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Ruth Wood
From Ballotpedia
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Tenure
Present officeholder
Term ends
2026
Ruth Wood is an at-large member of the Goddard Unified School District 265 school board in Kansas. Her current term ends on January 12, 2026.
Wood is running for re-election for an at-large seat of the Goddard Unified School District 265 school board in Kansas. She is on the ballot in the general election on November 4, 2025. The primary for this office on August 5, 2025, was canceled.
Wood completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2025. Click here to read the survey answers.
Biography
Ruth Wood was born in McAlester, Oklahoma. She graduated from Wichita Southeast High School. She earned a bachelor's degree from Wichita State University in 1972 and a graduate degree from the same institution in 1977. Her career experience includes working as an educator and administrator. Wood has been affiliated with the Kansas National Education Association, National Education Association, United School Administrators, and Goddard Women’s Club.[1]
Elections
2025
See also: Goddard Unified School District 265, Kansas, elections (2025)
General election
General election for Goddard Unified School District 265 school board At-large (3 seats)
The following candidates are running in the general election for Goddard Unified School District 265 school board At-large on November 4, 2025.
Candidate | ||
Ruth Wood (Nonpartisan)  | ||
 | Shane Ewing (Nonpartisan) | |
| Melanie Graber (Nonpartisan) | ||
 | Nathan Hunter (Nonpartisan) | |
| Todd Roberts (Nonpartisan) | ||
| Lindsay White (Nonpartisan) | ||
| Rachael Wyeth (Nonpartisan) | ||
| ||||
| = 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. | ||||
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Nonpartisan primary election
The primary election was canceled.
Endorsements
Ballotpedia is gathering information about candidate endorsements. To send us an endorsement, click here.
2021
See also: Goddard USD 265, Kansas, elections (2021)
General election
General election for Goddard Unified School District 265 school board At-large (3 seats)
The following candidates ran in the general election for Goddard Unified School District 265 school board At-large on November 2, 2021.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | Ginger Rose (Nonpartisan) | 17.8 | 1,258 | |
| ✔ | Ruth Wood (Nonpartisan) | 16.3 | 1,151 | |
| ✔ | Mark Richards (Nonpartisan) | 15.7 | 1,109 | |
| Kevin McWhorter (Nonpartisan) | 14.9 | 1,053 | ||
| Amanda Vrana (Nonpartisan) (Write-in) | 12.3 | 870 | ||
| Rachel Murphy (Nonpartisan) (Write-in) | 12.1 | 854 | ||
| Shane Dent (Nonpartisan) | 5.8 | 408 | ||
| Jon Weakley (Nonpartisan) | 4.0 | 281 | ||
| Other/Write-in votes | 1.2 | 88 | ||
| Total votes: 7,072 | |||
| = 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
The primary election was canceled.
Campaign themes
2025
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Ruth Wood completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2025. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Wood's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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I graduated from Wichita Southeast High School. I have a BA and 2 Master’s Degrees in Education from Wichita State University. All of my career in education has been in the Goddard School District. During that tenure I taught social studies and physical education at the middle level. The last 11 years of my career I was an elementary principal. I was also an officer in the Goddard Education Association which allowed me to work with teachers at all levels. These positions also allowed me to have a teacher and administrative perspective for both elementary and secondary levels. I retired after working in the district for 39 years. I am now in my 12th. year on the board. All of these positions have given me experience in curriculum, special education, budgeting/bonds, facilities, school improvement, negotiations and working with a variety of people. These are experiences that I feel make me a better BOE member.
- Addressing district growth has to be a priority. Unfortunately, a bond we proposed this May did not pass. The board and district administration need to study this failure and determine what changes need to be made to hopefully have a successful bond in a future election. One area to be studied could be a determination of why people voted no or didn't vote at all. In the meantime, we have to determine how facilities and resources may need to be shared. This can be difficult when monies are limited.
- Our District Mission is to educate our students for lifelong success. We need to address the needs of the “whole” child. Our staff needs to be trained to address the various ways students learn. The staff doesn't just present information, they equip the student to seek out information and to be a problem solver. We need to address not just their academic needs, but physical, emotional and social needs as well. All of these areas affect the learning of the child. Training needs to give staff members the “tools in their toolbox” to address those needs. It has to be continuous training with time for follow up and support.
- I believe our staff is our greatest strength. I know we have a staff that tries to do what is “best for kids” on a daily basis. You can have the best facilities and resources, but it won't help our students succeed if we don't have the best people working in the district. You can’t just hire the best people, you have to retain them. You need to ascertain their strengths and put them in the best position for those strengths to be utilized. As stated before, you must provide training and support to help address any weaknesses. Besides training, to retain our staff, we must also provide salaries and benefits that allow us to compete with other districts.
