Election Guide to the Worcester School Committee
Voting for at-large, district C, district E and the mayor
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As a watcher of school committee meetings, I hope to offer a concise guide on the school committee candidates and a perspective that helps you make an educated choice according to your priorities and values; to feel informed without feeling overwhelmed. Election Day is Tuesday, November 4 (which is also a no-school day). If you do not know whether you are registered to vote in Worcester or what district you live in, click here. Make a plan to vote!
School Committee Election.
It’s time to vote for our next school committee and this is just the second election where we will vote for six district members and two at-large members. The 2023 school committee election brought a new district model and the committee went from six at-large members to six district members and two at-large members. The Mayor also chairs the committee. In 2021 a coalition of people, including the Worcester Chapter of the NAACP and Worcester Interfaith, brought a lawsuit against the city. The basis of the lawsuit was that the at-large system “deprives communities of color of the opportunity to elect candidates of their choice” and violated the federal Voting Rights Act. The city council settled the lawsuit and new districts were drawn so that there were two “minority-majority districts.” (Ironically, for both elections since then, the minority-majority districts of B and D only have one candidate, thus leaving voters in those districts with even less choice than they had in the fully at-large model.) The new districts are labeled by letters A-F.
If you are a voter, you will be casting up to four votes to decide who is on the school committee: one for your district, two for at-large, and one for the mayor, who chairs the school committee. There are four districts out of the six where incumbents don’t have challengers: districts A, B, D, and F. So if you live in those districts, sorry, you get what you get. Interestingly, there are more current WPS parents on the city council (Luis Ojeda, Jenny Pacillo, Khrystian King and Etel Haxhiaj) than on the school committee (just Jermaine Johnson).
In district C incumbent Dianna Biancheria (who I could not find a campaign website for) and challenger Feanna Jattan-Singh are running. In district E we see a repeat of the 2023 election with Nelly Medina challenging incumbent Kathleen “Kathi” Roy. And incumbents Maureen Binienda and Sue Mailman–who both live in district A– are running for the two at-large seats. Also running at-large is challenger, and WPS parent, Adwoa Sakyi-Lamptey, who lives in district C.
What’s the work?
Let’s start with what we are electing people on the school committee to do. The school committee has certain functions and responsibilities, including finance/budget, education policy and goals, curriculum, advocacy, and collective bargaining, to name a few. These are the things we need the school committee to be good at getting done, and when they veer from these goals–as was common pre-2021 and was called out by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE)– the system doesn’t function well. Specifically, I think the school committee work that will be the most critical over the next two-year term is:
How to deal with federal funding cuts.
Redistricting of school zones, which the district plans to implement in the 2027-2028 school year.
Contract negotiations with teachers, as the current contract expires in 2026.
Implementing the strategic plan, which ends in 2028, and the process of developing a new strategic plan.
Superintendent Allen’s contract, which goes to 2028. Negotiations to extend his contract, or plans to hire a new superintendent, would likely start in early 2027.
The school committee makes decisions that impact the daily lives of students. Only 15-ish percent of the electorate in Worcester votes in city elections, and at a time when school boards across the country are being used as political battlegrounds, we need to make sure that it’s not just a small minority of the electorate who are deciding who will govern our schools. Go vote please! Early voting starts on the 25th and runs daily at the Worcester Public Library.
At-Large Candidates.
Maureen Binienda.
Maureen Binienda is running for a second term. She did not graduate from WPS, but she worked in the district for 46 years as a special education teacher and then principal at South High School (she worked there when both Superintendent Brian Allen and school committee member Jermaine Johnson went there.) Binienda was the superintendent of WPS for six years (from 2016-2022), and her tenure hit some pretty controversial bumps, including dragging her feet in recommending a new health curriculum, her stance against taking SROs out of schools, her recommendation not to bring transportation in house, and students asking her contract not to be renewed. Of the members currently on the school committee, district A member Molly McCullough, district C member Dianna Biancheria and Mayor Joe Petty all voted not to renew Binienda’s contract in 2021. When then-school committee candidate Jermoh Kamara said that WPS needed a new leader, Binienda said:
“It’s not like her to come out and say a statement like that unless coached to say a statement like that ...I think I was very instrumental in Jermoh being successful in her development, I gave her a ride to school every day...My feeling is she probably got coached into this particular statement that she was saying.”
That condescending tone, lack of self-awareness, and loyalty-based thinking is emblematic of Binienda’s approach to serving on the school committee.
