Brenda Warren (Wisconsin)
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Brenda Warren is an at-large incumbent on the Green Bay Board of Education in Wisconsin. She was first elected in 2004. Warren won re-election to her seat in the general election on April 5, 2016.[1]
Warren completed the 2016 Ballotpedia candidate survey. Click here to see her answers.
Biography
Email editor@ballotpedia.org to notify us of updates to this biography.
Warren is a retired pediatrician, who now spends her time volunteering in the Green Bay community. She completed her Ph.D. in educational leadership at Cardinal Stritch University in 2018. She and her husband, John, have three children.[2][3]
Elections
2016
Three of the seven seats on the Green Bay Area Public School District school board were up for general election on April 5, 2016. Members were elected at-large. The three incumbents -Celestine Jeffreys, Brenda Warren and Chris Wagner- ran for re-election to their seats. They faced challenger Julie Jansch in the general election. Jansch, Warren, and Wagner were elected to the three seats.[1]
Results
| Green Bay Area Public School District, At-Large General Election, 3-year terms, 2016 |
||
|---|---|---|
| Candidate | Vote % | Votes |
 Brenda Warren Incumbent |
27.66% | 17,547 |
| Chris Wagner |
25.82% | 16,380 |
| Julie Jansch |
23.67% | 15,014 |
| Celestine Jeffreys Incumbent | 22.13% | 14,039 |
| Write-in votes | 0.73% | 463 |
| Total Votes (100) | 63,443 | |
| Source: Brown County, "Summary Report Brown County Official Results," accessed May 18, 2016 | ||
Funding
Warren reported no contributions or expenditures to the Green Bay City Clerk's Office in the election.[4] Any candidate spending or receiving less than $2,000 was not required to file a campaign finance report.[5]
Endorsements
Warren did not receive any official endorsements during the election.
2013
| Green Bay Area Public School District, At-large General Election, 3-year term, 2013 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Nonpartisan | Chris Wagner Incumbent |
33.7% | 7,285 | |
| Nonpartisan | Brenda Warren Incumbent |
33.6% | 7,265 | |
| Nonpartisan | Celestine Jeffreys Incumbent |
31.9% | 6,896 | |
| Nonpartisan | Write-in votes | 0.7% | 162 | |
| Total Votes | 21,608 | |||
| Source: Brown County Clerk, "Official 2013 Election Results," accessed September 24, 2014 | ||||
2010
| Green Bay Area Public School District, At-large General Election, 3-year term, 2010 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Nonpartisan | Brenda Warren Incumbent |
29% | 11,102 | |
| Nonpartisan | Chris Wagner |
27.6% | 10,558 | |
| Nonpartisan | Celestine Jeffreys |
24.5% | 9,372 | |
| Nonpartisan | Elliot Christenson | 18.5% | 7,077 | |
| Nonpartisan | Write-in votes | 0.3% | 126 | |
| Total Votes | 38,235 | |||
| Source: Brown County Clerk, "Official 2010 Election Results," accessed September 24, 2014 | ||||
2007
| Green Bay Area Public School District, At-large General Election, 3-year term, 2007 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Nonpartisan | Andrew Becker Incumbent |
26.9% | 12,280 | |
| Nonpartisan | Brenda Warren Incumbent |
25.4% | 11,572 | |
| Nonpartisan | Linda McKeag |
24% | 10,933 | |
| Nonpartisan | Steven Terrien | 23.5% | 10,742 | |
| Nonpartisan | Write-in votes | 0.2% | 100 | |
| Total Votes | 45,627 | |||
| Source: Brown County Clerk, "Official 2007 Election Results," accessed September 24, 2014 | ||||
2004
| Green Bay Area Public School District, At-large General Election, 3-year term, 2004 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Nonpartisan | Brenda Warren |
20.8% | 7,640 | |
| Nonpartisan | Dotty Juengst Incumbent |
19.4% | 7,134 | |
| Nonpartisan | Andrew Becker Incumbent |
18.9% | 6,936 | |
| Nonpartisan | William F. McIntyre Incumbent | 15.2% | 5,601 | |
| Nonpartisan | Steven Terrien | 13.9% | 5,100 | |
| Nonpartisan | Sid Vineburg | 11.7% | 4,294 | |
| Nonpartisan | Write-in candidate | 0.1% | 39 | |
| Nonpartisan | Write-in candidate | 0% | 9 | |
| Nonpartisan | Write-in candidate | 0% | 9 | |
| Total Votes | 36,762 | |||
| Source: Brown County Clerk, "Official 2004 Election Results," accessed September 24, 2014 | ||||
Campaign themes
2016
Candidate survey
Ballotpedia survey responses
Brenda Warren participated in Ballotpedia's 2016 survey of school board candidates. In response to the question "What do you hope to achieve if elected to the school board?" the candidate stated on February 21, 2016:
| “ | I have been on the school board for 12 years, and my focus has always been to provide an excellent education for all our students so that they can all reach their highest potential. I also have a particular interest in improving reading achievement. This is all very challenging work, especially as our students' needs have changed and increased. However, it is very important work if our communities are to remain healthy and vibrant places to live. Student success will continue to be my number one priority. Another one of my goals is to help people in our state including our state government officials better understand the challenges we face in public education. In our district we work very hard to meet not only the academic needs but social and emotional needs that can get in the way of learning. We are committed to providing an excellent education to every child, every day. Students in private schools generally do not come to school with the same degree of challenges as we see in our public schools. Comparing public schools to private schools is absolutely not an apples to apples comparison and is therefore neither a fair nor an appropriate comparison. We must not give up on our public schools and we must not privatize education! Everyone in the state should commit to assuring that public schools have the essential resources needed to provide support for all our students, many who are arriving with significantly more challenges than in the past. We must also realize the dedication our teachers have to our students and how hard they work. We must value our public education teachers not denigrate them. Teaching is a very noble profession and one that is critical to the health of our economy and democracy. Our public school students are our future.[6][7] | ” |
Ranking the issues
The candidate was asked to rank the following issues based on how they should be prioritized by the school board, with 1 being the most important and 7 being the least important. Each ranking could only be used once.
| Education policy |
|---|
 |
Click here to learn more about education policy in Wisconsin. |
| Education on the ballot |
| Issue importance ranking | |
|---|---|
| Candidate's ranking | Issue |
| Closing the achievement gap | |
| Improving education for special needs students | |
| Improving post-secondary readiness | |
| Improving relations with teachers | |
| Expanding arts education | |
| Balancing or maintaining the district's budget | |
| Expanding school choice options | |
| “ | Our primary job as a school board is, first and foremost, to assure student success. Our students are all unique and each has a different path to success. Therefore, it is paramount that we continue to empower students to find their unique path. In some cases that means providing more challenging college-level courses; in others it means providing more hands-on learning experiences where students earn technical college credit; in other cases it means providing children with basic needs and emotional care so that they can focus on their learning. Since each student's situation is different, the above ranking of my priorities as a school board member does not do justice to the work that I (and our board) do. I ranked “balancing or maintaining the district's budget” low because that is an automatic expectation and not something to give weight to on a priority list.[7] | ” |
| —Brenda Warren (February 21, 2016) | ||
Positions on the issues
The candidate was asked to answer nine questions from Ballotpedia regarding significant issues in education and the school district. The questions are highlighted in blue and followed by the candidate's responses. Some questions provided multiple choices, which are noted after those questions. The candidate was also provided space to elaborate on their answers to the multiple choice questions.
| Should new charter schools be approved in your district? (Not all school boards are empowered to approve charter schools. In those cases, the candidate was directed to answer the question as if the school board were able to do so.) |
|---|
| No Answer. Charter schools that are an instrumentality of the school district can be a great option for students who need a non-traditional learning environment. In an instrumentality charter school the district sets the standards and policies for the school and holds the school accountable. It is important to note here the differences in how public or private charter schools are held accountable by the state. Public charter schools are held to the same state accountability standards as all other public schools but private charter schools are not held to those same standards. In addition, the motives of some private charter school operators are purely for profit. In Wisconsin there have been voucher and charter school operators that left the state with taxpayer money leaving children stranded in the middle of the school year scrambling to find a new school.
