Sharp disagreements emerged on some of the key issues the board will face in the coming period as it seeks to solve a persistent structural deficit, hire a new superintendent of schools and strengthen lagging academic performance across the district. Brouhard, for example, who has taught at schools including Glenview Elementary and Melrose Leadership Academy<\/a>, said school closures should not be an option, while Fleisher, a parent at Crocker Highlands Elementary<\/a>, said everything should be on the table that could put the district on a path to solvency. While Brouhard defended a board decision to separate from the previous superintendent, Kyla Johnson-Trammell, Fleisher criticized the move for taking place \u201cbehind closed doors.\u201d<\/p>\n The two candidates also found several points of agreement, with each expressing support for Oakland\u2019s immigrant sanctuary policies during a time of stepped up immigration enforcement and the need to retain experienced teachers. And they debated other hot topics the board will face in the years ahead, including school safety, whether OUSD has fallen short in its anti-discrimination efforts and student access to technology.<\/p>\n The Oaklandside\u2019s education equity reporter, Ashley McBride, moderated the District 2 debate, kicking it off with a question about the district\u2019s budget challenges and then opening it up for audience questions. This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity and ordered by topic.<\/p>\n Ashley McBride:\u00a0 Thank you all for being here. I\u2019d like to welcome our District 2 candidates: challenger Arielle Fleisher and incumbent Jennifer Brouhard. Let\u2019s get started. What are the changes that OUSD needs to make to maintain a sustainable budget? And should school closures or mergers be on the table?<\/p>\n Arielle Fleisher: In order to make a sustainable budget, there are three things I think about. The first one is that we need to admit we have a problem: We are overspending. Last year we overspent by $90 million.<\/a> We need to cut $30 million this year, major cuts, which are incredibly destabilizing to our schools. We need to admit the size and the gravity of this problem.<\/p>\n The second thing we need to do is have a vision. What are we budgeting for? What are our goals for our district? What does it look like to have a district that is fully resourced to deliver reading, math, college- and career-ready students?<\/p>\n And the third thing that we need to do is think thoughtfully and put everything on the table in order to get to a place of solvency.<\/p>\n That means we have to look at our programs. We have to look at our contracts. We have to look at our curriculum. We need to have an honest conversation about everything that\u2019s happening in the district. When I think about school closures, we did not do this well in the past, and we have to admit that, and we have to honor that, but we are a learning institution.<\/p>\n Our principals have sent three letters to our board, basically saying, \u201cPlease close schools.\u201d The moral I\u2019m trying to get to is: We have to listen to our educators, and at this point we need to put everything on the table, because that is leadership. It means wrestling with hard choices.<\/p>\n Jennifer Brouhard: Thank you. Well, as an educator, I am opposed to closing schools. I think to start with that on the table right now when we still have so much restructuring to do in our budget harms our communities, harms our families, harms our students. So the things we really need to look at? I agree we need to spend within what our revenues are.<\/p>\n In past years when we had COVID money and other federal resources, we paid for positions, and we can\u2019t afford a lot of those positions anymore, or we have to find other ways to fund it. But as our money ran out, as it did across the nation, we continued to spend. So we do have to spend within what we have.<\/p>\n We need to look at contracts and outsourcing, and this has been led by an ad hoc committee, with our unions and staff working together to cut our outsourcing. So this year we\u2019ve hired more OUSD speech and language pathologists and psychologists, cutting down a lot of our outsourcing costs.<\/p>\n We need to look at our central office and our site positions and see what is efficient, what meets the needs of our students, what are things we can combine. And the reality is there are things we\u2019re going to have to do without, but I don\u2019t think that closing schools is one of them.<\/p>\n School closures and a balanced budget<\/p>\n Audience question: This one is for Ms. Fleisher. Given what Director Brouhard said about the problem with school closures and how disruptive they are on a community, on students, on staff, and that studies show they do not save money for the district and it disproportionately hurts Black and brown and low-income communities, what is your justification for considering more school closures?<\/p>\n Fleisher: A couple things I want to say in response to that. One, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s really a response to our budget problems. It\u2019s more about academics and resourcing. The extent to which you save money from school closures is very much down the line. Two, when you ask what I think about it, I want to read to you what our principals said to that.