In her last few months as Superintendent, Binienda first floated the idea of running for office. She served as interim superintendent in Quaboag Public Schools for two years, and then interim superintendent in Easthampton last school year. As far as I can tell, her journeyman interim superintendent career is at a pause, as she did not get the job in Brookline or Wilmington. As she pointed out in her cover letter for the Brookline gig, “In November 2023, I was the highest vote getter in the City of Worcester for the position of Worcester School Committee member, which I currently serve with pride.” Let’s take a look at some highlights of her first term as a school committee member:
Binienda was the lone vote against hiring Brian Allen as superintendent. She recommended appointing head of teaching and learning, Dr. Marie Morse, as an interim superintendent while the district conducted a year-long internal search.
Binienda voted against the cell phone policy, saying it was not strict enough.
Binienda does not support a teacher’s right to strike.
Binienda requests reports and data, and then often misinterprets them to prove a point she wants to make, as she did with disciplinary data as explained here.
Binienda was the lone vote against a new graduation policy that allows students to walk at graduation if they are two credits short. After the meeting she filed for reconsideration of that item, implying that Assistant Superintendent Dr. Marie Morse misled the committee.
Binienda ignored school committee rules and voted for herself for vice chair, despite being ineligible. A little hypocritical coming from someone who has said, “There’s rules in life you have to follow in order to achieve things.”
Binienda has said that restorative practices do not work in all schools (begs the question what schools she’s referring to here and which students go to those schools).
Binienda voted against the FY25 budget when there was a $22 million deficit. In that budget deliberation, Binienda read out the contracts of Superintendent Rachel Monárrez, Deputy Superintendent Brian Allen and Assistant Superintendent Marie Morse, questioning their salaries. That year, Binienda made more than all of them between her $175k pension and her $141k salary in the Easthampton district (which has an enrollment of about 1100 students and 122 teachers. That’s 6% of what WPS has. At that same rate, based on enrollment, Worcester’s Superintendent should be making $2.6 million).
Binienda thinks we do not need climate and culture specialists since they just “roam the halls” and said “they are not trained professionals. I think it’s a cute name, but they’re not trained.”
On the face of it, the idea of having an experienced educator on the school committee makes sense. They have actual experience in the classroom and understand the challenges first hand. I would love it if there were more WPS parents who have experience in education would run for school committee (cough, cough, Shaun Connolly). My struggle with Maureen Binienda is that she has not taught in a classroom for thirty years, and it shows. Her perspective as an educator comes very much from a deficit thinking perspective which is outdated and does not serve our students. She is defensive and has not taken an ounce of accountability for her lackluster six years as the head of our district. And there’s cognitive dissonance about rehashing the past, while also criticising the now. As if her leadership didn’t create some of the problems she is now complaining about. It’s not constructive, and creates a combative environment on the school committee floor, both for other members and for district employees.
Sue Mailman.
Sue Mailman is running for her third term and the key issues that have emerged in her campaign are continuing to follow the strategic plan, a sharp focus on facilities, growing community partnerships and increasing vocational opportunities for students. Mailman is a business owner and a woman in the construction trades who brings that perspective. She often asks thoughtful questions about systems and processes that show she has decades of experience in leadership roles. Let’s take a look at some highlights of how Mailman’s been as a school committee member:
After hearing from parents and students, Mailman brought an LGBTQIA+ resolution to the floor (which was then hijacked).
Mailman often says the quiet part outloud, like when she brought up how unusual it is to have someone whose contract was not renewed to then serve on a public body.
Mailman has a long history of supporting vocational education before it was “popular” and understands best practices. As the district continues to expand programs to the comprehensive high schools, she has the understanding to ask the right questions and has been instrumental in the development of the career education admission policy.
Mailman has filed items about turf fields, screen time in elementary schools, bus monitors, and school enrollment and overcrowding.
Mailman has often raised the larger question of whether the committee should have items on the agenda that are specific to districts if the item would apply to all schools, pointing to mandatory school committee member training that says that every member of the school committee should advocate for all students at all schools.
Mailman is one of the school committee members who, through her knowledge and connections, has the strongest ability to advocate for resources for our district, both at the city and the state level. (She was actually named the top three “most influential people” by other “power players” in Worcester, after Worcester Chamber of Commerce head Tim Murray and tied for second with UMass Memorial Health chief Eric Dickson.) I appreciate her ability to cut through the bull (and acknowledge when she herself is part of it, as she did here). While a lot of candidates talk about transparency, it’s often performative. Mailman is not.
Adwoa Sakyi-Lamptey.
