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Joshua Bastian
Joshua Bastian was a candidate for District 3 representative on the Adams 12 Five Star Schools school board in Colorado. Bastian was defeated in the at-large general election on November 7, 2017.
Bastian participated in Ballotpedia's 2017 school board candidate survey. Click here to read his responses.
Biography
Bastian graduated with a B.S. in business administration with an emphasis in accounting and a minor in history from Colorado State University. His work experience includes serving as an accountant and internal auditor for the Colorado Department of Natural Resources.[1]
Elections
2017
Two of the five seats on the Adams 12 Five Star Schools Board of Education in Colorado were up for nonpartisan general election on November 7, 2017. In her bid for re-election to the District 3 seat, incumbent Kathy Plomer defeated challenger Joshua Bastian. District 4 incumbent Brian Batz ran unopposed and won re-election.[2][3]
Results
| Adams 12 Five Star Schools, District 3 General Election, 4-year term, 2017 |
||
|---|---|---|
| Candidate | Vote % | Votes |
 Kathy Plomer Incumbent |
69.18% | 23,164 |
| Joshua Bastian | 30.82% | 10,318 |
| Total Votes | 33,482 | |
| Source: Adams County Election Results, "Official Results," accessed August 28, 2023 and Broomfield County Election Results, "Official Results," accessed August 28, 2023 | ||
Funding
Bastian reported $956.48 in contributions and $791.48 in expenditures to the Colorado Secretary of State, which left his campaign with $165.00 on hand in the election.[4]
2013
Bastian and fellow newcomers Debbie Christensen and David Elliott lost to Kathy Plomer for the District 3 seat on the Adams 12 school board up for election on November 5, 2013.
Results
| Adams 12 Five Star Schools, District 3 General Election, 4-year term, 2013 |
||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Nonpartisan | Kathy Plomer |
38% | 11,361 | |
| Nonpartisan | Debbie Christensen | 37.9% | 11,333 | |
| Nonpartisan | David Elliott | 14% | 4,183 | |
| Nonpartisan | Joshua Bastian | 10% | 2,993 | |
| Total Votes | 29,870 | |||
| Source: Adams County, Colorado, "Election Summary Report," November 19, 2013 | ||||
Funding
Bastian reported $1,470.00 in contributions and $1,451.86 in expenditures to the Colorado Secretary of State, which left his campaign with $18.14 on hand in the election.[5]
Endorsements
Ballotpedia did not identify any official endorsements for Bastian in the election.
Campaign themes
2017
Ballotpedia survey responses
Joshua Bastian participated in Ballotpedia's 2017 survey of school board candidates.[6] In response to the question "What do you hope to achieve if elected to the school board?" the candidate stated on October 11, 2017:
| “ | Education is tremendously important to the future of our community and nation. I will work to ensure that the district is providing an excellent education for all of our students. I will work to ensure that the district is the premier district within the state. This will occur by building a community expectation of diverse and exceptional educational opportunities for all our students. It means setting high standards in all that we do and achieving them regularly. Every student can succeed and the expectation of the school board and community should always be that they will succeed.[7][8] | ” |
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 Colorado. |
| Education on the ballot |
| Issue importance ranking | |
|---|---|
| Candidate's ranking | Issue |
| Improving post-secondary readiness | |
| Balancing or maintaining the district's budget | |
| Expanding school choice options | |
| Closing the achievement gap | |
| Improving education for special needs students | |
| Improving relations with teachers | |
| Expanding arts education | |
| “ | These areas of focus do not match up well with the needs and concerns of the school district. The districts biggest issues will be around growth and continually improving the level of education provided to all of our students.[8] | ” |
| —Joshua Bastian (October 11, 2017) | ||
Positions on the issues
The candidate was asked to answer eight 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.) |
|---|
| Yes. Charter schools that are well designed and fit a need within the district, that have a solid financial plan and support within the community are welcome to apply to the district for a charter at any time. Not just any charter school should be approved by the district. I would expect a thought out plan be presented to our District Accountability Committee and District staff and a dialogue to take place prior to any approval process being brought to the school board. |
| 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? |
| Yes. Standardized tests are one measure that helps determine student achievement. What they specifically measure depends on the standardized test. Each test has areas of content that it does measure and areas of content that it does not measure. Trying to utilize a standardized test outside the purpose for which it is intended is a misuse of that test. |
| 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? |
| Offer additional training options. 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. |
| Should teachers receive merit pay? |
| Yes. Teachers should be paid a certain amount of their salary as a base that every teacher gets. At that point the district should have the ability to increase pay for specified teachers in two ways. 1. Base building pay increases - These could be for things like additional qualifications, additional certifications, Ability to teach multiple subject areas or levels, higher ratings on teacher evaluations, exceeding performance objectives etc. These could be tailored to the specific needs of the district. A district with a need in Title 1 schools could tailor their base building pay increases to encourage teachers to move to the schools that need the most assistance. A district with other needs could then tailor their merit pay to their particular needs. 2. One time payments - These would be for things like coaching a sport, sponsoring a club, leadership positions within the school, rewards for ideas that save the district money, rewards for receiving specified honors like teacher of the year. |
