Editor’s Note: This is the eighth story in an 11-part series focusing on local candidates running for election. The City Commission candidates ran Thursday. The School Board candidates will run Friday and Saturday.
If you would like a PDF of our entire Voters Guide, email us at [email protected]. Printed copies of the Voters Guide will be available to read at Zeb’s next week.
Name: Heather Whalen
Race: School Board
Current job: Director of development for Hope Leadership Academy Charter School in Kansas City, Missouri. Third grade teacher one day a week in Kansas City.
Current community involvement:
Site council at the middle school.
Substitute teach in the Eudora district.
Parent volunteer with Cardinal Corps.
Senior parent for the cross country team and the track team and help coordinate meals.
Why are you running for election?
We really love Eudora and the school district. We think it’s an amazing place to live and raise children. I have served on a School Board in Kansas City at Hope Leadership Academy for the past 12 years. I have stepped off of that role and now I’m the director of development, but in my time serving on the school board at HLA, I saw the value of having an educator on a school board.
Often, school board leaders are business men and women and sometimes people from the medical field, which are all very important to running a school, but I feel like a voice that is lacking on the Eudora School Board is the voice of an educator. I have been a teacher for 25 years in several different capacities, and I just feel like it’s a valuable voice and something that’s missing on the current Eudora School Board.
Earlier this year, residents participated in surveys and focus groups about what they wanted in a new superintendent. We’re going to ask you some questions related to this same data since they relate to leadership vision for the district. One of the top priorities was creating more competitive salary and benefits packages to attract and retain staff members. How do you think the School Board should approach this issue?
I think that’s a critical issue for our district. Our district, though property poor, has many other great qualities to offer potential teachers, to keep and retain quality teachers. However, it does come down to salary and benefits. That does play a role, you can’t just blow that off as something that “Oh, but we got these other great perks in our district.”
I think that needs to always remain a high priority for the board. Teachers and administrators are who have the direct touch and the direct impact on our students and if we are not keeping and retaining high quality staff, that’s a direct detriment to our students. And so I think being creative with our finances is critical.
I think the Nottingham development is a great thing for the community of Eudora, but it’s going to be a little bit of time before the financial benefits of that reach the school budgets. In the meantime, I think we need to promote the other strengths of our district, which is just the sense of community, the high academic standards, the support the community shows, the Eudora Schools Foundation is critical in supporting our schools, that’s a really amazing piece that most districts don’t have.
I think just promoting our positives that we do have, the strengths we do have as a district, but also behind the scenes as a board really being strategic and finding all the places where we might be able to beef up our salaries.
Another priority that residents noted was upkeep of buildings. What capital improvements do you think are needed across the district?
Well, I’m hearing just sitting in on different board meetings and just listening, I know that our HVAC system is something in several buildings that is nearing the end of life, so I know even speaking with Mr. Moeckel that that is one of the top priorities, which is obviously very, very important, but is one of those things that isn’t obvious to everyone to see how much money goes into that, how important that is that you don’t really, you know, it’s not really an eye testing that you can really see how that makes the building better, so I know that’s a very important thing, so that’s going to be addressed.
Just space, we have some large classes moving through the district right now in the middle school and high school and so classroom space is critical and important. We really need a second auxiliary gym at the high school. We’re the only school in our league that does not have a high school auxiliary gym and that hurts us in several different facets, including just practice time for kids. We got kids all over the district getting up at, middle school kids getting up at 5:30 in the morning to practice just cause we’re out of practice space.
I think the traffic issue between the middle school and the high school is also reaching a critical level. Again, we got some really big classes moving through the middle school and high school, which is going to add about 50 drivers here in about a year and a half, so the traffic flow situation is going to be, I think, an area of critical concern. Also, the addition of several homes. That new addition over in Shadow Ridge is going to add more traffic, too, so I think traffic is an issue that we’re really going to have to look at as well.
Improving diversity and equity in the district was also noted as important. What role do you think the School Board should play in this?