Adwoa Sakyi-Lamptey is the only first-time candidate in November’s election and a WPS parent. She has a fourth grader, a second grader, as well as a three-year-old, which means she will be a WPS parent until 2040. Sakyi-Lamptey is the only candidate that I know on a personal level–she and I served on a school PTO executive board together and she was an instrumental part of the team who opened and now volunteers in the school library at our kids’ elementary school (she is an avid reader!) Originally from Ghana, Sakyi-Lamptey moved to Worcester when she was in middle school, and attended Forest Grove and Doherty, where she graduated in 2003. Her mother was a teacher/professor back in Ghana, and education has always been an important factor in her home growing up.
A senior associate director for employer and alumni engagement at Clark University, Adwoa is always impeccably dressed, which she says is because you never know who you will meet when you step out of your home, and first impressions are everything. Her campaign priorities are supporting a rigorous curriculum, promoting equity and support for every learner, championing collaboration between families, and fostering transparency and accountability. I think she’s representative of your average WPS parent when she says on her website “I believe every child deserves access to a strong, well-rounded education—one that challenges them academically, supports them personally, and prepares them for the future.” Knowing Adwoa is to know that she is smart, community oriented, asks good questions, and listens to the answers.
District C Candidates.
Dianna Biancheria.
Dianna Biancheria served on the school committee for six terms before losing in the 2021 election, coming in 7th with 6,132 votes (behind Laura Clancey, who received 6,911 votes. Jermoh Kamara, who lost to Biancheria in district C in 2023, beat Biancheria in the at-large contest in 2021 by 1,900 votes.) She is running for her eighth term. Let’s take a look at Biancheria’s votes and what she says on the school committee floor (she talks A LOT, way more than any other school committee member. Many times her sentences are non sequiturs and hard to follow, and she often asks questions of district employees that are clearly answered in their presentations):
Biancheria voted against signing onto a lawsuit to stop the dismantling of the US Department of Education (the vote was 6-2, with Kathi Roy also voting against).
Biancheria requested a report on classrooms without doorlocks and pushed for them to be installed, but only for the schools in her district.
Right before voting to appoint Brian Allen as Superintendent, she looked at him and said “you better not screw this up.”
Biancheria disparaged the role of climate and culture specialists calling them “glorified bouncers,” derogatorily asked if they’re going “to wear vests” and belittled student calming rooms.
According to the district, Biancheria never read the school safety audit, despite specifically requesting that it be an option for the committee and despite mentioning at almost every meeting that school safety is a concern for her. (Binienda, McCullough, Mailman and Johnson did read it).
In 2024, Biancheria gave then-Superintendent Rachel Monárrez an objectively unreasonable evaluation. It’s also worth noting that it was a who-copied-who moment with Kathi Roy that, if they were students, probably would have been flagged as academic dishonesty.
Biancheria has focused her campaign on school safety, the budget, and career readiness opportunities for students–a campaign platform that has been unchanged for at least six years.
Feanna Jattan-Singh.
While it’s her first time running for school committee, it is not Feanna Jattan-Singh’s first time running for office. She may be a familiar name because she ran for city council district 3 in the 2023 election. Jattan-Singh has two kids at North High School and one 2025 graduate, who was a student representative on the school committee last year. Her website says she’s running because she believes “it’s time for parents to have a real voice in the decisions that shape our schools. I’m running to ensure we select the best superintendent for Worcester Public Schools, and to bring transparency, accountability, and empathy to the table.” Students having safe routes to school has been one of her biggest priorities. She’s been endorsed by at-large member Sue Mailman.
District E Candidates.
District E had a preliminary in September, with Nelly Medina and Kathleen “Kathi” Roy getting the nod to the general election. You can read what I wrote about them here. The only new thing to add is that Medina has been endorsed by the teacher’s union and Roy has been endorsed by the MAGA 1776 Project PAC, an explicitly anti-trans organization.
Mayoral Candidates.
The Mayor is the chair of the school committee, and is in a unique leadership position to connect policies on the city side with how those things impact the schools. Like policies that increase affordable housing, protect immigrants, and push against the school-to-prison pipeline. I see that connection rarely made across municipal bodies, except when it comes to school facilities. I understand that there are many elements that go into voting for mayor, and I am not a city council watcher, so I am approaching this race just from the lense of education. Remember that the voters of Worcester do not reflect the same demographics as the students in Worcester Public Schools and their families.
Joe Petty.
When it comes to the school committee, one gets the sense that Joe Petty chairs the committee because he has to rather than actually caring about schools beyond the economic value of having a “good” school system. A small way that’s visible is that he leaves school committee meetings often for mayoral duties, but he does not leave city council meetings to do those things. In a more substantial way, this sentiment of schools being the lesser priority became clear when Petty decided to run for a state senate seat in 2022, which if he won, would have made Donna Colorio the chair of the school committee. (Colorio, who served two terms on school committee before being elected to city council, acknowledged herself she had some ‘crazy’ stances while on the school committee). When Petty made the decision to run for state senate, he was telling us that he no longer wanted to be mayor. And that disinvestment shows. He’s disconnected to what is actually happening in the schools and has a hard time relating to public school families and young people. The best way I can describe it is like senioritis. It’s not necessarily malicious, but he feels like he’s earned his keep and can just sort of coast now.