| Should the state give money to private schools through a voucher system or scholarship program? |
| Yes. In the theoretical realm I have no problem with money going to private schools through a voucher or scholarship program. In the real world I have yet to see a good working model that safeguards public money and ensures adequate educational results. I completely oppose tax credit or deduction schemes to try and get to voucher light approach. These sorts of schemes are ripe for abusing the tax code and provide minimal if any help where it would actually be needed. Safeguards that would be needed on any voucher or scholarship program 1. The school receiving the money would be required to comply with all state required tests/assessments and publish the results like any other public school. 2. Audits by an independent auditor would be required annually 3. Assurance via performance audit that government money intended for education was not being spent on non educational areas. 4. |
| How should expulsion be used in the district? |
| Expulsion should be used as one of a series of tools in dealing with severe disciplinary action. Typically it would only be used for severe or repeated cases of classroom disruption and/or use of violence by the student. |
| What's the most important factor for success in the classroom: student-teacher ratio, the curriculum, teachers, parent involvement or school administration? |
| Parent involvement. All of the factors but student teacher ratio are extremely important to success in the classroom. The least important factor is student teacher ratio due to constraints imposed by the budget, building space available, and teachers available. Each of the other factors are all present in highly functioning schools. High quality teachers working with highly involved parents using a well designed curriculum is recipe for successfully educating students consistently year after year. |
2013
In response to a candidate survey, Bastian provided the following two priorities of his campaign:[9]
| “ | I have two primary goals. I would like to continue to improve the quality of education within Adams 12 to the point that it can be considered the premier district within the state. I will fix the budget issues that have plagued the district for the past few years.[8] | ” |
| —Joshua Bastian (2013)[9] | ||
In the same survey, Bastian also stated that the following was the largest issue confronting the school district:[9]
| “ | The top issue that will be facing Adams 12 in 5 years unless it has been addressed before then will be fixing the budget. A constant yo-yo effect in the budget adversely affects students and staff. It needlessly decreases the confidence of the general public in Adams 12. To address this issue I will implement system of controls to moderate this effect in both good and bad years. That will allow the board and the administration to focus on improving the educational quality in Adams 12.[8] | ” |
| —Joshua Bastian (2013)[9] | ||
On his campaign website, Bastian outlined the reasons behind his opposition of Amendment 66:
| “ |
1. The money cannot all end up in the classroom (legally). At least $381 million must end up in administration costs. 2. CEA wants the money but does not want the strings that come attached. This should be a package deal. If the CEA wants the money it should be required to follow the spending requirements on that money. Why would CEA support a law only to try and change it immediately after passage? I refuse to support a bait and switch scheme. 3. Other tax increases will be required to access the tax increase being voted on in this amendment[8] |
” |
| —Joshua Bastian (2013)[10] | ||
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Joshua Bastian Adams 12 Five Star Schools school board. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
- Adams 12 Five Star Schools, Colorado
- Adams 12 Five Star Schools elections (2017)
- Adams 12 Five Star Schools elections (2013)
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Josh Bastian for Adams 12 School Board, "Candidate Information," accessed October 7, 2013 (dead link) (dead link)
- ↑ Adams 12 Five Star Schools, "Adams 12 School Board Election," accessed September 11, 2017
- ↑ Adams County Election Results, "Unofficial Results," accessed November 7, 2017 These election results are unofficial and will be updated after official vote totals are made available.
- ↑ Colorado Secretary of State, "TRACER: Candidate Search," accessed December 11, 2017
- ↑ Colorado TRACER, "Candidate Detail," accessed December 20, 2013
- ↑ Note: The candidate's answers have been reproduced here verbatim without edits or corrections by Ballotpedia.
- ↑ Ballotpedia School Board Candidate Survey, 2017, "Joshua Bastian's responses," October 11, 2017
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 9.3 Adams 12 Five Star Schools, "Joshua Bastian," accessed September 19, 2013
- ↑ Josh Bastian for Adams 12 School Board, "On the issues," accessed November 4, 2013 (dead link) (dead link)
| Adams 12 Five Star Schools elections in 2017 | |
| Adams County, Colorado | |
| Election date: | November 7, 2017 |
| Candidates: | District 3: • Incumbent, Kathy Plomer • Joshua Bastian District 4: • Incumbent, Brian Batz |
| Important information: | What was at stake? • Additional elections on the ballot • Key deadlines |
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