Cambridge’s School Committee race is seeing the most candidates on a ballot in two decades, a sign of frustrations with politics and systems nationally and locally.
Eighteen candidates for the six-seat committee that sets policy for the public school district have returned papers for Nov. 4 elections, compared with 11 for elections in 2023 and nine in 2021, according to city records. The average number of candidates dating back to 2003 has been 10 candidates.
For the coming City Council elections, meanwhile, 20 people have submitted nomination papers to run for nine seats. That’s down from 25 candidates in 2023, according to city records, but roughly on par with the average of 21 candidates dating back to 2003.
All current councillors are seeking reelection except for Paul Toner, meaning one seat is guaranteed to go to one of a dozen challengers – and potentially a write-in candidate. Similarly, all current committee members are running again except for Rachel Weinstein, making one seat among six guaranteed to go to one of the 13 challengers.
Candidates must gather at least 50 to 100 signatures from Cambridge residents to qualify for the November ballot, and they had to be filed by 5 p.m. Thursday, the end of a monthlong nomination period. The Election Commission has until 5 p.m. Aug. 14 to verify each signature, but there have already been a half-dozen people who took out nomination papers but did not reach the signature threshold.
Some candidates took out papers to run for both council and committee. Caitlin Dube and LaQueen Battle filed enough names to keep running for both; Melanie Gause wound up filing only for the committee.
The surge in School Committee candidates has a few causes, candidates said.
Alborz Bejnood and Eugenia Schraa Huh, who both ran in 2023, are trying again for a committee seat and attributed on Thursday and Friday the increase in candidates to several issues arising in Cambridge Public Schools over the past few years.
Among them were the removal of algebra for all eighth-grade math classes around the time of the Covid pandemic and the hiring and subsequent ousting of former superintendent Victoria Greer after complaints about her hiring and organizational practices and poor district survey results. One of her hires resulted in conflict and allegations of creating a toxic workplace at the Graham & Parks School; the practices of school councils have also caused conflict at Graham & Parks and districtwide. Candidate Lilly Havstad, a Harvard lecturer, is a Graham & Parks parent.
Bejnood mentioned also the closing this year of the Kennedy-Longfellow School, a 51-year-old, K-5 campus in East Cambridge in need of a physical upgrade and drawing a disproportionate number of high-needs students, leading to low test scores – the result of years of failing to address how students are placed in the district. The move sparked frustration among Cantabrigians who felt that its systemic problems could have been long ago identified and addressed.
When people become disillusioned, frustrated and disappointed with the political climate, it motivates them to enter politics, Dube said Friday. The significant increase in candidates for the 2025 election suggests that people are seeking genuine change in the leadership of the current School Committee, she said.
Jane Hirschi said on Friday that after a long history of voting in elections at every level, she felt a “call” to run for School Committee because of the current state of the federal government.“The schools are not new to me,” said Hirschi, founder of the urban environmentalism education nonprofit CitySprouts. “But running for office is a new spark, and some other people may have felt that spark, too.”
Incumbents seeking reelection include David Weinstein, Caroline Hunter, José Luis Rojas Villarreal, Richard Harding Jr. and Elizabeth Hudson.
Along with Battle, Bejnood, Dube, Gause, Havstad, Hirschi and Huh, committee candidates include Alexandra Bowers, Anne Coburn, Luisa De Paula Santos, Jessica Goetz, Arjun Jaikumar and Jia-Jing Lee.
Council incumbents include Burhan Azeem, vice mayor Marc McGovern, Patty Nolan, Sumbul Siddiqui, Jivan Sobrinho-Wheeler, mayor E. Denise Simmons, Ayesha M. Wilson and Cathie Zusy. If reelected this November, Simmons will serve her 13th term. She was first elected in 2001 and is the longest-serving councillor.
Some new candidates aiming for a council seat include Battle, founder of Battle First Aid Responder Services; Dube, educator and consultant for nonprofits; former emergency room nurse turned entrepreneur Elizabeth Bisio; lawyer Timothy Flaherty; Ned Melanson, a city public defender; Stanislav Rivkin, associate director of admissions at Harvard Graduate School of Education; and Zion Sherin, an entrepreneur.
Returning challengers include Dana Bullister, a local data scientist who ran in 2021; and Ayah Al-Zubi, Peter Hsu, John Hanratty and Robert Winters, all of whom ran in 2023.
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Will any of these candidates run on this platform: we want to substantially improve on the situation that 50% of grade school students cannot read or do math at grade level. We also do not believe that students should be promoted to the next grade if they can’t read and do math at their current grade level.
This is what the candidates should be addressing.
With all these newcomers jumping in I’m going to be leery as to who they are and their motivations, as I certainly don’t want any Trumpies running to act as disruptors to the school system or attempting to force the false king’s agenda into our school system.