One example is when he spoke at a July 2023 school committee meeting to talk about how impressed he has been with then Superintendent Monárrez building an infrastructure to create a school district that supports students and teachers, where he quickly added “it’s nobody’s fault. It’s just the way it was. For years.” And all I could think at the time was Really? Was it no one’s fault that our school district was a scattered disaster? It’s just something that passively happened? In the big context of things it’s a random small comment, but so emblematic of his inability to take accountability or hold others accountable.
The chef’s kiss is the hot mic at a meeting this past June that picked up Mayor Petty telling then-Superintendent Monárrez that she should join him on the Cape because they just drink all day. Senioritis personified.
Khrystian King.
I know Khrystian King first and foremost as a WPS parent, as we both have kids in third grade at the same school. What I would argue is most important when thinking about King chairing the school committee, is that as a city councilor, King prioritizes the things that impact schools the most: affordable housing (and zoning laws) and increased access to health and human services. Specifically around education, King’s campaign priorities are supporting mental health and increasing sports and after school programs. These are not the most robust, and I like to see more specifics laid out. What I appreciate about King is that he is in the community and around young people, building relationships and seeing the challenges. He listens, and most importantly is in the community so he can listen. It would be a little bit of a learning curve for King to understand the school committee in that it is governed by different rules and different state laws than city council. But I have faith that King has the leadership skills to hit the ground running, and we need an actual leader at the helm of the school committee. As a public school parent, he is invested in a way that many others are not.
Owura Sarkodieh.
Owura Sarkodieh works at Worcester Recovery Center, and is father of five children, all of whom attend WPS. On his website Sarkodieh says, “I’ve seen both the promise in our students and the gaps holding them back.” His platform on education is well-aligned with the district strategic plan, but as often is the case, there aren’t specifics on how he’ll do those things as chair of the school committee. Born in Ghana, Sarkodieh moved here after high school and he believes that being an immigrant gives him a “unique understanding of Worcester’s growing diversity.” I appreciate his statement that “Worcester deserves schools where every child can thrive, and that starts with treating education not as an expense, but as an investment in our city’s future” and his argument that Worcester has been run “by the same faces for over a decade” and we could use some change is one that I definitely agree with. If he doesn’t make it on to city council, I hope he’ll consider running for school committee next time.
My two cents.
To be honest, over the last two years I have grieved the committee from 2021-2023. That school committee was high functioning in a way Worcester rarely sees in municipal bodies. They did not always agree, but they did not get bogged down in personal vendettas and performative gestures, always keeping our kids at the center. To put it simply, they were doing the work. A big part of that is that they were smart, committed people who care, and who understand their roles and purview. But it’s also the culture of the committee that they created together, and how they functioned as a group. This current committee is not that. It lacks leadership, cohesiveness, and they are more focused on the adults/themselves than the kids.
Still, the fact we recently had a high-functioning committee gives me hope that we can have it again. Half of that 2021-2023 committee was WPS parents. I do not think that’s a coincidence. Every day, in our roles as public school parents (and this is true for educators too), we interact with people who make different choices for their families and who may have different values. We share our frustrations, about teaching and parenting, about the state of the city and the world. We have hard conversations, and even though we may have different solutions in mind, we try to find common ground. Because when our kids are classmates, teammates, or friends, it’s hard to villainize and hate each other for our views; being in community reminds us of each other’s humanity. And as we face many unknowns at the federal level, the most important thing we can do right now as a community is keep each other’s humanity in focus. Let’s keep that in mind as we go to the ballot box, and vote for people that actually keep our kids at the center, as demonstrated by their actions. Because there’s still A LOT of work to do.
Bill again. If you liked this, found it useful, learned something, etc, consider sharing it with a friend—and making sure that friend votes!
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Voted so hard for Nelly that I almost tore through the ballot.
Aislinn, I so appreciate your work here. — what a thorough, fact-based, and incisive guide. The coming year will be fiscally tough, and Worcester’s children and families will need student-focused leadership. Of course I'm for Sue and Adwoa. Though I live in District B, you inspired me to contribute to Feanna’s and Nelly’s campaigns because strong schools serve the whole city and we need a high-functioning School Committee like we had in 2021–23. Thank you -- your work is so important.