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Doug Paulson
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Doug Paulson represents the Trustee Area 1 seat on the Escondido Union School District school board in California. Paulson won the seat in the by-district general election on November 8, 2016.
Paulson participated in Ballotpedia's 2016 school board candidate survey. Click here to read his responses.
Elections
2016
Two of the five seats on the Escondido Union School District Board of Education were up for by-district general election on November 8, 2016. Neither incumbent filed to run for re-election, guaranteeing two newcomers joined the board. The race for the Trustee Area 1 seat featured candidates Giovanny Miranda and Doug Paulson. Mirek Gorny and Joe Muga ran for election to the Trustee Area 3 seat. Paulson and Muga won election to the board.[1][2]
Results
| Escondido Union School District, Trustee Area 1 General Election, 4-year term, 2016 |
||
|---|---|---|
| Candidate | Vote % | Votes |
 Doug Paulson |
70.83% | 3,150 |
| Giovanny Miranda | 29.17% | 1,297 |
| Total Votes | 4,447 | |
| Source: San Diego County Registrar of Voters, "Presidential General Election - Tuesday, November 8, 2016," accessed December 9, 2016 | ||
Funding
Paulson reported $7,730.00 in contributions and $7,639.09 in expenditures to the San Diego County Registrar of Voters, which left his campaign with $90.91 on hand in the election.[3]
Endorsements
Paulson was endorsed by the San Diego County Democratic Party.[4]
Campaign themes
2016
Ballotpedia survey responses
Douglas Paulson 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 October 23, 2016:
| “ | If elected, I hope to bring the board and community together to ensure that every student and family receives the educational support they need to be successful.[5][6] | ” |
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 California. |
| Education on the ballot |
| Issue importance ranking | |
|---|---|
| Candidate's ranking | Issue |
| Closing the achievement gap | |
| Expanding arts education | |
| Improving education for special needs students | |
| Improving post-secondary readiness | |
| Balancing or maintaining the district's budget | |
| Improving relations with teachers | |
| Expanding school choice options | |
| “ | All of these are important, and all of them work together to increase post-secondary readiness,especially closing the achievement gap and expanding arts and music education. Clearly, providing a high quality, rigorous education for special needs students is a requirement, not a prioritizable option.[6] | ” |
| —Douglas Paulson (October 23, 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. This is really not a "Yes" or "No" question. Local school boards are required to approve Charters if the Charter demonstrates that they have a legitimate educational paradigm and plan, adequate financial oversight, and a reasonable probability of success. At this time, there are so many charter schools operating in Escondido without any oversight from their authorizing districts that the need for more is highly questionable. In any case, Charter schools must reflect the local community and provide some educational option different from that offered by the local district, and must receive complete and rigorous oversight from the authorizing district. |
| 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 can be one element of an overarching metric to determine student achievement. However, one standardized test cannot be a stand-alone determiner of student success. |
| What is your stance on the Common Core State Standards Initiative? |
| The concept of having some common curriculum and educational goals across the nation is a good idea. However, there must be regional variation to take different community standards and needs into account. The idea of incorporating both college and career standards into the school curriculum is a good one. However, these standards need to be rolled out over a number of years, not started instantly thinking that students can change their entire educational understanding with no transition time. |
| 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. In dealing with underperforming teachers we must follow the law and the teacher's union contract. The most important part of this ongoing problem is to recognize when there is a problem and to take decisive action to resolve the problem. |
| Should teachers receive merit pay? |
| No. Merit pay, in whatever form, generally favors teachers who already work with high performing, low needs students. |
| Should the state give money to private schools through a voucher system or scholarship program? |
| No. |
| How should expulsion be used in the district? |
| Expulsion should only be used in extreme cases in which the safety and education of other students is threatened by the continued presence of the student. |
| What's the most important factor for success in the classroom: student-teacher ratio, the curriculum, teachers, parent involvement or school administration? |
| Teachers |
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Doug Paulson Escondido Union School District. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ San Diego County Registrar of Voters, "Candidate List: 2016 General Election," accessed August 19, 2016
- ↑ San Diego County, "General Election - Tuesday, November 8, 2016," accessed November 9, 2016
- ↑ San Diego County Registrar of Voters, "CampaignDocs eRetrieval: Search by Candidate's Last Name," accessed February 15, 2017
- ↑ San Diego County Democratic Party, "Democratic Candidates 2016," accessed October 13, 2016
- ↑ Ballotpedia School Board Candidate Survey, 2016, "Douglas Paulson's responses," October 23, 2016
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
| 2016 Escondido Union School District Elections | |
| San Diego County, California | |
| Election date: | November 8, 2016 |
| Candidates: | Trustee Area 1: • Giovanny Miranda • Doug Paulson Trustee Area 3: • Mirek Gorny • Joe Muga |
| Important information: | What was at stake? • Additional elections on the ballot • Key deadlines |
