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Nicholas Alexander (Florida)
Nicholas Alexander ran for election to the School District of Lee County school board to represent District 6 in Florida. He lost in the general election on November 6, 2018.
Alexander completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2018. Click here to read the survey answers.
Elections
2018
General election
General election for School District of Lee County school board District 6
Betsy Vaughn defeated Nicholas Alexander in the general election for School District of Lee County school board District 6 on November 6, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | Betsy Vaughn (Nonpartisan) | 57.4 | 124,163 | |
 | Nicholas Alexander (Nonpartisan)  | 42.6 | 92,109 | |
| Total votes: 216,272 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Nonpartisan primary election
Nonpartisan primary for School District of Lee County school board District 6
Betsy Vaughn and Nicholas Alexander defeated Lori Fayhee and Karen Putman Watson in the primary for School District of Lee County school board District 6 on August 28, 2018.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | Betsy Vaughn (Nonpartisan) | 29.3 | 28,657 | |
| ✔ | | Nicholas Alexander (Nonpartisan) | 27.0 | 26,405 |
 | Lori Fayhee (Nonpartisan) | 23.0 | 22,497 | |
| Karen Putman Watson (Nonpartisan) | 20.8 | 20,403 | ||
| Total votes: 97,962 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Campaign themes
2018
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Nicholas Alexander completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Alexander's responses.
What would be your top three priorities, if elected?
1) Increasing safety across all public school campuses across the district 2) Reducing teacher attrition 3) Increasing the career readiness opportunities and overall graduation rate
What areas of public policy are you personally passionate about?
Governance, budget oversight and operational efficiency are the three areas that I will bring to the board based on my professional experience as a corporate executive in 4 different Fortune 500 companies
Who do you look up to? Whose example would you like to follow, and why?
I keep a personal board of directors who help me to craft and fine tune my personal ethos and ethical compass. The board includes business leaders, heath professionals and spirituals leaders.
What characteristics or principles are most important for an elected official?
Ethical behavior and personal accountability
What qualities do you possess that you believe would make you a successful officeholder?
Clarity of thought and purpose which allows me to collaborate with other leaders without reducing my independence of thought
What do you believe are the core responsibilities for someone elected to this office?
- Building bottom up budgets and driving inefficiency out of the educational enterprise - Providing policies and procedures aimed at increasing K-12 output - Collaboration with elected and community leaders to help shape the vision of the school district
What legacy would you like to leave?
One that is built upon transparent communication, truth and trust
What is the first historical event that happened in your lifetime that you remember? How old were you at the time?
September 11th, I worked and lived in New York and saw first hand the impact the attack had on our way of life
What is the primary job of a school board member in your view?
- Building bottom up budgets and driving inefficiency out of the educational enterprise - Providing policies and procedures aimed at increasing K-12 output - Collaboration with elected and community leaders to help shape the vision of the school district - Increaing community involvement through outreach
Who are your constituents?
All constituents across Lee County
How will you build relationships with members of the broader community? Which groups, organizations, stakeholders will you specifically target?
I would establish a county wide council to focus on early childhood reading and comprehension.
What will you do to build a better relationship with parents in the district? What plans do you have to be inclusive of parental involvement?
Implementing quarterly state-of-the-school-district sessions in various community centers would allow the board members to go the community to gain insight vs allowing for dialogue solely at board meetings
Do you believe it is important to intentionally recruit with the aim of diversifying the district’s faculty, staff, and administration? If so, what would be your policy to achieve this?
Having a diverse work force increases the depth of quality and effectiveness. Diversity can be encouraged but not forced - policies would need to established to guard against forced diversity
What issues get in the way of quality education? How would you address these obstacles?
The lack of diversity of thought and collaboration
What type of skills should students be learning for success in the 21st century?
Greater reading and comprehension, social interaction and collaboration skills
How might you improve the value of a high school diploma? What should a 21st century diploma reflect?
We must increase career readiness through investment in technical and craft training. This must include establishing better working relationships with local business leaders who can support apprenticeships and job placement
What strategies or plans would you advance to ensure the schools are properly funded?
1) Creating a budget from the bottom up that challenges efficiency and waste - capitalizing on my extensive experience in operational efficiency 2) Creating greater transparency around the future growth of the school district to help county and state elected officials understand and meet the increasing demands requiring capital and operational expense support
How might you support the mental health needs of students/faculty/staff?
Increasing number of mental health counselors in each school and working to educate the student, teacher and administrative population on the need to be empathetic
What role do you imagine technology playing in (and outside) the classroom in the future? How would you prepare the district for this?
Technology will continue to play a vital role in our schools and educational process. We must continue to refresh our technological resources to remain competitive
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
External links
Footnotes