I think they always need to keep an open mind to students of all interests. Sometimes I think we get focused on the idea that diversity is primarily a race issue and that is not true. I substitute in all the buildings, and we have an enormously diverse population in Eudora, though it doesn’t always look like it based on skin color.
I think sometimes we need to make sure we’re not just looking at that and looking at all the different ways that our student population is diverse. I think the School Board’s job in relation to diversity is really listening to the building administrators and the superintendent to the needs of the students within the schools and then to support any programs or things that the building administrators and our superintendent feel is needed to support the diversity of students in the buildings.
How do you hope to improve the educational experience for students?
I feel like as a School Board member, your job is to help provide a budget that is workable, so that the administrators and the superintendent can really be, they’re the educational experts as to what the educational experience for the students need to be. The board’s role is to be able to manage a financial budget, to be able to support initiatives that those administrators and Mr. Moeckel feel are best to raise the academic levels of our students.
I think helping to support strong core values to make sure that the board is setting goals for our district and then to provide the means and ways to support that administrators and teachers and staff can carry out those goals that have been set by the board.
Not only community members but School Board members themselves said they wanted a next superintendent who is a proactive thinker. But the board plays a key role in this as well. What vision do you personally have for the district?
That’s a great question. My vision for the district is that we are providing the highest quality education that we possibly can for the students and families that have chosen to live in Eudora. Eudora is a super unique and special community and many, many people, including my family, chose to live and raise our family in Eudora based on the small town size, the sense of community, and I think we need to remember that when setting goals for our school.
People choose Eudora for some specific reasons and one of them is just the smaller-town feel, that we are not Lawrence, that we are not Kansas City, people choose Eudora for those reasons, and when we are making decisions as a board and setting goals, I think we need to keep in mind the reasons that people choose Eudora and that we are not to look exactly like Lawrence or Kansas City.
We want to look at the values from such things as the community survey and to see what is important to the people of our community, so as we make policy and move forward as a board, I think we keep in mind what the community has said on these surveys. I’ve been a part of a couple of them and so I think that’s really important, so my vision and goal for the school is to be the highest quality of education, a place where teachers want to stay and retire because they’ve enjoyed their experience and feel supported and where families want to move in because of the reputation of our schools and our community.
What do you think are the biggest strengths of the school district?
Our staff. Being a substitute in the district, I see almost on a weekly basis the commitment, the dedication of our staff to our students. That is by far our greatest strength. From the administrators to the certified staff to the classified staff, they are 100% committed to our students and to caring not only for their academic needs, but also for their social and emotional needs.
They get to know the kids, the kids miss their teachers when they’re gone when I’m subbing, so our No. 1 strength is definitely our staff and their commitment to our students. I think another strength of our district is our sense of community. The community, whether it’s grandparents or people who don’t have kids in school, their commitment to making things work for the school to supporting the kids in different activities, businesses that support the school has just been amazing and overwhelming to see the community support.
And then I think our third strength is the Eudora Schools Foundation. That is an incredible organization that provides just amazing support to teachers and staff that wouldn’t be possible without them and it makes a huge difference in the lives of teachers, students, and drawing quality staff to our district.
What do you think are the biggest challenges?
Funding. Eudora, like I said earlier, we just need a bigger tax base budget. Funding is our biggest struggle and it will always be our struggle and part of that is due to our location. A little too close to Lawrence at times for just businesses to thrive as well, so I think our biggest challenge is funding.
I think our second biggest challenge is tied to funding, but it’s keeping, retaining, attracting high quality teachers and that’s our second biggest challenge. And then I think one of the challenges again that we’re facing is just that our buildings, being able to update and add some features that we are needing at our buildings.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
Yes, I think I just would like to say that we’ve seen the impact and influence that the local School Board has played and that the role that it has and the effect it has on every child and teacher and family in our community. I believe strongly in the need for value-based and fact-based student-focused leadership driving the decisions for our district, and I would love to be a part of that process.
I feel like an educator’s voice is highly important and valuable on a board, along with the voices of others from a variety of occupations, but we love and value Eudora. We have three children in the district, and I would love to be able to serve the community as a School Board member.
