I believe public education should be willing to evolve when the evidence, the experiences of families and educators, and the needs of students tell us something needs to change. As a trustee, I want to bring a practical, progressive and student-centred voice to the board, with a particular focus on how we protect students’ attention, strengthen their connection to the world around them, and create schools where every student can feel both safe and included.

One of my priorities is reducing our reliance on screens and educational technology where it is not meaningfully improving learning. Technology has an important place in education, and some students depend on it for accessibility and learning supports. But I do not believe every innovation is automatically progress. I want the district to continually ask whether technology is serving students, rather than expecting students and teachers to adapt to technology simply because it is available. I want to encourage more pen-to-paper learning, reading, outdoor and land-based education, hands-on experiences, and partnerships with the extraordinary community resources we already have in Greater Victoria. SD61 itself says technology should support the goals of its strategic plan; I want that principle to remain at the centre of how we make decisions about it.

My second priority is building an approach to school safety and inclusion that refuses to treat those values as opposites. I strongly support SOGI 123 and the right of 2S/LGBTQ+ students and staff to feel safe, respected and represented in our schools. SOGI 123 is not a separate prescribed curriculum; SD61 describes it as resources and practices intended to help educators create inclusive school environments. At the same time, I support rebuilding a constructive relationship between SD61 and local police, including exploring what a modern School Police Liaison Officer program could look like with clear objectives, appropriate oversight, youth-focused training and meaningful accountability.

I understand why some members of our community have serious concerns about police in schools, particularly given the experiences of marginalized students. Those concerns deserve to be heard rather than dismissed. SD61’s own review identified significant shortcomings in the former program, including the absence of defined objectives, consistent roles, reporting requirements and district oversight. For me, acknowledging those problems is not an argument against partnership; it is an argument for doing partnership better. I also believe we need to be candid about what was lost when the program ended. The former liaison model provided opportunities for relationship-building between young people and officers, safety education, and a familiar point of contact between schools and police. While police have continued to respond to emergencies, threat assessments and other serious safety matters, that reactive role is different from having an established, preventative relationship with a school community. I don’t believe our choice has to be between returning to an inadequately governed program and abandoning that relationship altogether. We can take what worked, learn from what didn’t, and build something better with clear roles, appropriate safeguards, meaningful oversight and accountability.

Ultimately, I’m not running because I think a trustee should arrive with all the answers. I’m running because I believe good governance means asking difficult questions, listening to students, families, educators and community partners, being transparent about trade-offs, and being willing to reconsider how things have always been done. With limited resources, every decision should come back to the same question: does this help our students learn, belong and thrive?