<\/p>\n Our principals have sent three letters to our board<\/a>. It is notable that in the list of unions that endorse my opponent, the administrators\u2019 union was not included. Our principals have sent three letters to our school board voting no confidence. And they said, and I quote:<\/p>\n \u201cThe experts have been clear. We operate too many schools for a district of 33,755 students. We can no longer afford to postpone difficult decisions. Critics point to school closures as an equity issue. We posit that the gradual starvation of our schools is also an equity issue.\u201d Our principals have essentially said, \u201cPut me out of a job.\u201d<\/p>\n I cannot stand on the sideline and watch while our schools are starved of the resources they need. What I want to do is have an open and honest conversation about reimagining our schools. That is my goal.<\/p>\n Brouhard: On the union for administrators, they are not endorsing. I do have good relationships and meet regularly with UAOS [United Administrators of Oakland Schools], and I\u2019ve had some great conversations. But as far as servicing schools and students getting what they need, closing schools doesn\u2019t do that either.<\/p>\n We\u2019re not able to use the money that we get from closing schools for our general budget. So we still have the same amount of money. The only thing we really lose are administrators and SEIU classified staff. Teachers will go to other schools. Students will go to other schools.<\/p>\n I was at La Escuelita when it was closed, and it was brutal. [Editors\u2019 note: only its middle school<\/a> was closed; the elementary school remains open.] Kids were told where to go. They didn\u2019t want to go. I mean, it was a mess, and we were told abruptly. So we can say we\u2019ll learn from it. I\u2019m not sure we will.<\/p>\n The other piece is, who\u2019s going to get crowded schools? Because when we close schools in West Oakland, Deep East Oakland, those kids are going to go to more crowded schools.\u00a0<\/p>\n Audience question: I was reading an article in the Oaklandside last week about the board meeting discussing a September 15 letter from the Alameda County Office of the Superintendent, and there was a quote there from Director Brouhard saying that letter was a wakeup call.<\/p>\n What was it about that letter that felt like a wakeup call for you? And what are the most important takeaways from both that letter and other recent communications we\u2019ve seen from the county?<\/p>\n Brouhard: The wakeup call for me was two parts. One, I think she [Superintendent Alysse Castro] did recognize the hard work that we\u2019ve done, and she recognized more importantly that we made these decisions and we stood by them, which has probably been her biggest criticism and to some extent a true criticism. So she has recognized the depth of the collaboration that we\u2019re doing with the district leadership to restructure our budget.<\/p>\n On the other hand, she was extremely clear about timelines. We had to discuss the letter by October 8, which we did. We had to have our fiscal stability plan, which we are working on, and what we\u2019re going to be doing at each of our meetings is taking a section of that fiscal stability plan so that we can talk about it piece by piece so people can really look at what we\u2019re doing.<\/p>\n The wakeup call to me was: We recognize the work, now get down and finish it. I think that was a very different tone than she\u2019s had before, which has been: We\u2019re not doing the work. It represents a change in our relationship with her.\u00a0<\/p>\n Fleisher: I don\u2019t know how many of you guys have read these letters in depth, but it\u2019s worth reading. It\u2019s good reading. When I read that letter, it\u2019s funny \u2014 to me, it made me sad because it felt like our county was really okay with Oakland just being in survival mode. What we did last year was we drew down our reserves by $90 million<\/a> by effectively using your retirement fund to pay for your lunch and we shifted pots of money around.<\/p>\n And if we did that to become stable, sure, but there was nothing that we did in the whole year last year to think about the structural reality in front of us. The fact that we spend more than we take in. We didn\u2019t have any real conversations with the community, as a board, to acknowledge and talk about what are we going to do about that structural challenge.<\/p>\n So I\u2019m deeply concerned that, again, we are here in survival mode, we are not addressing the fact that we have this $30 million gap and we\u2019re not looking at our structural challenge. We cannot deliver the school district our kids deserve if we are continuing to operate in survival mode. And I refuse to let this incredible school district just be in survival mode.\u00a0<\/p>\n Academic priorities<\/p>\n McBride: Please name one academic program or initiative in OUSD that you think the district does well and deserves more investment.\u00a0<\/p>\n Brouhard: One thing they do well at our high schools is our career training and Pathways. I know the one at Oakland High School, we\u2019ll give a shout out here, is an amazing program.\u00a0<\/p>\n In our district, among many of our high schools, we have 95% or more of our students enrolled in Pathways. [Editor\u2019s note: For the 2025-2026 school year, 92% of OUSD\u2019s 10th, 11th and 12th graders<\/a> were enrolled in a pathway.] This is definitely a program that keeps students in school and focused on not just skills, but experience. If you ever get a chance to get to the Capstones, they\u2019re really amazing. That is one thing that we do really well.