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Benjamin Salop
Benjamin Salop ran for election to the Oakland Unified Board of Education to represent District 1 in California. He lost in the general election on November 5, 2024.
Salop completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. Click here to read the survey answers.
Biography
Benjamin Salop was born in Oakland, California. He graduated from Oakland Technical High School. As of his 2024 campaign, he was attending the University of California, Berkeley. His career experience includes working as a researcher in the Department of Civil Engineering, as well as contracting for Caltrans and the California Air Resources Board.[1]
Elections
2024
See also: Oakland Unified School District, California, elections (2024)
General election
General election for Oakland Unified Board of Education District 1
The ranked-choice voting election was won by Rachel Latta in round 1 .
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Total votes: 28,960 |
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 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
Endorsements
Ballotpedia did not identify endorsements for Salop in this election.
Campaign themes
2024
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Benjamin Salop completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2024. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Salop's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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Ben's commitment to public service was fostered by his time as a student at Oakland Tech, where he worked alongside his fellow students to support an accountable budget process and secure funding for Oakland Tech's special education program. Ben worked alongside our Superintendent and Mayor on education policy, where he coauthored our landmark Youth Vote measure and secured millions of dollars in funds for student priorities. Ben later served as a student advocate to the State Board of Education, helping to draft and co-author several laws related to student and family educational equity.
Right now, Ben is a student studying civil engineering and history at the University of California, Berkeley. He's currently working to calculate the embodied carbon of California buildings, as well as collaborating on stronger and more seismically resilient concrete bridge structures.
Ben believes that our public schools are the key to success in all phases of life, and have the potential to anchor the diverse communities that make up Oakland. For our schools to thrive, it's critical that Oaklanders give back to our schools. Ben is running for our School Board to continue this work and enact change in our community.- Ben's top priority is to reform our district's governance and balance our budget. OUSD needs immediate and decisive action to address growing deficits and protect the long-term health of our schools. When elected, Ben will review our district's budget with our Budget department to cut unsustainable spending, ensure our dollars reflect our focus on students, and maximize our local and state funding. For our district and budget to work, Ben knows open government is critical. Ben will appoint OUSD community members to boards and commissions through a more democratic selection process, supporting constituent input. Ben will also work to publicize and share our finances so that our district is accountable to the public.
- Ben's first policy priority is to get serious about the College and Career success of our students. Ben recognizes that for OUSD to succeed in this measure, we as a district need to focus on literacy and early childhood education. Ben will refocus our district on literacy and math for our youngest students to ensure all students can reach grade level, and expand our math and science courses in middle and high school — including eighth-grade Algebra and AP science classes for all students. He will also develop stronger partnerships with our community colleges and universities, expanding pathway programs and connecting students with career resources and civic engagement education.
- Ben is also focused on developing our school facilities so every student and teacher is in a safe, healthy and secure academic environment. As a student, Ben attended undersupplied classrooms and experienced unsafe class conditions — he will reimagine our facilities process and focus on equitable allocation of district resources. Ben's background in project management and buildings engineering will inform his leadership. He will ensure that our resources and capital expenditures are managed effectively and responsibly while incorporating life cycle cost analysis and environmental building assessments for a more sustainable OUSD. Ben will ensure that our dollars are maximized to provide the services and resources students need.
Ben believes that all community members deserve a say in their government, and he has worked tirelessly to make our systems more accountable to the public. He coauthored Oakland's landmark youth voting ordinance and worked to pass state laws to enfranchise and expand public representation on county boards of education.
Former Oakland Councilmember Loren Taylor
Former Oakland School Board members Jody London, Gary Yee and James Harris,
Current Oakland School Board Members Mike Hutchinson and Clifford Thompson
Alameda County Board of Education Trustees Ken Berrick and Janevette Cole
Empower Oakland
In addition to restoring community engagement and outreach, we as a board need to reestablish and reform the way we provide individualized support to residents. The overwhelming majority of Oakland's elected officials have eschewed constituent services in favor of policymaking — recognizing that these two responsibilities are equally important and engaging to directly serve our community members is key. Since I served as a member of the OUSD LCAP committee, I've spent a plurality of my time working one-on-one with parents and students; whether it was connecting a staffer with their OUSD ombudsperson, helping appoint a young person to the LCAP committee or explaining the PE excuse and IEP rules to some of our parents, these services are invaluable to the individual Oaklanders we serve. As a board member, I would provide my contact information to the community and continue supporting and connecting our parents with the individual assistance they need.
Developing institutional memory within departments through teacher-to-teacher and staff-to-staff mentorship programs like the Paideia program at Oakland Tech is one step to increase recruitment and retention. Paideia is anchored by a strong set of well known educators who train newer teachers to join the program, and the administrators working with Paideia can support and advocate for these educators. By developing a strong community, well-developed lesson plans, and a supportive parent network that will advocate and fund the needs of these staff, Paideia has some of the highest retention in the district.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
See also
2024 Elections
External links
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Candidate Oakland Unified Board of Education District 1 |
Footnotes
- ↑ Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on October 7, 2024
