In the Streetsboro Board of Education race, three candidates are vying for two seats.
Incumbent Andrew Gibson is seeking reelection to his seat, while being challenged by Kristin Bedford and Robert Fulton. School board member Denise Baba is not running for reelection this fall, so one of the winners will take her seat.
Fulton said he is running in part to provide voters with a choice of candidates.
“I’m a retired teacher and principal, and I would like to see the state back off,” he said. “I think local schools should be in charge of their own school systems.”
Specifically, he said he would like to see the stakes reduced in the annual state achievement tests so teachers can be more free to teach the way they want rather than focusing on test preparation.
Gibson said he would like to stay on the board because he still has children in the district.
He said he originally joined the board because he “wasn’t thrilled with the way they are handling some things.”
“Now, I’m running again because there’s always something,” he said.
Bedford did not respond to requests for comment.
Gibson said he’s happy with the mask mandate now in place for Streetsboro City Schools.
“I was OK with it being choice at first,” he said. “We started losing too many kids, and we started losing teachers. With the available pool of talent right now, you can only lose so many teachers before you start shutting things down.”
Fulton said mask wearing should be up to parents and kids because enforcing it is difficult.
“Some of them have it halfway down their face, some of them have their nose uncovered,” he said. “Demanding that they have to wear it is a real problem.”
He also isn’t a fan of Critical Race Theory being taught in class.
“Use of the phrase ticks me off, personally,” he said. “[Some people] will manipulate it to be what they want it to be.”
Gibson said Critical Race Theory isn’t required by the state, so Streetsboro doesn’t teach it.
“If that changes, as a board we’ll have a discussion how we want to handle it,” he said.
