Manhattan resident Katrina Lewison became the first candidate to file for the Manhattan-Ogden School Board. Lewison, a West Point graduate and U.S. Army veteran, works as a Product Manager at CivicPlus.
“I am passionate about education and it would be an honor to represent this community on the school board,” Lewison said. “The fact of the matter is, our state has an extremely limited budget to fund public education. We have a local responsibility to stretch those dollars as efficiently as possible to give our students a world-class education and protect and pay our teachers and administrators fair salaries on par with this region.”
Lewison, who has three daughters in the USD 383 school system, believes that coordination with other local, state and federal elected officials is critical to managing the budget situation. “We must have an open dialogue with our city commission and regional leaders from the county, military, and chamber to ensure we have excellent schools that attract working professionals to live, work and raise kids in this community,” Lewison said.
In Lewison’s work as a Product Manager at CivicPlus, she helps to advise city and county governments on how to utilize software to better engage citizen populations and streamline processes.
“Working for a tech company, I approach problems from a business perspective,” said Lewison. “I know how difficult it is to attract and maintain good talent to our community. Not only do we need to attract young professionals to fill jobs in our growing community, we also have to look 10 to 20 years down the road and ensure our local education system is producing the caliber of student we need to eventually fill professional jobs here in Manhattan.”
Lewison said she would like to be a voice for parents and residents of USD 383. “When you have children going to public school, you talk to other parents, educators and administrators,” Lewison said. “You hear about the issues that bother them—things that families are talking about around the kitchen table. Often, folks are just too busy to bring these concerns to a public forum. I want to be the voice of these families and bring those issues to the forefront.”
“I was educated in the Kansas public school system, left for a university education, and came back to Kansas to work and raise a family. I want to ensure Kansas schools continue to produce kids that can take a similar path. I have no doubt that with good leadership and dialogue between local groups, we can continue to build our schools to have a top reputation in
this region.”
The post First candidate for USD 383 school board files for election appeared first on News Radio KMAN.
