By Magaly Muñoz

Post Staff

Oakland families gathered at Lazear Charter Academy last Thursday night to meet the candidates running to represent District 5 on the Oakland Unified School District’s school board.

The seat became vacant in March when board president Mike Hutchinson transitioned to represent District 4 after previously serving as a D5 representative. Sasha Ritzie-Hernandez and Jorge Lerma were announced as the final candidates for the position in August.

The forum, at 824 29^th Ave., was sponsored by Families in Action, an organization that supports parents and students in their fight for quality education in Oakland.

The event was well-attended, with every seat in the room filled to hear what each candidate had to say about issues concerning the parents and teachers. However, Lerma was the only candidate present at the forum, leading to disappointment among some organizers about Ritzie-Hernandez’s absence.

“When someone who is running doesn’t have time for the people in the community, it’s very disappointing, it’s like putting our children last versus putting them first,” stated Tunisia Harris, a mother with several family members in D5 schools and a parent leader with Families in Action.

In a follow-up with The Oakland Post, Ritzie-Hernandez explained that her home had been vandalized during the week and she was dealing with the post-traumatic effects of the incident. Despite not being in the best mindset to attend the forum, she mentioned that she had talked to many of the families and organizers and was open to continuing the dialogue.

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In lieu of being there in person, Ritzie-Hernandez opted to audio record her responses to the questions, which covered a range of topics from safety to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on education.

When asked about test scores affected by the pandemic, Ritzie-Hernandez said the low scores for kids in Oakland comes from systemic racism and the often limited resources that are available to students of color. She said more attention needs to be put into culturally competent teachings.

Lerma, conversely, stressed that teachings should reflect “the real world.” He argued against blaming the children who are often labeled “defiant or hard to teach” and advocated for providing them with an environment that allows them to grow.

“We always make it seem that kids that are of color or immigrants, are broken. Let’s change that narrative,” Lerma said.

Both candidates shared similar viewpoints in almost all the categories of questions, except for one: charter schools.

Charter schools have been a contentious issue in Oakland for years, as many say that they take away attendance and, consequently, funding from the schools under OUSD.

Ritzie-Hernandez said in her follow-up interview with The Post that while she doesn’t oppose charters in the district, she is against their expansion because it becomes harder to regulate what each individual school is teaching if they aren’t under the district.

“My goal, if I become a board member, is to ensure that we create a robust public education system here in Oakland,” Ritzie-Hernandez said.

In a follow-up conversation, Lerma stated that charters are neither bad nor good, they’re simply options available to parents for their child’s education.

He suggested that instead of framing the conversation on charters as bad vs. good, OUSD should focus on improving schools that are failing to keep kids in the classroom and provide them ample resources to achieve.

“It’s not the charters that are the biggest threat to [OUSD] — it’s failing schools because failing schools then add to truancy,” Lerma said. “The kids start thinking, ‘well, there’s nothing there for me.’ It’s the same old thing. Education is like a mass production assembly line, one size fits all, and that’s exactly what I’m fighting against.”

The candidates will continue to campaign for the vacant school board seat until the special election on Nov. 7. All Oakland District 5 voters will be sent ballots to cast their votes by mail.

Magaly Muñoz

A graduate of Sacramento State University, Magaly Muñoz’s journalism experience includes working for the State Hornet, the university’s student-run newspaper and conducting research and producing projects for “All Things Considered” at National Public Radio. She also was a community reporter for El Timpano, serving Latino and Mayan communities, and contributed to the Sacramento Observer, the area’s African American newspaper.

Muñoz is one of 40 early career journalists who are part of the California Local News Fellowship program, a state-funded initiative designed to strengthen local news reporting in California, with a focus on underserved communities.

The fellowship program places journalism fellows throughout the state in two-year, full-time reporting positions.

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