Election preview: Alameda County Superintendent of Schools

The top education position in Alameda County is being contested on the ballot for the first time in eight years, as two-term incumbent Superintendent of Schools L.K. Monroe faces off against Alysse Castro, an Alameda resident who works in a leadership position with the San Francisco Unified School District.

Unlike local school districts where superintendents are hired by elected board members, the county superintendent is selected directly by the voters.

The role has been cast into the spotlight for residents perhaps more than ever as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, as decisions and guidance from the Alameda County Office of Education has often impacted actions in local districts.

One set of decisions made by Monroe and her administration during the pandemic has been thrust into the campaign discourse in recent weeks.

Critics have called into question the distribution of stipends for COVID-19 response duties to certain county education employees, including managers who have received between $15,000 and $22,500 in the pandemic through April. Monroe did not take home a stipend, but some have alleged favoritism and politics were motivations at play.

The Alameda County Board of Education discussed the matter in an informational report at last week’s public meeting, where Monroe addressed the process head-on.

“Managers were tasked, including our associate superintendents, with identifying those that had done work that was deemed above and beyond, and put forth those names for receiving stipend funds that needed to be spent in very short order. So that’s how that happened,” Monroe said during the May 10 board meeting.

“Folks kept a record of the tasks that they did, but there was not an hourly time accounting or any of that,” she added. “But we know what the tasks that were performed, and we also know what the criteria were, in very broad strokes.”

Castro, who boasts union endorsements including the California Teachers Association, local teachers unions including Pleasanton and Dublin, and the California School Employees Association, released a statement late last month denouncing the stipend payout process.

“It is unacceptable that classified employees were an afterthought when distributing the COVID mitigation funds. CSEA members consistently show up for our students and for far too long, employees have felt left behind and unseen by current leadership,” Castro said, while vowing to “always work transparently and fairly with workers and staff.”

As for overall campaign goals, Castro cites six top themes on her website: “break the school-to-prison pipeline; embed systems of care in schools; our kids deserve guarantees, not choices; teachers from our community for our community; safety comes from support; and personalize learning for equity and agency.”

“I am the best candidate because of I have a long history of doing more with less, getting better than average results for kids and teachers, and I am supported by educators because I support educators — including financially,” Castro said in brief comments to the Weekly.

She also described how her experiences as a high school principal and a resident of Alameda, a community she said “has a great deal in common with the cities of the Tri-Valley,” have prepared her for the superintendent role.

“I understand what it is like to lead schools where everything is done on a shoestring budget and we have to make sure our schools really can serve the incredibly diverse needs of every kid across an incredible range of gifts and challenges,” Castro said.

“Often our small and mid-sized districts get little in the way of county services because their needs are overshadowed by the big urban districts, but there are still ways that the County Office of Ed can lighten the load for smaller districts by providing economies of scale that help our local districts focus their resources in their own classrooms,” she added.

For Monroe, who has led the county office since winning a runoff election in 2014 and then an uncontested ballot in 2018, her campaign theme is “leadership and advocacy in service of all students.”

“As a second generation teacher and principal, and now Superintendent of Schools, student learning is core to my policy decisions,” she told the Weekly. “Students must have the academic opportunities and support services needed to thrive at school and in life — not just academically, but socially and emotionally.”

Monroe has earned endorsements from education leaders such as State Superintendent Tony Thurmond and five of the seven county board members, as well as other fellow elected leaders.

“From our youngest learners to our young adults, my focus is on increasing high quality early learning experiences for our preschoolers; providing work-based learning, including internships in STEAM and education, in addition to challenging curriculum to ensure students have what they need to be career and college ready; increasing the pipeline of diverse teachers and giving them the training and mentorship they need to be successful educators; and providing peer leadership and social emotional learning,” she said.

“For me, student learning and well-being are paramount to keep at the forefront of everything we do at the Alameda County Office of Education,” Monroe added. “I will never back down when it comes to fighting for all that is possible for every student in Alameda County and beyond.”