Maren Norton Endorsement

I attended the Shoreline Council Candidate Forum and would like to share my impressions on the School Board candidates:

Within two minutes of Maren Norton speaking I realized she is one of those rare, intelligence, exceptional people that come around occasionally and that we need to grab her because someone else will. She definitely stood out far from the pack.

Why? She has successful experience to bring to the table. She was voted student body president at Stanford University representing 14,000 students and 4 million dollars. She worked at Washington State House of Representatives getting to know our legislation process in Olympia. She went to Michigan Law School. She has an impressive resume and has received too many outstanding achievement awards to mention in email.

On a personal note: I had coffee with Senator Maria Cantwell when I visited Washington DC. When her Educational Legislative Assistant found out I was from Shoreline she asked about Maren Norton. She said she was outstanding and that both Senators are keeping an eye on our local Shoreline School Board elections.

She has awed both our State Senators, she has my vote.
Why is this legislative tidbit important? Because we have huge gaps in un-funded educational mandates and we need someone that understands and can begin the process of closing those funding gaps. She has the experience and connections to do a lot for us.
Please also vote for Richard Potter and Kyle Burleigh.
The school board incumbents are running on the platform that they inherited the school district mess and they have worked hard to correct the problems. Yes that is true, but they didn't start correcting any problems until they were brought out publicly about two years ago. Michael Jacobs has been on the board six years and Jim Leigh for four. Both robotically continued to approve budgets such as the $4.5 mil. (est.) energy studies which the district didn't have money for. Michael Jacobs was part of hiring Jim Welsh the school Superintendent that caused this mess. These incumbents didn't understand their jobs, and what was already falling apart finally came out in the open.
Teachers are frustrated with our current school board. Teachers are the ones in the everyday trenches educating our kids; and are our fist indicators of when things are not working.

Please email this to anyone that can vote and lets get a good school board elected.

Web Sites: marennorton.com
SmileForKyle.com
Vote4Potter.com

Shorelineschools.org for undated meetings and candidate forums

Tiia-Mai Barrett
Highland Terrace Elementary and Einstein Middle School