<\/p>\n Fleisher: I have the same answer, and I swear I thought of it before you said it. I think our Pathways programs are really wonderful. I do a lot of work in my day job in workforce development, and I think it\u2019s really important to think about the wide breadth of careers that are possible after graduating from high school.<\/p>\n Thinking about a skill suite and all the ways we can link learning and connect what is happening in the classroom to real world jobs and how that makes you feel empowered and capable and able to, post high school, get on the track that is right for you.<\/p>\n So I agree \u2014 it\u2019s an incredibly impressive program here in Oakland, and one that I think we can continue to grow and to celebrate for what it\u2019s done.\u00a0<\/p>\n McBride: Let\u2019s do a lightning round, with a community-submitted question. Briefly, what is the one student outcome metric that you would commit to track at every board meeting?<\/p>\n Fleisher: Growth on our i-Ready scores [the diagnostic tool OUSD uses to assess students\u2019 math and reading levels].<\/p>\n Brouhard: Student attendance.\u00a0<\/p>\n Teacher retention<\/p>\n Student question: How will the district support teacher retention and having quality teachers that have the best interests of youth in mind?<\/p>\n Fleisher: I like this question a lot. Our teachers are the backbone of our schools. We know that success is so important to having teachers at our schools.<\/p>\n I have the statistics somewhere in my notes, but right now our teacher retention is very low. We\u2019re some of the lowest across California. [Editor\u2019s note: Teacher retention is about 81%<\/a> in OUSD, just a bit below the state average of 86%<\/a>.] A lot is made about the raises that our teachers just got<\/a>, which is wonderful. Our teachers need to be paid more. But to me, when I think about retention, a solid salary is just part of it.<\/p>\n Think about you in the jobs that you like. Why are you there? You\u2019re there in part because you\u2019re paid well, but also because you feel supported, because you feel like you have the resources that you need to succeed in that classroom. And when I hear things from our principals, I\u2019m actually very worried about principal retention<\/a>.<\/p>\n We\u2019re losing our principals this year who are so important to our schools because of the situation that we find ourselves in. When we talk about teacher retention, salary is a big part of that, but so are those supports at our schools, so is feeling resourced, so is feeling we have a strong community.<\/p>\n And we see that strength in our middle school network right now, that it\u2019s really working backwards from goals. Very data-driven, very community-oriented; coaching, professional development, all ladders up, and I think that\u2019s all important to retention.<\/p>\n Brouhard: I think that the compensation is important, but what really matters to me is that our teachers were organized, our teachers stood together, and they fought for what they deserved. And that to me is a lot of the retention, and I think that, actually, our retention rate for teachers is not that low.<\/p>\n It\u2019s lower in the third year when teachers are tenured, but the last time I looked, we were around 87% retention of teachers.\u00a0<\/p>\n This year is the first year [in a long time] we started every single classroom with a teacher, a teacher with a contract, and not somebody from the central office that we pulled in to teach part-time till we could hire somebody, not subs that had to change at 30 days.<\/p>\n We had a classroom teacher in every single classroom. We hired speech pathologists. We hired 10 speech pathologists. [Editor\u2019s note: According to recent hiring reports, OUSD has approved two speech pathologists and six speech therapists so far this year.] That\u2019s huge for us.<\/p>\n Discrimination and inequity<\/p>\n McBride: We received several community questions about discrimination and inequity. Do you believe OUSD has adequately addressed antisemitism, racism, gender discrimination and anti-LGBTQ bias in our schools? And where has OUSD fallen short?\u00a0<\/p>\n Fleisher: I don\u2019t think this is something that we are ever done addressing, right? Again, we are a learning institution. That\u2019s what we are. That\u2019s what we do. We\u2019re continually learning and thinking about how we can do this better and how we can create more belonging for our students. Belonging is one of the most important things \u2014 the evidence is very clear, and we feel it too, right? Belonging is so essential to being able to thrive in school.<\/p>\n There\u2019s always more that we can do to create opportunities and to create a space where we can support and celebrate learning. There\u2019s always room for us to continue to think thoughtfully and deeply about how are we creating environments where our kids are thriving, and how we are centering belonging in our schools.<\/p>\n Brouhard: I would agree. I think it is an ongoing problem. I want to address one of the things that I am proud of in our work, our sanctuary policy, which was broadened this year to include LGBTQ+ students. We are looking as a board for ways that we can infuse our policy and develop all that work.