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Six candidates are vying for three seats on the Mountain View Los Altos High School District Board of Trustees in the Nov. 8 election, with only one incumbent in the race. Current trustees Debbie Torok and Fiona Walter opted to retire, leaving at least two seats open for newcomers to fill.
Incumbent Catherine Vonnegut, elected in 2018, is running alongside candidates Thida Cornes, Eric Mark, Esmeralda Ortiz, Jacquie Tanner and Carrol Titus-Zambre, none of whom have held public office before.
MVLA looks to be in pretty good shape coming out of the pandemic. The district is fiscally sound as it prepares to accommodate a projected enrollment increase in coming years. Several new programs have been implemented in recent months, including the reintroduction of English Learning Development at Los Altos High, a pilot class for the yearlong freshman-level ethnic studies course, increased career technical course offerings and expanded wellness options for students.
Construction is set to wrap up on several new buildings this year, including student services centers at Los Altos and Mountain View high schools. The $295 million Measure E bond passed in 2018 was intended to fund updates to aging classrooms, labs and school facilities, as well as new classrooms for anticipated enrollment growth. Despite some pandemic-related delays, construction is scheduled to finish in the spring, but MVLA administrators are already assessing the possible need for an additional campus to prevent overcrowding.
The Town Crier recently interviewed the candidates to discuss their campaigns and what they hope to bring to MVLA.
Catherine Vonnegut
This is Vonnegut’s second time on the campaign trail, and she is emboldened by how much she has enjoyed serving on the board in the past few years. She is currently board president and a member of the Finance Committee.
She said she is proud of the way the current board collaborated with Superintendent Nellie Meyer to address pandemic-induced obstacles and implement new modes of online instruction that now act as a model for districts throughout the state. MVLA also has been praised for its robust COVID testing and tracking system.
“I love it, and I would love to have another so-called normal four-year term to do some of the initiatives that I wish we had gotten around to but we haven’t, or see some of these other things we’ve just started come to fruition,” Vonnegut said.
For example, she wants to see the recently created ethnic studies course reach full implementation next month and to expand on current efforts that support students’ mental health. She said wellness initiatives begin in the classroom and can be expanded through teacher training and increased service staff.
Vonnegut added that with two seasoned trustees stepping down, her experience will help the newcomers integrate next year. She believes that her background in engineering and her easygoing personality are strong assets to the board.
“My engineering self believes in continuous improvement, yet to make progress or change we have to start somewhere,” she said. “I also believe that we can accomplish anything we want, just not all at once. Progress takes time and money.”
Thida Cornes
Cornes is a longtime Mountain View resident with a business background. In the past 20 years, she has advocated for children on the Parks and Recreation Commission, served as vice chairperson of the city’s Environmental Sustainability Task Force and served on various Mountain View Whisman School District committees.
“My experience as a disabled, mixed-race immigrant and mother of two children drives my years of public service,” Cornes said. “This firsthand knowledge of how the educational experience must adapt to the students’ social, emotional and academic needs drives me to help every student succeed.”
Cornes is focused on addressing students’ mental health, promoting academic achievement in students of all backgrounds and ensuring fiscal responsibility and transparency.
If elected, Cornes said she plans to work in partnership with Santa Clara County, which has set up 19 health and wellness centers in socioeconomically disadvantaged schools, to establish wellness centers in MVLA schools that students feel comfortable entering to manage their mental health, “just as they might enter the gym to manage their physical health.”
Cornes also aims to reduce class sizes to ensure that underserved students, such as first-generation or students of color, receive adequate attention in the classroom. She also suggests assessing all underserved minority students over the summer so that schools can start providing the help they may need come fall.
“I am committed to ensuring that all our students feel connected, embrace challenges and thrive,” she said.
Eric Mark
Mark, a retired engineer and father of three children who have attended local public schools, has always been involved with his children’s education.
In addition to volunteering at Los Altos School District and Mountain View Whisman School District schools in various capacities, he gained insight from his daughters and their friends who graduated from MVLA schools and has noted the ways their school experiences were positive or lacking.
He saw the way Mountain View High and Los Altos High had a culture of academic competitiveness that left some students stressed. He also observed that while many of the students went on to be high achievers in college, a lack of education in life skills impacted their lives negatively.
