they feel comfortable having the conversations as to why?”

“[Staff turnover is] happening because of either burnouts or, the harsh reality, of the inflation of the area and the high cost of living,” Fortenberry said. “It is our responsibility for a successful district to make sure teachers are equipped with everything they need to feel supported. In addition to that, to ensure that goal is met, we need to make sure we plan for the ongoing, rapid growth of the area.”

“Our biggest challenge by far is growth,” Day said. “We grew by 9.9% last year, and recruitment and retention in a highgrowth area when we have property values growing the way they are is a real challenge… even without the exits from the profession we’re seeing nationwide. Our retention rate in our district has been really good — we’ve beat the state average every year — but we’re busting at the seams.”

“A lot of our issues [relate to] transparency in our current board, and I want to make it easier to communicate with our board,” Quintero said. “Board members are encouraged to… be the liaison between the community and the district, but they’re not really allowed to say what they want to say. I want to make sure that our taxpayers and our community have a good line of communication with our board members.”

After years of school board debates regarding mask mandates and other COVID-19 policies in schools, school board elections have begun to garner more attention from the public eye. Additional hot-button issues came up this election season, including critical race theory and book banning.

“I want parental rights, no forced masks, no forced COVID-19 vaccines, no critical race theory and age-appropriate books in the library,” Quintero said. “It’s hard enough fighting my kids with their apps and everything else they’re trying to get into, but to have to worry about the information they can pick up in their library… it’s not fair to parents.”

“I don’t believe in book banning, and I don’t believe that books that cover certain subject matter should be excluded from school libraries,” Day said. “Our district does a really good job vetting resources before they are purchased for the library. We have policies and procedures in place that allow books to be leveled so they’re age appropriate for the child who is checking them out — or they have parent permission.”

“What I think needs to happen here is the community coming together,” Barnard said. “We want to have as many books as possible… but not everything is appropriate for school-age children. At the end of the day, it is going to be the checks and balances and the regulations of the state of Texas that make that call, but to say the district hasn’t made mistakes… would be inaccurate.”

“The district has a book evaluation system in place, and I think it would benefit us all to confirm that it’s working,” Fortenberry said. “I think we’re facing a much larger challenge with digital devices. I think there’s a lot of importance we need to place on a digital citizenship and make sure students actually make decisions based on foundational values.”

For more on each candidate, additional information is available on their respective campaign websites: Joanna Day at votejoannaday.com, Olivia Barnard at oliviafordsisd.com, Thaddeus Fortenberry at thaddeusforschoolboard. com and Tricia Quintero at tricia4dsisdtrustee.com. For information about voting in the upcoming election, visit dsisdtx.us/elections.