School board sees a youth movement
How 2 young candidates won seats in South Florida
Behind a rising trend of youth activism across the country, South Florida served as a microcosm of that growing movement with a pair of young candidates breaking through and winning seats on their local school boards.
Alexandria Ayala, 27, won in Palm Beach County on Tuesday night, and Sarah Leonardi, 30, won in Broward, making them youngest members on their school boards when they’re sworn in later this year.
Traditionally, school board members have skewed older in age. Of the 16 board members in the two counties, just four are younger than 50. The youngest school board officials in Broward and Palm Beach are in their 40s.
“It’s a huge honor and it’s also very validating in a way to feel that just because of your age, it’s not a limitation,” Ayala said. “I think voters are looking for new ideas and clearly our messages and visions resonated with them enough to earn their trust and support.”
Ayala and Leonardi are part of the wave of young candidates breaking into public office across the country. The two were both endorsed by Run for Something, a national organization geared toward recruiting young progressive can
didates under 40.
Co-founder Amanda Litman said when they launched Run for Something in 2017, she expected it would be a small endeavor and they’d have maybe 100 people in the first year. Since then, it’s exploded to over 60,000 candidates across the country.
“It gives me a lot of hope to know that people are not satisfied with the status quo, and they’re not satisfied with letting other people fix it for them,” Litman said. “Especially young people who are saying, ‘It’s our turn to claim the mantle of leadership.‘”
“To see young people across the country and in Florida step up and not just campaign as voters and volunteers, but as candidates — it’s really powerful.”
Born in Puerto Rico and raised in Palm Beach County, Ayala is replacing Chuck Shaw, 72, who decided
not to run for re-election in District 2, which covers Greenacres and Lake Worth Beach.
An aide to County Commissioner Robert Weinroth, Ayala became the first Hispanic woman elected to the Palm Beach County School Board. During the campaign, Ayala said at times she received hesitation from voters questioning her age.
“I definitely received the ‘You’re so young,’ [comments],” Ayala said. “It wasn’t really asked directly about my ability. Funny enough, it was, ‘You’re so young. Why would you want to do this? Why would you care about this?’
“And that question was very puzzling to me because I’ve been in this community for 20 years. I went to three schools here. My mother was a preschool teacher here for 15 years. I care about our community deeply. I care about our success. I care about our future. So how is that unaligned with what the school board’s message and purpose is?”
A public school teacher for the past eight years, Leonardi edged incumbent Heather Brinkworth for the Broward District 3 seat, which includes Fort Lauderdale.
Leonardi believes her election will prove beneficial to the younger demographic of teachers, who may not feel represented on the board.
Leonardi, who became a teacher after the Florida Legislature passed a bill in 2011 ending tenure for new teachers, cited the state’s decision — and her ability to relate with younger teachers — as an example of how she can bring a fresh view to the school board.
“The fact that I am young and the fact I haven’t been teaching for 30 years or 20 years, it brings a different and much-needed perspective to our school board,” Leonardi said. “Because I hope to represent a lot of these teachers who really are in a different type of [teaching] contract and had a very different experience with the education system.
“We started teaching in this paid-for-performance, test-drill environment and we’ve also seen the attack on public education and that’s all we’ve known in our whole careers and we still got into it and stayed in it.”
Ayala reiterated Leonardi’s point about bringing a new perspective to the school board, saying it’s a necessity.
“I think it’s an asset in this day and age,” Ayala said. “Not only with just technology but with the giant curveball that COVID-19 poses to us.”
Ayala said her experiences have equipped her for public office, given that she’s someone “who has always had technology and virtual and online schooling as a part of my process and who also has newer ideas of how to approach solutions.” She said it’s “uniquely a time for that kind of individual to step up and run and lead.”