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve heard complaints, and in our Title IX office, I think we need to make a lot of improvements so that parents feel, and students feel, that their complaints go somewhere, and that there\u2019s resolution to those.<\/p>\n As a former history teacher, I think one of the places to really embrace this work is in our history curriculum and social science. That sense of belonging, that sense of studying your history and seeing yourself in that history is very important. We do have a lot more work to do in that.\u00a0<\/p>\n School safety and sanctuary polices<\/p>\n Student question: What is your stance on the district sanctuary policy protecting students from ICE, and what would you do in your role to support your school sites with that work?<\/p>\n Brouhard: I think our sanctuary policy is really important, and I\u2019m proud to have been a part of co-sponsoring that and co-writing it. I am extremely pleased that we include other people as well, that we include the LGBTQ community.<\/p>\n As far as our work supporting our students against ICE attacks, I was very moved by the day we heard there was a possible attack at Hoover [Elementary School]<\/a>, and the community came out. It was amazing to see. The whole school was surrounded.<\/p>\n What I felt at that moment living in Oakland was that we show up. We show up for communities that most of us didn\u2019t live in. We show up for students and families that we didn\u2019t know. But we showed up to protect those students and to allow those parents to walk their students out and feel protected at school that day. The principal also did an amazing job. That\u2019s where we really do that work \u2014 is we show up when we need to.\u00a0<\/p>\n Fleisher: Likewise, I think it\u2019s imperative that we have the sanctuary policy. I\u2019m very grateful that it is on the books and it is something that we hold and we carry.<\/p>\n You\u2019re right that this is Oakland. I think about that a lot. The way that our community is standing behind this policy is very, very special and very important. And my own story of being moved is parents who are doing ICE patrols outside of schools here, walking, having Signal group chats to be able to support people who are feeling unsure when they\u2019re just trying to come to school and to learn.<\/p>\n I wish we weren\u2019t in that position. Like many of you in this room, it bothers me to no end. But I\u2019m very impressed and moved by the community of Oakland and how people stood up for a community of people they didn\u2019t even know to support this policy and ensure that we kept ICE out of our schools.<\/p>\n I\u2019m glad to see what strength that we have behind that.\u00a0<\/p>\n Student question: I\u2019m a junior at Oakland High School, and I was wondering how you envision a safer environment for students on campus, and how would you implement those safety measures specifically around Yondr pouches [used to lock up phones during the school day] and how we\u2019re going to be able to contact home in case of an emergency?<\/p>\n Fleisher: These are all fair questions. I have a first grader in school, and I think a lot about safety. I think a lot about being able to communicate. There\u2019s too much bad in this world, and that\u2019s something that I know keeps me up at night.<\/p>\n At Oakland, we have our culture keepers who do an important job at our school, keeping our kids safe. The focus on restorative justice I also think is really imperative to keeping our kids safe and to having environments of learning and growth as being embedded in our schools.<\/p>\n With the Yondr pouches, I think a lot about the rollout. What I would have loved to have seen is piloting it at one school. What did we learn? What did we need to change? Iterating before we rolled it out across the district. I know it was state law, but still, I would have loved to have seen that so we can talk through some of the issues that you\u2019re describing today of how do we plan for these edge cases? How do we plan for these scenarios? What are the metrics of success? Our student board members did a survey, but I would have liked to have seen that required as part of the rollout.<\/p>\n Brouhard: One of the biggest things for safety is working with the city and the county to get our violence prevention work. We were funded by the city previously, and they\u2019ve cut back that funding.<\/p>\n Too often we look at safety in schools and safety in our communities as two separate things. Our students are in the communities, they\u2019re in our schools, and we have to work together to provide really safe neighborhoods, safe communities, and safe schools together.<\/p>\n Our culture keepers do amazing work, but we need to take care of our culture keepers. A number of our culture keepers see things that are very traumatic, and we say, \u201cThank you for doing your job,\u201d and they really need care. This is coming up a lot in talking with SEIU.<\/p>\n The Yondr pouch, I do agree. I think we should have talked with the students about it. The state law said we had to do this, and I know different districts have done it different ways. I\u2019m not sure we needed to do it that way. But I also hear that people have seen more communication between students without the phones.