The Konk Life Candidate Questionnaire: Sue Woltanski for Monroe County School Board District 5

Q. Let our readers know the reasons in general that you believe you would make the very best person to fulfill the position for which you are running.

A. I’m an informed, grass roots public education advocate, devoted to ensuring great public schools exist for all our Keys kids.

Q. What specifically are the top four factors you believe qualify you over the assets of any other potential candidate?

A. As one of South Florida’s leading grass roots public education advocates, I have closely studied Florida education policy and understand how it impacts our local schools.

I have personal experience at both traditional and charter schools. My children have attended (or are currently attending) Plantation Key School, Ocean Studies Charter School, Treasure Village Montessori Charter and Coral Shores High School.

I have served on multiple Monroe County School District committees, including Audit and Finance (2016-18), Calendar (2017,2018) and Student Assessment for Learning Taskforce (2015), Ocean Studies Charter School Board (2013-2016) and School Advisory Councils for Plantation Key School, Treasure Village Montessori and Coral Shores High School.

As a retired pediatrician, I have a clear understanding of child development, health and well-being. I believe in the focus on the “Whole Child.”

Q. What is your personal view on the state of the nation in this year’s particularly interesting political season?

A. If people become politically aware and more involved in local and state politics, that will be a good thing. I am concerned regarding the denigration of the press. I believe a free press is essential for a healthy society and worry about the increasingly partisan nature of some media outlets. We need to be able to trust the press to provide factual reports, from which we can form our own opinions.

Q. Given your personal awareness of governance in Southeast Florida, are you optimistic about relations between the public and the powers that be?

A. On the local level, I have found our School Board and County Commissioners to be fairly accessible and responsive to community concerns. Unfortunately, both have been repeatedly stripped of local control by Tallahassee mandates. Given the unique nature of the Keys, I believe local control is vital to our community.

I believe that 20 years of single party rule, combined with term limits, has left Tallahassee a place where lobbyists and special interests, particularly those serving the pet projects of legislative leadership, control the legislature. In such a system, local legislators find it difficult to fully represent their constituents’ concerns. After observing the legislative process in Tallahassee over the last 5 or so years, I believe such single party rule results in bad government. There needs to be some balance.

Q. Do you feel that the general tenor of political discourse is becoming less polite in Monroe County or staying about the same?

A. As long as you stay off social media, the tenor of political discourse in the Keys remains appropriately polite.

Q. Tell us more about your personal history –- your work and family life –- and how they relate to your political ambitions.

A. I was raised in Fremont, CA, where my father was a local public school administrator. I attended public schools and, ultimately, the University of Michigan Medical School, where I completed my pediatrics residency, began a general pediatrics practice and met my husband, Tom, an ER physician. We bought a vacation home in Tavernier in 1999 and moved to the Keys permanently in 2008 so our daughter could start kindergarten at Plantation Key School and our children could grow up next door to their grandmother.

My children have (at one time or another) attended Plantation Key School, Ocean Studies Charter School, Treasure Village Montessori and Coral Shores High School. They are currently looking forward to 7th and 10th grade.

A lifelong supporter of public education, my education advocacy “career” began, 8 years ago, on the PKS School Advisory Council, where I became deeply aware of the fiscal impacts of the great recession on education funding for our local schools. Many of the programs cut at that time have still not been restored. While investigating school funding, I became increasingly aware of the impacts of high stakes standardized testing on our schools and children. I created a grass roots effort to minimize standardized testing in Monroe County Schools (Minimize Testing Maximize Learning). In 2015, I launched an education blog, Accountabaloney, which calls out the flaws I see in Florida’s education accountability/school grades system. In just two short years, Accountabaloney has become one of the more influential pro-public education blogs in Florida. Over the last two years, I have joined with a broadly bipartisan coalition of education advocates from across the state and across the political spectrum, forming Common Ground, a group which discusses current education issues and advocates for positions on which we find universal agreement. Working with this team, I have been able to help influence the legislative process in Tallahassee.

I feel our local public schools are at risk due to privatization efforts in our state and nation. I do not believe such efforts will serve our Keys community well. We need high quality, safe PUBLIC schools that serve the needs of ALL our Keys children. As a school board member, I will be fighting to ensure quality public education continues to exist for our children and grandchildren.

Q. From your personal experience, would a generally peaceable outlook in the Keys depend upon a measure of control over the number of our visitors and residents?

A. I suppose so. With one road in and out, there are certainly time of the year when traffic can cause tempers to flare.

Q. What do you personally love most about Monroe County and the Florida Keys?

A. While I love the Keys marine environment, the best part of living in the Keys is when the community works together to help neighbors in need, as we especially saw in the aftermath of Irma.

Q. What troubles you the most about today’s Monroe County and the Florida Keys?

Lack of affordable housing for essential members of the community: law enforcement, nurses, teachers, etc.

Q. What planning or political mistakes do you personally believe were the worst to be inflicted on the Keys over the past decade?

A. Keys wide:

-The failure to address affordable housing when housing was still somewhat affordable.

-The failure to restore freshwater flow to the Florida Bay.

In Education:

-The A-F School Grade system, which grades schools primarily on standardized test scores, has resulted in a test focused education system where kids are trained to take tests.

-The chronic defunding of public education by failing to adjust education spending for inflation, over the past 20 years.

Q. Who is your favorite character in the history of the keys?

A. Carl Tanzler. Who doesn’t love the story of his Corpse Bride?

Q.  Who is your least favorite character?

A. Mosquitoes

Q. What is your favorite book?

“The Princess Bride” by William Goldman. I have loved it since high school (before the movie came out).

Q. What is your favorite movie?

A. Current favorite is “The Greatest Showman.” I have the soundtrack playing in my car.

Q. What is your favorite quote?

A. “If you change nothing, nothing will change.”

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