Brad Banks
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Brad Banks is an at-large member of the Oswego Community Unit School District 308 Board of Education in Illinois. He was first elected to the board in the general election on April 7, 2015.[1][2][3]
Biography
Banks joined the U.S. Marine Corps when he was 18 years old, and he still serves in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves as a gunnery sergeant and data systems chief. He also works as a business development manager for EMC Corporation. Banks has coached baseball and football and volunteers at the Hunt Club School coordinating an after school running program. He earned his bachelor's degree in management and marketing from Park University. He and his wife have three children, two sons and a daughter.[4][5]
Elections
2015
Three of the seven at-large seats on the Oswego Community Unit School District 308 Board of Education were up for general election on April 7, 2015. The seats held by incumbents Bill Walsh, Alison Swanson and Brent Lightfoot were on the ballot. Though he originally filed to run for re-election, Walsh withdrew his candidacy due to a mistake on his petition. Swanson and Lightfoot ran against challengers Brad Banks, Lauri Doyle, Kevin Harris and Jared Ploger. Newcomers Banks, Doyle and Ploger won the three seats.
Results
| Oswego Community Unit School District 308, At-Large General Election, 4-year term, 2015 |
||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Nonpartisan |  Brad Banks |
22.7% | 2,958 | |
| Nonpartisan | Lauri Doyle |
21.9% | 2,857 | |
| Nonpartisan | Jared Ploger |
18.9% | 2,470 | |
| Nonpartisan | Alison Swanson Incumbent | 14.3% | 1,871 | |
| Nonpartisan | Brent Lightfoot Incumbent | 10.5% | 1,371 | |
| Nonpartisan | Kevin Harris | 10.3% | 1,350 | |
| Nonpartisan | Write-in votes | 1.4% | 177 | |
| Total Votes | 13,054 | |||
| Source: Kendall County Clerk, "Consolidated Election April 7, 2015," accessed April 28, 2015, Will County Clerk, "April 7, 2015 Consolidated Election: Results," accessed April 28, 2015, Kane County Clerk, "2015 Consolidated Election Contest Results," accessed April 28, 2015 | ||||
Funding
School board candidates in Illinois are only required to file campaign finance reports if they accept contributions or make expenditures in excess of $5,000 in a 12-month period.[6]
Banks reported no contributions or expenditures to the Illinois State Board of Elections in this election.[7]
Endorsements
Banks did not receive any official endorsements for this election.
Campaign themes
2015
Banks highlighted the following issues on his campaign website:
| “ | Administrators' Compensation
Brad believes District 308 residents are overpaying Superintendent Matthew Wendt and other key administrators, who receive hefty bonuses for meeting yearly “goals.” While Brad is not opposed to merit pay, he feels that many of the so-called goals should be considered part of the job. This year, Dr. Wendt is slated to receive a bonus of $27,500 on top of his yearly $225,000 base salary for meeting goals such as evaluating the district’s kindergarten program, making sure the district has enough operating cash, and setting up a task force to improve programming for gifted students. The bonuses are outlined in Dr. Wendt’s 5-year contract extension approved this year by the school board. In the second year, Dr. Wendt’s bonus will be $32,500; the following year it will be $37,500; the fourth year, $42,500 and in the fifth year, Dr. Wendt’s bonus will be $47,500. Brad believes this is out of line with surrounding school districts. Teachers' Compensation Brad is concerned the pay offered to Oswego teachers is too low for our community to be competitive with surrounding districts. He firmly believes that pay for teachers should be “competitive,” while pay for district-level administrators should be “comparative.” As a manager in the business world, Brad is a firm believer in slightly overpaying those who work on the front lines. His personal practice is to give new employees 10 percent more than what they were making previously. The idea is for employees to be able to concentrate on their jobs without worrying about how they are going to take care of their families. In the education world, according to Brad, the front-line people are our teachers. “We pay a lot of money in property taxes to live in this district,” Brad said. “I want my children’s teachers taken care of, so that they can concentrate on educating, nurturing and inspiring the next generation.” Brad is concerned about the difficulty the district experienced last spring and summer in filling vacant teaching positions. Several parents attended a school board meeting in August to express concern that vacancies had not been filled for classroom positions. At Plank Junior High, U.S. and World History courses for Dual Language students were canceled a week before school started, because the district was unable to find qualified instructors for positions that were posted in February. Communication Lack of two-way communication is a growing problem in District 308, where administrators and board members largely ignore the input of parents and teachers. The decision to pull out of the Special Education Cooperative is a prime example. No plan for educating the district’s most challenged learners was made public prior to the decision. The district did not even meet with worried parents until after the fact. Our partners – the other school districts participating in the cooperative -- were put in such a bad position that ultimately the district was forced to postpone taking any action for a year. The on-going Dual Language issue is another example where the concerns of parents and teachers are ignored. The district has operated a two-way immersion program – the gold standard for helping English Learners succeed in school – for a decade. Last winter, with no warning, the former program director called teachers into a meeting and announced the model would be changed to something less effective. The program director sent an email to parents inviting them to discuss the changes at the Bilingual Parents Advisory Council meeting. At the last minute, the Assistant Superintendent for Teaching and Learning decided to attend as well. During the meeting, which was packed with angry parents, the director denied that teachers had been given this mandate and even pretended not to know about the email. Parents in the audience then pulled out their cell phones to show the email to the assistant superintendent, who neither confirmed nor denied that the mandate was given.[8] |
” |
| —Brad Banks' campaign website (2015)[9] | ||
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Brad Banks Oswego Community Unit School District 308. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
- Oswego Community Unit School District 308, Illinois
- Oswego Community Unit School District 308 elections (2015)
- Hot tub Gatorade, turnout in Peoria and the Wisconsin state budget... (April 8, 2015)
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Kendall County Clerk, "Consolidated Election April 7, 2015: Unofficial," accessed April 7, 2015
- ↑ Will County Clerk, "April 7, 2015 Consolidated Election: Unofficial Results," accessed April 9, 2015
- ↑ Kane County Clerk, "2015 Consolidated Election Contest Results," accessed April 9, 2015
- ↑ Bradley Banks for District 308 School Board, "Meet the Banks," accessed March 26, 2015
- ↑ Only Oswego, "Oswego Election 2015: Brad Banks, Candidate for School District 308 Board," March 17, 2015
- ↑ Illinois State Board of Elections, "A Guide to Campaign Disclosure," accessed March 31, 2015
- ↑ Illinois State Board of Elections, "Candidate Disclosure Search," accessed April 3, 2015
- ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ Bradley Banks for District 308 School Board, "Platform," accessed March 26, 2015
| 2015 Oswego Community Unit School District 308 Elections | |
| Kendall County, Illinois | |
| Election date: | April 7, 2015 |
| Candidates: | At-large: • Incumbent, Brent Lightfoot • Incumbent, Alison Swanson • Brad Banks • Lauri Doyle • Kevin Harris • Jared Ploger |
| Important information: | Key deadlines • Additional elections on the ballot |