<\/p>\n The superintendent and other personnel decisions<\/p>\n McBride: This question is specifically for Director Brohard. As we reported, Superintendent Saddler sidelined her chief business officer from the budget process last year<\/a>, prompting her resignation. And the board then approved the district spending far more on outside financial consultants to replace her. Can you explain your position on those events?\u00a0<\/p>\n Brouhard: Sure. So what the board did is we presented [budget] scenario three to the district. At that time Lisa Grant-Dawson was there [as chief business officer]. And there became this fork in the road. There were those of us on the board who were directing the superintendent to do whatever we needed to do to restructure our budget so that we didn\u2019t have to take a loan out.<\/p>\n There\u2019s probably many of us in this room whose kids went to school during our state takeover, who taught during state takeover, who tried to organize during state takeover. We absolutely had no voice, and none of us wanted to go back to that. I think Lisa Grant-Dawson and Dan Bellino, who was the chief of staff at that point, had proposed another [budget] scenario, which was taking out a loan.<\/p>\n And we voted on our scenario first, so therefore that was the one in place, so we did not vote on the scenario to take out a loan. I can\u2019t say enough: It was extremely important to those of us on the board to not take out a loan and to maintain local control.<\/p>\n McBride: The board initially approved a one-year contract for Superintendent Denise Saddler<\/a> in 2025. This year, the board extended it another year<\/a>. Will you commit to a robust and transparent search process this year, and what would that look like?<\/p>\n Brouhard: We do have a robust plan to do this. We have a search committee on the board, and what that committee is doing right now is working with a consultant to get the community engagements together, get the community search team together. And the people on that board are [school board members] Patrice Berry and Rachel Latta, the student directors Andrew Bloch and Amina Tongun, and [school board member] Clifford Thompson.<\/p>\n So it\u2019s a broad range of people, and they are starting that work now. We\u2019re kind of late in the game, so we\u2019ll start, hopefully, doing our engagements in the spring. But we also realized we had elections coming up, so we wanted to make sure that whatever board was in place was also the one making the decisions about the superintendent. But yes, there is a search.<\/p>\n Fleisher: I find the superintendent process to be very concerning the way that it happened with [former superintendent] Kyla Johnson-Trammell being removed from her role, and then an interim superintendent [Denise Saddler] being installed when there was supposed to be a community search.<\/p>\n The part that actually really irks me as a parent in this district is when the interim title was lifted behind closed doors in a closed meeting and she became our superintendent. I don\u2019t think that\u2019s right. I don\u2019t think we should be doing such big, important business behind closed doors. The superintendent is the most important role in our district, and it deserves public transparency, it deserves happening on the dais, not behind. It\u2019s really imperative that we work with our community right now and start to have an honest conversation about the right leadership for our district.<\/p>\n I\u2019m also frustrated to see that we don\u2019t have a superintendent work plan. We don\u2019t have priorities. We don\u2019t have a board work plan. All things we would get from a strong superintendent. So yes, I\u2019d love to see that search happen.\u00a0<\/p>\n Audience question: I work with young people. I would like a response from Director Brouhard and Ms. Fleisher about the last issue, the [nonpublic] superintendent vote.<\/p>\n Brouhard: So what was done in closed session was done legally according to the Brown Act<\/a>. We discuss personnel decisions in closed session.<\/p>\n But I want to make one thing clear: Superintendent Kyla Johnson-Trammell was not fired. She actually came to me and said, \u201cI wanna renegotiate my contract.\u201d We came to a different view of things, and we renegotiated her contract<\/a>. That renegotiation was done in closed session.<\/p>\n With extending the superintendent [Saddler] for a year, we knew that this year with budget cuts coming up, with an election, with making sure that we had a stable board come January, we did not want to do a superintendent search right now. We do want community engagement, and that\u2019s why the extension of the superintendent\u2019s contract was only for one year.<\/p>\n Fleisher: Thank you. If I used the word fired, I apologize. I did not mean to use that word. The challenge I have is Superintendent Kyla Johnson-Trammell was eight years in this role, Oakland homegrown, the longest serving superintendent in Oakland for a long time. I think that\u2019s wonderful and I am frustrated as a parent and a community member that we didn\u2019t lift that up, somebody who was doing really well in this role. I would\u2019ve loved to have seen that leadership continue. I thought she was doing wonderful work for the district.<\/p>\n I appreciate that there are complexities this year, but I still don\u2019t think that means we have to take the interim title from our superintendent and make her superintendent. That to me, without a community-driven process, crosses a line that I am very uncomfortable with.