By Stuart Gibson, Hunter Mill school board rep A lot of people have asked me - now that I am not seeking re-election - whom am I supporting for School Board this year. So I decided to share my views. I write this from the perspective of a Board member who made a life-changing decision 16 years ago, so that readers might get some idea of what drives people to seek this demanding position, why that motivation is so important, and whom I am supporting.  When someone considers whether to run for elected office, there is one question they need to answer for themselves, before ever filling out a …

When Fairfax County elected its first School Board in 1995, the superintendent had a sign on his desk that reminded us all why we were here.  It said, “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.” In other words, we should never lose sight of our primary goal: to improve teaching and learning, so that our students will achieve academic success.  And ever since I first took the oath of office in December 1995, I have tried to “keep the main thing the main thing.” Over the past few years, a number of advocacy groups have formed in Fairfax County, each one dealing with a narrow …

One of my favorite quotes is from James Thurber: "It is better to know some of the questions than all of the answers." As a public official, I often hear from community members who have "the answer" to one policy issue or another. Most recently, I have heard from people who are upset over recent news reports about the school system’s efforts to impose consequences on three students who broke the rules relating to drug possession at school.One advocacy group is pushing a set of "all of the answers," which reflects a response to their own experience with the system. One of their answers is to …

With apologies to Charles Dickens, “It was the best of school systems.  It was the worst of school systems.”  No, this is not a piece comparing Fairfax County to Washington, DC.  This is a piece that highlights how different people perceive Fairfax County Public Schools, and how those perceptions are often driven by personal experience and bias.  It cannot seriously be disputed that Fairfax County today educates more children from more diverse backgrounds to higher standards, on less money per pupil, than in recent memory.  We are administratively lean, compared both to national benchmarks …

 What would you call a group made up of vocal critics of Fairfax County Public Schools, driven by issues unrelated to student achievement, and led by people running for the school board?   They call themselves the Fairfax Education Coalition, or  FEC.  Despite their name, FEC has ignored or sidestepped every serious discussion about student achievement.  More importantly, FEC has been AWOL while Fairfax County has lost tens of millions of dollars in state and local school funding, as enrollment increased by thousands.  Instead of focusing on the educational issues that matter most, FEC has …