There are five candidates running for two seats on Upper Arlington School Board. Pencilstorm asked each of the candidates five specific questions centered around issues that impacted Upper Arlington schools and questions that were being raised by fellow voters. Pencilstorm will be posting their complete and unedited answers individually throughout October and reposting all their answers together before the election. Answers will be posted in order they're received. Our third candidate, Carol Mohr, is featured below.
Carol Mohr, Upper Arlington School Board Candidate
Carol Mohr
www.MM4UA.com
What makes you qualified to have oversight of the $98 million schools operating budget?
In my 8 years of service on the UA Board of Education, I have served six of those years on the Treasurer’s Finance Committee. I have worked with our Treasurer, Andy Geistfeld, over changes that have made a huge difference to our bottom line and to the efficient running of the District. The Treasurer has changed over to a modern payroll system. We have changed our investments for short term funds from a straight money market account into laddered funds using a specialist investing company, Meeder Investments, who works with public entities like ours. Andy Geistfeld has been a hard working Treasurer who year after year has gotten it right when it comes to the five year forecast, and who has found efficiencies to save the district money. We have made the tough choices of value engineering during the building process to come in on time and on budget. I have been working with Treasurer Andy Geistfeld for 8 years, and you just do not find public servants of his quality at other districts.
One priority of our strategic plan is “Whole Learning.” How will you foster whole learning in our elementary schools, middle schools and high schools?
I like programs that have a low bar to entry and that raise students’ horizons. For example, the UA Idea Day selections gave choices to everyone at an entry level to try something new. A few I remember: edible art/cookie frosting; building and operating drones as a business; using an Arduino to make a model parking spot sensor. Following the UA Idea Day outside-the-box thinking, the current program I am excited about at the elementary level is Explorations, which every two weeks gathers an entire grade level to do a learning project. I also like that Explorations is happening districtwide, so every student can have the chance to find a passion they never knew about before and that could become their career.
Another priority of our strategic plan is “Student and Staff Well-being” with a key element of belonging. How will you serve as a role model to our community and create a feeling of safety and connectedness?
I serve on the Student and Staff Well Being Committee as a UA Board Member representative to the committee. Even within this committee, we model a wellness activity at the start of each meeting, whether a quick prompt such as “share a word that has helped you get through the week so far”; or a quiet reflective gathering activity. You may not know I went back to Capital University to get my nursing degree while serving on the Board. Every single class started with a centering, a five minute quiet guided meditation, or other wellness break. This was done intentionally, to model the nurse’s “gathering moment of calm” before seeing each patient--so that it became second nature to us.
In my role as a Board Member, I advocate for and support programs that help with student and staff wellness, from Start with Hello, to Ferris the facility dog [https://www.arlingtonian.com/archives/24446], to having the arts, music, and physical education at every level of our schools. Even giving all elementary grade level teachers a common planning period every two weeks will aid in staff wellbeing, because crucial human connections and support among peers can be made. This may seem obvious, but is one change that has been put into place districtwide this year.
Everyone at Pencilstorm is a musician. To that end, what would you do to support music education at a younger age in our elementary schools?
General music is part of every elementary school curriculum. Our Centennial was celebrated by a song composed by elementary students in a composition club. Exposure to different styles of music such as Taiko drums or guitar playing; or singing together at a Town Meeting, Chautauqua, or Tremont-a-palooza, all help form community, togetherness, and the emotions that make a whole person. Staff creating a music video can model for students the creativity and fun of making music together. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CJ8jXV2HJg]
Here’s a fun question. If you had a time machine and an unlimited amount of money and could pick any band or performer to play in the new auditorium for our students, who would you pick? Bonus question – who’s the opening act?
For my dream performance, I would want The Ramones to play UAHS auditorium. They could play Rock n Roll High School, Sheena is a Punk Rocker, and get the entire student body bopping. You at PencilStorm know The Ramones were hardly trained musicians. They took the last name Ramone but were not all brothers. They reworked the same basic song into many hits. So let me say a word for the Punk ethos. There’s no one path to start a band, you just have to do it. Play music. Have fun. Entertain people and change their mood. You might be a DJ, a party band, or you might be Walk The Moon [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6JCLY0Rlx6Q],
Pencilstorm would like to thank Carol Mohr for taking the time to answer our questions. Learn more about Carol at her website: www.mm4ua.com. Look for responses from future candidates in the coming days. Pencilstorm is an independent news source and does not endorse any individual candidate.
Local UA Politics coverage provided by Wal Ozello. You can email him at Pencilstormstory@gmail.com or try to catch him at Colin's Coffee.
Check out coverage of all the candidates we've received responses from by clicking here.