<\/p>\n That should not have happened in a closed session, behind closed doors. I would have wanted to see at least something of that process, something at the board meetings telling us more about what happened. It is the most important role in our district.\u00a0<\/p>\n Policy background<\/p>\n McBride: Ms. Fleisher, we\u2019ve heard about aspects of the incumbent\u2019s record, so let\u2019s turn to you. You often reference your policy expertise, which I assume is based on your years working for Waymo; the policy think tank SPUR, or the San Francisco Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association; the SFMTA or San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency; and on the leadership team of Empower Oakland. How would this experience in big tech and public transit shape your approach to the school board?<\/p>\n Fleisher: I do have a very strong background, a lot of experience, in policy. I\u2019ve worked in the nonprofit sector, I\u2019ve worked in government at SFMTA, SFDPH [San Francisco Department of Public Health], in nonprofits at SPUR, which is a policy think tank, and in my current role doing policy development.<\/p>\n Look, the school board is a policy board. That\u2019s the job. It\u2019s a governance board, it\u2019s a stewardship board. Its job is to do rigorous analysis, weigh trade-offs, understand the big picture, bring people together and make decisions. And that\u2019s what I have done my whole career.<\/p>\n I\u2019ll give an example. One of the things in my career is I\u2019ve done a lot of work in transit policy. It\u2019s esoteric, right? Who thinks about these things? I do. I think about those little issues. If you transfer from AC Transit to BART now, that\u2019s free, and that\u2019s because of the work I did. That might not impact a lot of us in the room, but I met so many people who would walk to BART because they couldn\u2019t afford both paying for the bus and paying for BART. It\u2019s a huge piece of transportation equity.<\/p>\n What did I do? I did rigorous analysis, understanding the challenges. We looked at best practices all around the world. We brought 27 different transit agencies together. We thought of each other as disparate agencies, and we brought them together as collaborators, and I think that\u2019s what it takes to do this.<\/p>\n Student access to technology<\/p>\n Student question: I have a question about Chromebooks, because some students don\u2019t have access to them. They struggle to turn in their work and they get frustrated. What can you do to make sure all students have Chromebook access?<\/p>\n Brouhard: You\u2019re absolutely right. As well as wi-fi hookups in people\u2019s homes. During COVID, we did have money to buy Chromebooks, and OaklandUndivided donated a lot of Chromebooks and made sure that everyone had them at home.<\/p>\n This is something that we have to budget in as we look at priorities. You\u2019re right, especially for our older students who need computers at home, when so many of our textbooks are online, so many of our resources are online, we do need to look at how to fund that in our budget.<\/p>\n But right now, we aren\u2019t funding that. Once OaklandUndivided took their money out, we lost that funding. So I would encourage students to work with us to get that funding. Come to Budget and Finance [committee], come to Teaching and Learning [committee]. You can do it online. Come and raise those issues in the places where we can really discuss them.<\/p>\n Fleisher: I appreciate the question as well. Good for you for sticking up for your friends. I think it is really important that we have access to Chromebooks. It\u2019s important for your work, to be able to turn in your assignments, for learning.<\/p>\n One of the challenges I have right now with our budget is we\u2019re not budgeting towards goals. So if we want all of our kids to graduate college- and career-ready, we have to work backwards from that. And when you think backwards systematically, then you think about what are the supports that we need in the classroom to deliver against that goal. And that\u2019s not what we\u2019re seeing right now in terms of our budgeting, and why things like this often fall to the side. So I\u2019m really glad that you brought that up, and it\u2019s really imperative that this is something we think holistically about when we are budgeting.<\/p>\n Are we budgeting towards goals? Are we budgeting to make sure that our kids can read on grade level, do math on grade level, and graduate college- and career-ready?<\/p>\n Board accessibility and tone<\/p>\n Student question: Right now, the major budget items often get discussed later in the school board meeting. Would you be in favor of moving that up earlier so people can understand what\u2019s going on before it\u2019s time to leave, before it\u2019s time to go to bed, and allow people to be involved?<\/p>\n Fleisher: I\u2019m happy with that idea. I get it. What I would love to see as best practice is that 50% of our board meetings should be talking about student outcomes.<\/p>\n So I agree with you, the budget\u2019s incredibly important. It\u2019s a policy document. It informs those student outcomes. But what I would like to see first and foremost is 50% of our board meetings actually covering student outcomes as a baseline expectation. Too often, student outcomes come at 10 o\u2019clock, but I can\u2019t stay anymore, and I have to go home and go to bed.