Kitty Sargent

Relevant degrees and education-related job titles:

  • Bachelors in Elementary and Special Education
  • Masters in Social Work
  • Taught for five years in Arizona and Colorado
  • Director of Education and Prevention Blue Sky Bridge – 10 years
  • Sargent Consulting – Mandatory reporting and sexual abuse prevention education – 4 years
  • Volunteer at the school and district level in BVSD for 19 years.
  • Incumbent BVSD Board of Education member

Q: Why are you running, and why do you deserve a seat on the BVSD Board?

I’m running to continue the work I have done in the last four years on the Board. Since I have been in office the Board has accomplished much, including the following:

  • Hired a new superintendent
  • Developing a new strategic plan
  • Made high school start times later
  • Implemented full day Kindergarten for all students
  • Implemented a five year rotation for policy review
  • In the process of removing School Resource Officers
  • Adopted new policies on discipline and dress code that address the inequitable application of the previous policies, i.e. students of color being punished more harshly than white students, and girls being ‘dress coded’ more frequently than boys.
  • Established an Equity Council, Title IX committee, Latino Parent Advisory Council

BVSD District F

Q: You are running to represent a geographic district, though you would be part of a board that oversees the entire BVSD district if you win. What are some top concerns or needs in your specific district?

Although we are elected in districts, we don’t represent them in the way, say, a state legislator would. We don’t advocate for our director district. All Board members represent everyone. I do have things I would like to see happen district-wide. We need to address the rape culture in some schools so every student is safe. We need to continue our equity work by making our materials more inclusive so students see people like them represented. We need to figure out how to address staffing issues with bus drivers and substitute teachers. We will have to figure out how to deal with declining enrollment and whether we can continue to operate schools in Boulder while needing to expand capacity in the east county.

Q: COVID-19 has been an awful challenge for schools in general. In your opinion, is the current “Back Together BVSD Reintroduction Plan” sufficient to provide the greatest level of safety for all at this time? Should parents, students, faculty and staff feel reasonably confident about COVID-19 safety within BVSD?

I do believe we are doing the best we can with COVID-19. We will continue follow the advice of our public health professionals because they are the experts. Our primary goal is to keep students safely in school in person. Parents, students, faculty, and staff should feel confident that we are doing the best that can be done for their safety. There are some parents who don’t believe what the public health professionals are telling us and they aren’t confident we are doing the right thing. They are frightened for their children and are angry. I understand their feelings, but don’t agree with them.

Q: What are your top priority strategies to boost or maintain BVSD’s educational performance levels?

This is an area that many people don’t understand about the job of a Board member. It is not our job to develop strategies for educational performance or anything else – we trust our administration to do that. We can and do direct them to accomplish our priorities, such as improving achievement of our lower performing students, and improving ethnic representation in our faculty and staff. How to accomplish Board priorities is the administration’s job.

Q: Do you believe BVSD has done a good job managing educational achievement gaps? What can BVSD do to narrow the gaps?

Historically, BVSD has done a poor job of narrowing the achievement gap. Three years ago we had the biggest gap in the state. Since Dr. Anderson started with us he has led us to contract with the University of Virginia to work with our lowest performing schools to help them do better with their students. We started out with two schools, Alicia Sanchez and Columbine. After one year, both schools had shown improvement. In the second year we added Kohl to the program. The pandemic has interrupted so much that we don’t have reliable information from the last school year. That addresses the issues with low performing schools, but not with individual students’ achievement. We still have a long way to go, but I am confident we have the best people on the job. This is one area I believe the Board needs to stay on top of to hold the administration accountable.

Q: What is your take on the use of or reliance on standardized testing in today’s educational environment, and would you favor changes?

I have never been a fan of high stakes testing. Too much weight is put on the test scores, which are not available until the end of summer, so they can’t be used to help the students. Frequently the test results were misconstrued. For example, the first statewide test, CSAP, was given to fourth graders. When the results came out, many families wanted to enroll their children in the school that had the highest score, thinking it must be a better school. The next year a different school had the highest scores. The CSAP achievement levels were Unsatisfactory, Partially Proficient, Proficient, and Advanced. Grade level fell in the Partially Proficient range, but the media reported the students were behind due to the number of them in the Partially Proficient category.

Now the tests have changed, but the stakes have not gone down. A standardized test tells you how each child performs at a specific point in time. It doesn’t tell you how good a school or a teacher is. For that you need a broader assessment including ongoing formative evaluation, a portfolio of the students’ work, teacher observation, and an understanding of each student’s home situation. The best predictor of a student’s success is still their zip code.

Another problem with the tests is the participation rate. The participation rates at some schools were low enough to call the results into question. That did improve prior to the pandemic, but this year little can be learned about the schools’ or the district’s performance. The state’s rating of a school or district can go down due to low participation.

Since teacher evaluations are highly dependent on the students’ test scores, they have to teach to the test, which can leave untested subjects lacking. There is usefulness in standardized summative testing, but we are doing it too much and making too much of the results. I would prefer that we spent more time teaching and less time testing.

Q: Students may have suffered learning losses due to the pandemic. How can BVSD help prevent these losses from getting worse, and/or help affected students catch back up?

We offered free summer school to students, prioritizing students who were significantly behind in literacy and math. We are also offering credit recovery classes and tutoring both during and after school. We will need to provide all the support student’s need in order for them to catch up.

The district also has robust social/emotional help resources to help students deal with the emotional impact of COVID-19.

Q: Do BVSD students have access to the best educational resources when it comes to understanding race relations in the United States? This question is not necessarily about Critical Race Theory, but would you favor taking a fresh look at BVSD’s curriculum or approach to race education, and why or why not?

I know that some of the high schools offer classes in ethnic studies or similar subjects. I think we need to expand that and require at least one class in race education, as you put it. Our population is becoming more diverse and all students need to understand and appreciate differences. All students need to see themselves reflected in the curriculum. For much too long we have been teaching through a white lens and not recognizing that there are other equally important lenses.

I would like to see us take a look at all of our curriculum to determine if there is an aspect of white supremacy in it and to remove that. This won’t be easy to do, and I don’t know how to do it, but I am working to find a resource for help.

Q: BVSD is a big organization, with lots of people involved, lots of transportation needs, and many facilities. What are a few strategies you’d support to reduce BVSD’s carbon footprint?

I support what BVSD has long been doing to reduce our carbon footprint. We have Green Building Guiding Principles, BVSD Energy website, BVSD Energy Dashboard, Renewable Energy Technologies including solar, wind, and geothermal. plus several schools have gardens. We will also be teaching about sustainability in the classroom. More information can be found by searching for ‘greenBVSD’.