Funding from state and federal levels provides the monies needed to address the needs of our students. These monies are limited and should not be taken from public schools to fund vouchers/scholarships for private schools. This is a direct assault on our public school system. Our public schools are the backbone of our country. An educated public is what keeps our society at its best. Nothing in our state constitution says the legislature should be providing monies for private schools. The private schools do not deserve these monies when they are not held to the same state accountabilities as our public schools. A private school is not required to provide services to ALL students. They can choose not to enroll a special needs student
First of all, they must serve with integrity and honesty. They should be sure they are representing the needs of all their constituents. Not just one sector of their population. It is critical that they have not chosen to serve because they have a hidden agenda or an axe to grind. .
My responsibility is to work with the other board members and superintendent to set policies that are going to best address the goals of our district. We also have the responsibility to hire and evaluate the superintendent. It is not our responsibility to try to micro-manage the various areas of theAs district..
The assassination of President Kennedy. I was in the 8th grade and remember the Principal coming on the intercom, telling us what happened and sending us home. I remember being glued to the tv for 3 days watching all the activities, including his funeral. I remember seeing my Mom and Dad crying during this time. They had gone to see JFK at Lawrence Dumont Stadium when he stopped here on the campaign trail. I think this was my first time to realize that we could be here one minute and literally gone the next. What was happening to our country we our President would be gunned down?
To have any decision I make be one that I can honestly say was made with the knowledge that I was trying to do what I thought was “best for kids”!
My constituents are the students, staff, parents and patrons of the district.we
Everyone associated with the district has to be willing to be a life long learner. As the district becomes more diverse, we have to be willing to gather all the information we can to be pro-active in addressing those needs. We have to make it a priority that the necessary information, training and monies be allocated. It is a long process that won't be accomplished in a short amount of time. I also have to be a good listener, so I can be aware of any changes that need to be made.
I am fortunate that I have been affiliated with the district for 50+ years. 39 years working for the district and 22 years as a board member. I have been able to build relationships with students, staff, parents and patrons. I am currently a member of the Goddard Women’s Club which is a service organization in our community. This group has given me more contact with our city government and our senior groups in the community. I really consider the Goddard community to be my second family.
A world class teacher is a mentor for student learning. They provide information, but through their encouragement the student assimilates the information and utilizes it to solve problems. This information is provided visually, auditorial, and kinesthetically/hands on. The teacher has a love of learning that they pass on to their students. The teacher is a life long learner and the student realizes the importance of this. Our District Foundation has encouraged our teachers to “think outside the box” by providing classroom grants. The teacher uses this grant for training and supplies to try innovative strategies with their students,
This is difficult because our funding is tied to what the legislature allocates. Our superintendent has continued to build relationships with our legislators, so they will ask his opinion on how certain bills would affect our district. Our board members are advocates for public schools. Our district has participated in the lawsuits, “Schools for Fair Funding”, against the state when the funding has been inadequate. No one wants lawsuits but I think we have to when they refuse to provide adequate funding for our students’’ education.
This again is a priority. Student’s can’t learn if they don’t feel safe. I unfortunately was on the Goddard Junior High staff when a student wounded a student, 2 teachers and killed our principal. This incident showed that school safety is not just a big city problem, but violence can happen anywhere. Our board at the time, was proactive and hired a chief of police so we could have our own district police department. Our chief was excellent and studied the ways that we could improve safety. Many times it was from analyzing unfortunate incidents in other districts. Our last two bonds included ways to make our district safer. Such as doors that could be locked from the inside, cameras at entrances and a buzz in system for these entrances.
Since CoVid, this seems to be even more critical. We have to use all of our resources such as counselors, psychologists, nurses and social workers. Psychiatric help for students is extremely low. Our superintendent and nurses have been working hard with KU Med. to try to have more mental health resources for students, faculty and staff. This area needs to continue to be addressed. It is critical for a healthy environment for our schools.
Our district administration is constantly reviewing policies with the assistance of our State Department of Education. Changes or new policies need to be made to improve our educational environment and so we remain in compliance with State and Federal law.
As stated before, the academic, physical, emotional and social needs of the student have been assessed and addressed. The teacher understands the learning styles of the individual students and provides the modalities to best provide a successful learning environment.
As stated above, I have relationships with a lot of parents and grandparents because of teaching, being an administrator and board member in the district. You have to be a good listener and always let the parents know that your priority is to do what is best for our Goddard kids.
I support the district administration in their efforts to hire new staff as early as possible. For example, hiring teachers in January instead of the spring. Getting them committed to the district, many times before the teacher has graduated. They have also done a good job of providing opportunities for potential employees to visit our district. HR staff also go to colleges to visit with potential candidates. I am part of our negotiations team and we must continue to work to provide the best salaries and benefits that we can possibly afford to do. We have to stay competitive with other districts.
Not at this time.
This is very complex and I’ll be honest, a little scary. That your looks and voice can be copied so that a character developed by AI is mistaken to be you, is very troubling.
In 2011, I was named to the School District Hall of Fame. I think it made me feel like I hopefully had made a difference in the District I have loved for 50+ years. It is nice to feel like your chosen career has been validated.
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.
2021
Ruth Wood did not complete Ballotpedia's 2021 Candidate Connection survey.
See also
2025 Elections
External links
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Personal |
Footnotes
- ↑ Information submitted to Ballotpedia through the Candidate Connection survey on October 10, 2025