<\/p>\n That\u2019s something I would really prioritize in the meetings. At last week\u2019s board meeting, there was going to be another round of discussion on the budget, and unfortunately, that was not allowed to happen. And I think it\u2019s very important. We are running a debt. We overspent by $90 million last year<\/a>. We have to make $30 million in cuts<\/a>.<\/p>\n So I would like to see more prioritized discussion around our budget. It\u2019s hugely important. But first and foremost, I want to see more conversation about student outcomes.\u00a0<\/p>\n Brouhard: I agree. What we\u2019re trying to do is actually have one board meeting where we talk about student outcomes and student work, and then have another one where we do business. A lot of districts function this way. We\u2019re trying to get there.<\/p>\n We go back and forth on the order. We have parents who come from PSAC [the Parent and Student Advisory Committee], and they\u2019ve got their kids with them, so we try to do that first. We try to do the student board directors first because I know a lot of them have to go home and study. So there\u2019s a number of reasons why we\u2019ve moved that forward. We moved the public comment up to the front for people who couldn\u2019t stay.<\/p>\n But I agree. I know Dr. Saddler and Vice-President Bachelor and I have been working on trying to get an agenda pinned down so that one meeting would be students and one meeting would be our budget.<\/p>\n Audience question: How should school board members respond when parents, students, educators and community members strongly disagree? How would you listen without simply following the loudest voices?\u00a0<\/p>\n Fleisher: I appreciate that question. The main job of a school board member is to represent your community, to listen to your community, to understand the vision and values of your community. It\u2019s really important as a starting point to be in your community and listening, and to not just have everything happen down in the boardroom, but to be holding community meetings.<\/p>\n Right now, there is a community engagement effort happening, MSEG [the volunteer Multi-Stakeholder Engagement Group<\/a>], and it\u2019s great that it\u2019s happening, but I think it\u2019s the board\u2019s responsibility to be leading engagement in communities and to be out there and talking and listening.<\/p>\n My values and my priorities here on this board are to fix the budget for real this time. I want to have a vision for our schools, our budgeting boards, and I want to lead with transparency and accountability. That\u2019s me. That\u2019s what I\u2019m going to do when I\u2019m on this board. Those are my priorities that I will hold when I\u2019m in that seat and when I\u2019m talking with community members.<\/p>\n Brouhard: One thing I learned coming onto the board \u2014 I came on as a teacher \u2014 is that I had to work with a lot of different voices, and I had to build relationships with a lot of people I had been on the opposite side of bargaining tables with. And I think building those relationships and learning to put my voice in the background and learn to listen was really a valuable thing for me.<\/p>\n I would like to think that my constituents know that I listen. I do community engagements. I do engagements at schools. I\u2019ve done engagements in houses. I\u2019ve done all kinds of things. I go out in the community. But the biggest thing is really deeply and actively listening and committing to things that I will act on as a result of that listening.<\/p>\n I am not, as many of you know, the loudest voice in the room. I am the under-the-radar person. I have the skill as a teacher, learning to really listen and act on what I hear.\u00a0<\/p>\n Community and staff engagement<\/p>\n Audience question: I\u2019m Matt Glaser. I wanted to first thank you for plugging our organization, MSEG. This district has done board-supported and district-supported community engagement over two decades, maybe even longer. I\u2019d like to know from both of you, would you support the efforts of a homegrown community engagement organization?<\/p>\n Fleisher: Look, I think it\u2019s a wonderful program. They\u2019re leading this community group. We spoke with Matt and we learned more. It\u2019s incredibly impressive. I think it\u2019s wonderful that you\u2019re taking the initiative in doing this.It\u2019s a wonderful district, right? It needs all of us to step up. It\u2019s why we\u2019re all here tonight.<\/p>\n But when you are elected to this board, you are elected to be the voice of the community. That is your job. That is the job. To understand the community\u2019s vision and values and to be the representative for the community. So I think it is imperative that the board own that trust, the board own the sorting of our district through its next chapter, that this is really board-led. I hear you on the before, but I maintain that if elected to this seat, I\u2019m elected as your voice for the community, and it is my job to be out there, to be doing outreach, to be engaging.<\/p>\n Both things can be true, but I do think it\u2019s very important that there is a board-led process for restructuring and reimagining anything for our district. I\u2019d also like to see the superintendent having a huge part of that.