Lando seeks to narrow district office-teacher gap

CHICO >> Chico Unified School District board of trustees District 4 candidate Tom Lando is running for reelection after serving on the board since 2018.

“There are significant gaps in trust and understanding between the district office and teachers and we need to address that going forward,” he said. “We also need to find different ways to make education accessible to students such that are in rural areas, for example.”

Lando said both high schools have virtual academies.

“We are finding ways to keep students virtual. Education in 10 years won’t look like when we were kids,” he said. “Students can explore Career and Technical Education opportunities.”

“We want to make sure we have better channels to hear from special education committees. We need to find ways to streamline and use the experts we’ve got. One of the big functions in school is that we are childcare. Kids come to school to become good citizens. So many parents didn’t know how to make life work when kids didn’t have anywhere to go during COVID-19,” he said.

“We kept a sense of community. When my son was in kindergarten he spend his entire year virtually. The teacher said we are part of the family, so when we come back in first grade, they know you and you know them,” Lando said. “Chico Unified has a great staff and great teaching staff. It’s tough to find good people. Teaching is starting to look less appealing. One thing we can do is work with the community and find things about the system we can agree on and support and bring people back to the table and remove stress.”

Lando talked about school renovations.

“Marigold and Shasta got upgraded. The faster we can raise the money and get the bonds out there is the best option. McManus will be renovated and Chapman and Sierra View also. We need to get those updated so we don’t have to worry about those facilities for 20 to 30 years,” he said.

He said renovating classrooms is a big goal.

“We need to add more to the facilities and tools into the classroom and built in technology. We need to arrange access to classrooms for safety issues,” he said. “We have a couple big holes, and need to use HVAC units. They are hard to replace.”

For Lando the school district is personal because he is a teacher.

“I am a teacher, I want to make sure kids and teachers have what they need. I’m a homeowner too. Teachers are taxpayers. Every penny counts for us too,” Lando said.

Lando talked about his goals for the future as a board member.

“We need to make sure the funding is set and make sure responsibilities are met. The average daily attendance has dropped a bit after the return from COVID-19. We need to make sure we are careful with public dollars and student directed leadership. We need to keep the progress we’ve made. We need to improve math scores. We should focus on the core services students can participate in once they get out of high school.

“Some are still angry about how schools played out during COVID-19. We want to keep going, keep moving forward. There’s a serious push to politicize school boards. What drew me to the board was not aligning with a particular party,” Lando said.