If elected, Mark lists mental health as a key priority, and he sees the integration of life-skills programs as an essential component of social and emotional support. He said educational diversity is crucial to educating members of society. In addition to promoting the new ethnic studies course, Mark recommends that MVLA add courses teaching digital, environmental, financial and media literacy.
“We provide an exceptional academic education, but we need to help students look to a future beyond school,” he said.
Mark believes his background in engineering will serve the board well, but he emphasized how his mellow personality makes him easy to work with in a team setting.
“I want to be part of a team that develops the curriculum or policies to help our kids manage stress, understand what it means to live in a multicultural society and become digitally savvy, socially, fiscally and environmentally responsible,” he said. “Armed with these types of skills, our students will lead a just and equitable society.”
Esmeralda Ortiz
Ortiz is a first-generation college graduate and lifelong Bay Area resident who has worked for the Boys & Girls Clubs of the Peninsula for 12 years, currently serving as vice president of its high school and post-secondary success program.
“In partnership with the Sequoia Union district, we were at all of their high schools doing college success programming,” she said of her work with the Boys & Girls Clubs. “And I think that’s a really unique perspective to be able to share at the board level, to inform how we sort of set up students for post-secondary success, which I think is one of the primary goals of the board.”
Ortiz is particularly enthusiastic about helping students understand and pursue post-secondary success, whether through the workforce or higher education. If elected to the MVLA board, she plans to forge a deeper relationship with California community colleges to increase awareness of options after graduation.
She also noted social, emotional and mental well-being of students as a priority, and advocates approaching the issue from different perspectives and increasing access to counseling, therapists, intramural sports, electives and academic support to address the diverse needs of the student body.
“I’ve dedicated my career to student success and believe education is the key to generational success, and this requires collaborative efforts across our community,” Ortiz said.
Ortiz’s husband is an English teacher at Mountain View High, but she does not consider that a conflict of interest and will need only to recuse
herself from staff salary negotiations.
Jacquie Tanner
Tanner, a near-lifelong resident of Mountain View, recently retired from her position as a senior production materials planner at Tesla and now wants to dedicate her time and energy to serving the community.
A mother of a freshman at Los Altos High, she believes the board would benefit from a parent perspective. After 10 years in a highly demanding position, she said she isn’t afraid to make the tough decisions.
“Because of my business skills, I see things in a different light,” Tanner said. “I think outside the box. Or (when people say), ‘This is how it’s always been,’ – I hate that statement.”
Tanner said she respects the job the board has done in the past few years, and she wants to add to their success.
She is particularly focused on fostering better communication between MVLA and the Mountain View, Los Altos and Los Altos Hills city councils, as well as with the local K-8 school districts. She noted that communication is especially important when discussing the possibility and potential location of another high school site.
“To be successful, we need to improve our communication and collaboration with all the stakeholders,” Tanner said. “We will not be successful in a vacuum.”
Tanner also noted the importance of providing mental health resources for students, and floated the idea of providing students with resource information cards they can access at any time and setting aside time for midday reflection periods.
Carrol Titus-Zambre
Titus-Zambre is a business owner and veteran of the Silicon Valley corporate world. She owns Golden Poppy, an educational media production studio that produces STEAM e-learning video games and books. In the past, she has been a Girl Scout troop leader, a junior varsity volleyball team head coach and an elementary school classroom volunteer.
Titus-Zambre believes that her background working for a Fortune 50 company will benefit the district, especially in future conversations about a potential new school site.
“I very much would be able to help some of those conversations having done large deals in corporate,” she said.
Titus-Zambre was motivated to run for the MVLA board when a Girl Scout connection suggested it, which prompted her to meet with Superintendent Meyer, who she said “tapped her to run.” In an email to the Town Crier, Titus-Zambre also claimed that Meyer had endorsed her for the position. Meyer confirmed that while she met with Titus-Zambre, as she has with all board candidates, she has neither endorsed her nor “tapped” her to run.
“I have not endorsed any candidates for this election and make it a policy not to endorse any school board candidates,” Meyer said.
Titus-Zambre also named MVLA High School Foundation treasurer Laura Schmidt and Foothill-De Anza Community College District trustee Laura Casas as community members who have endorsed her campaign, but both women denied formally endorsing Titus-Zambre’s candidacy.
This story was updated to reflect that Jacquie Tanner’s daughter is a student at Los Altos High, not Mountain View High.