Our Green Bay school district has one charter school which is a project-based learning high school (John Dewey Academy of Learning). Over time we have found that we can provide non-traditional learning environments without necessarily creating a charter school which is the direction we are taking. |
| Which statement best describes the ideal relationship between the state government and the school board? The state should always defer to school board decisions, defer to school board decisions in most cases, be involved in the district routinely or only intervene in severe cases of misconduct or mismanagement. |
| The state should defer to school board decisions in most cases. |
| Are standardized tests an accurate metric of student achievement? |
| No. Standardized tests cannot accurately measure every student's level of achievement due to many factors such as test anxiety, other sources of anxiety, lack of cultural sensitivity with test questions, students not proficient in English, etc. A student's level of achievement should be measured through multiple assessments. The best assessments are those given by the teacher that not only measure achievement but help the teacher plan for future instruction. However, with that said, I think one good thing No Child Left Behind did was to require schools to disaggregate their achievement data so that more attention would be placed on those students with an achievement gap. |
| What is your stance on the Common Core State Standards Initiative? |
| Although not perfect, I think the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) are much better than the Wisconsin Standards we had been using up to this point. I think it is important to consider the CCSS on its own merit and separate an assessment of the standards from the state testing controversies which is an entirely different discussion. It is also critical to realize that the standards do not dictate the curriculum. Each district has the freedom to determine what curriculum they will use so that their students will meet the standards. Unfortunately, because of these two controversies (testing and curriculum), some have developed hostile feelings toward the standards. In reading just the standards themselves, one would find
that they are standards we would all want our own children to meet. |
| How should the district handle underperforming teachers? Terminate their contract before any damage is done to students, offer additional training options, put them on a probationary period while they seek to improve or set up a mentorship program for the underperforming teacher with a more experienced teacher in the district? |
| Terminate their contract before any damage is done to students. Offer additional training options. Put them on a probationary period while they seek to improve. Set up a mentorship program for the underperforming teacher with a more experienced teacher in the district. All of the above answers are good options depending on the degree to which a teacher is underperforming and how well they respond to coaching, training, mentoring, etc.. How we handle underperforming teachers is very much on a case by case basis. |
| Should teachers receive merit pay? |
| No. I do think excellent teachers should be rewarded. However, it is very difficult to create a fair merit pay system when not all teachers have the same students with regard to demographics and needs. At this point, taking the extensive amount of time it would take to create such a system is not high on my priority list. |
| Should the state give money to private schools through a voucher system or scholarship program? |
| No. The voucher program has taken money from our public school students. The state should not be in the business of funding a completely second school system. In Wisconsin, 82% of students in the statewide voucher program were not public school students. Therefore, the state has now essentially taken on funding a whole new group of students. It is essentially a tax-payer funded private school scholarship program for schools with no strings attached. The voucher schools are not held to the same accountability standards as public schools and don't have to abide by open meeting laws. They take taxpayer money and don't have to inform taxpayers how they are spending that money. In addition, our state legislature has proposed bills that require public schools to take money out of their budget for their own public school students to pay for students that are not and have never been in their schools. |
| How should expulsion be used in the district? |
| Expulsion should be used for students who have committed an offense that has endangered the health and safety of other students and staff in that school. |
| What's the most important factor for success in the classroom: student-teacher ratio, the curriculum, teachers, parent involvement or school administration? |
| Teachers There is no question in my mind that excellent teachers are the most critical requirement for student achievement. Excellent school leadership is the next most important factor. Although parent involvement is nice and certainly helps a student achieve, schools cannot always control this. It is important that we focus on what we can control and not use the lack of parent involvement as an excuse. Also, we need to redefine what parent involvement looks like and help those families who cannot be in schools during the day understand the ways they can be involved at home with helping and supporting their own children. |
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms 'Brenda Warren' 'Green Bay Area Public School District'. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
- Green Bay Area Public School District, Wisconsin
- Green Bay Area Public School District elections (2014)
- Green Bay Area Public School District elections (2015)
- Green Bay Area Public School District elections (2016)
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Green Bay, Wisconsin, "Candidates 2016," accessed January 12, 2016
- ↑ [Ballotpedia email exchange with John Warren, January 29, 2019]
- ↑ Green Bay Area Public School District, "Brenda Warren," accessed September 24, 2014
- ↑ Tiffany Rouse, "Email correspondence with Green Bay City Clerk Kris Teske," March 29, 2016
- ↑ Wisconsin State Legislature, "Campaign Financing," accessed January 25, 2016
- ↑ Ballotpedia School Board Candidate Survey, 2016, "Brenda Warren's responses," February 21, 2016
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
| 2016 Green Bay Area Public School District Elections | |
| Brown County, Wisconsin | |
| Election date: | April 5, 2016 |
| Candidates: | Incumbent, Celestine Jeffreys • Incumbent, Chris Wagner • Incumbent, Brenda Warren • Julie Jansch |
| Important information: | What was at stake? • Key deadlines • Additional measures on the ballot |