<\/p>\n Brouhard: I\u2019m going to take a little different approach because I have been the liaison to PSAC [Parent and Student Advisory Committee], and I have been the liaison to the CAC [Community Advisory Committee], which is the special education group. I deeply value the work that PSAC does. When I want to understand LCAP [Local Control and Accountability Plan, which guides how funds are spent], I go to PSAC.<\/p>\n The work that they\u2019ve done, the research that they\u2019ve done, the conversations that I\u2019ve been a part of \u2014 we\u2019ve read Matt\u2019s blog. The analysis that our parents have done, this group of, what, 40 parents, is phenomenal, and everybody should look at their analysis of LCAP. It is totally worth looking at. What I feel with this group is that, yes, I do represent my constituents, but we are a shared governance model district.<\/p>\n I think that\u2019s what many board directors aim to have, is that there\u2019s an equal voice at the table. So it\u2019s not my going and listening to people and then deciding what I\u2019m gonna do. It\u2019s my going to PSAC, going to CAC, going to your conference that you do once a year. That\u2019s where I get the information I need and that shared governance and realizing that these are parent and community leaders, and I rely on that expertise.<\/p>\n Audience question: My name is Dr. Shalonda Gregory. I\u2019m the principal of MetWest High School. I\u2019m also a resident of District 2 and very active in my community. I don\u2019t really care for performative behavior. I care about having a board that is supportive of not just the community, but also supportive of principals.<\/p>\n Currently, I only have a part-time counselor. I\u2019m teaching two classes as a principal. So I want to know, one, what measures will you put into place to hold yourself accountable? And, two, what are you going to do to support schools and principals and address the need for us to have a voice in the decisions you make? Because that\u2019s absent at this point.<\/p>\n Brouhard: I\u2019m not sure about the first part, but I have been extremely lucky in my time at OUSD to have worked for some amazing principals, and I know the value of a principal. If a principal creates community at the school, the principal is the instructional leader, that\u2019s the person I go to when I need help in my classroom. I have worked from Deitra Atkins to Chelsea Toller to Farris Jabbar \u2014 I\u2019ve worked with some amazing principals, and it\u2019s been an amazing experience for me. I do meet regularly with your leadership in UAOS.<\/p>\n I do pass on different things as we talk about the needs and the wants and the desires in your contract negotiations. I do have those conversations with district leadership. I fully support the demands of the principals. I\u2019m meeting right after having a bargaining session next week. I do 100% support, and I do feel that principals have an untenable job.<\/p>\n Fleisher: I think it is actually imperative that the board do self-evaluations as well as a superintendent evaluation. That\u2019s part of being in a leadership role. I don\u2019t know if that is happening right now, but it\u2019s something that I would definitely like to see: formal board evaluations and reporting on that to the public. How did we evaluate ourselves? What are the criteria we\u2019re using? Do we feel like we\u2019re going in the right direction?<\/p>\n That\u2019s all part of a growth mindset, and that\u2019s what I think we need to be bringing to the board. It is deeply concerning that our principals have sent three letters to our board, none of which were acknowledged, none of which were responded to.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/large-Oakland-School-Board-candidate-forum_092926_Mtierney98.jpg\")
A student asks District 2 candidates a question at an Oaklandside school board forum at Oakland High School, Sept. 29, 2026. Credit: Maurice Tierney\/Cityside<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/large-Oakland-School-Board-candidate-forum_092926_Mtierney49.jpg\")
District 2 school board candidate Arielle Fleisher gives opening remarks at The Oaklandside\u2019s election forum at Oakland High School, Sept. 29, 2026. Credit: Maurice Tierney\/Cityside<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/large-Oakland-School-Board-candidate-forum_092926_Mtierney45.jpg\")
District 2 school board candidate Jennifer Brouhard, the incumbent, gives opening remarks at The Oaklandside\u2019s election forum at Oakland High School, Sept. 29, 2026. Credit: Maurice Tierney\/Cityside<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/large-Oakland-School-Board-candidate-forum_092926_Mtierney30.jpg\")
Oaklandside Editor-in-Chief Tasneem Raja with school board candidates Jennifer Brouhard and Arielle Fleisher, District 2; Kathryn Camp, Mike Hutchinson and Sylvia Williams, District 4; and Valarie Bachelor, LeAna Powell and Alexandra Williams, District 6 at a candidate forum at Oakland High School, Sept. 29, 2026. Credit: Maurice Tierney\/Cityside<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/large-Oakland-School-Board-candidate-forum_092926_Mtierney124-1.jpg\")
Audience applause during the District 2 breakout discussion at The Oaklandside\u2019s school board candidate forum at Oakland High School, Sept. 29, 2026. Credit: Maurice Tierney\/Cityside<\/p>\n