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Sendolo Diaminah
Sendolo Diaminah was the District 2 representative on the Durham Public Schools school board in North Carolina. He resigned in August 2016.[1]
Diaminah was first elected to the chamber on May 6, 2014.
Biography
Diaminah earned a degree from City University of New York in 2006. He has worked as community organizing trainer for Black Organizing for Leadership & Dignity (BOLD) and has served as the Administrative and Leadership Coordinator for People’s Durham. Before organizing for BOLD, he was a community organizer for People’s Durham Neighborhood Project and People’s Durham Education Organizing. He was also a North Carolina advisor for Southerners on the Ground, a Rank-and-File Labor Organizer and a campus organizer with All City in New York. Diaminah has received several awards, including the 2012 Indy Citizen Award, the 2012 Louis Burnham Award and the 2013 BWFJ Self-Determination Award.[2]
Elections
2014
- See also: Durham Public Schools elections (2014)
Sendolo Diaminah defeated fellow newcomers Jimmy Doster, Donald A. Hughes, DeWarren K. Langley and Terrence R. Scarborough for the District 2 seat in the general election on May 6, 2014.
Results
Diaminah won election to the board in 2014.
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nonpartisan |  Sendolo Diaminah |
44.3% | 2,936 | |
| Nonpartisan | Donald A. Hughes | 28.3% | 1,874 | |
| Nonpartisan | Jimmy Doster | 13.7% | 910 | |
| Nonpartisan | Terrence R. Scarborough | 8.9% | 588 | |
| Nonpartisan | DeWarren K. Langley | 4% | 266 | |
| Nonpartisan | Write-in votes | 0.7% | 49 | |
| Total Votes | 6,623 | |||
| Source: North Carolina Board of Elections, "05/06/2014 UNOFFICIAL PRIMARY ELECTION RESULTS - DURHAM," accessed June 2, 2014 | ||||
Funding
Diaminah reported $9,484.28 in contributions and $4,375.43 in expenditures to the Durham County Board of Elections, which left his campaign with $4,108.43 on hand.[3]
Endorsements
Diaminah was endorsed by The Durham Association of Educators, The Durham People’s Alliance and INDY Week.[4][5][6]
Campaign themes
2014
Diaminah's campaign website listed his themes for 2014:
| “ | 1. Why do you want to serve on the Durham Public School Board of Education? What is the role of a board member?
I want to serve on the DPS Board of Education because I believe that our community needs leadership that protects and strengthens public schools at a time when there are so many attacks on public schools. Vouchers, budget cuts, removing the cap on classroom sizes—these are some major examples. I believe that the role of a board member, while including oversight duties, is principally to lead DPS and the Durham community in identifying solutions to the problems that our schools face. As a community organizer my orientation is not to solve people’s problems for them, but to engage people collectively in facing and solving our problems together 2.The board will be involved in the hiring of a new superintendent. What should the search process look like? What qualities should the successful candidate possess? The search process for the superintendent needs to involve all stakeholders in DPS. For a superintendent to lead our school system effectively they must have the confidence and support of parents, educators, administrators, and students. In addition to strong competence in personnel and financial management skills, a successful candidate should be interested in investing in DPS for the long-term and not simply looking to build a resume to move on to a bigger school system. They should also share a commitment to transparency and decision-making that involves all stakeholders. 3. How should teachers and administrators be evaluated? Are the current state standards effective? North Carolina’s six standards are a strong foundation for teacher evaluation. Only one of these standards is based on testing, however in North Carolina and around the country high stakes tests have been increasingly emphasized as the only meaningful standard. The adoption of Read to Achieve and the expansion of end-of-course testing at the high school level to include more subjects are examples of this in our state. Teachers and administrators should be evaluated primarily by using peer assessment and review. Currently these reviews involve mostly administrators. The school system should establish panels of teachers, administrators, teaching coaches, parents, students, and education specialists to evaluate the performance of their staff. 4. How should students be assessed? What role should standardized tests play in evaluating students? Rather than asking students to choose among multiple-choice answers, assessments should challenge students to perform specific tasks relevant to what they have learned, for example, by writing an essay, making a speech or presentation, performing a piece of music, etc. There are many performance-based assessment tools being used around the country and performance is the assessment tool most often used in the work environment. We already have this kind of assessment approach being used in the International Baccalaureate program. Student portfolios that track progress are another key way this has been applied in the school environment. Standardized tests can be effective when they measure growth rather than knowledge. We need to be assessing how much students have learned from year to year, not how much they know compared to other students, otherwise we end up measuring the resources that students bring into the classroom not the classroom itself. 5. In spite of the introduction of magnet schools, it appears that Durham Public Schools have become increasingly segregated by socioeconomic status and race. What are your thoughts on this situation? When all of our schools are high quality I think we’ll see less segregation. Right now segregation happens because resources are not fairly allocated. Parents are going to do what’s best for their children and send them to the schools where they believe their children will have the best chance to succeed in. Every Durham public school can be one of those schools, given the resources. 6. Does DPS need to make changes to its school suspension policy? If so, what changes would you work for as a Board Member? The current policy and its implementation is neither fair nor consistent. Can it be improved? Yes. We need to do as much as possible to keep students in schools. Out of school suspensions have not been proven to actually address or change student behavior and the range of infractions that students can be suspended for is too wise. Right now, students can get suspended for skipping school, which of course does not help solve the problem. As a BOE member I would look into restorative practices and suspension alternatives, as well as advocating for more support services, like counselors and social workers, so that every student gets the attention they deserve. 7. What is your opinion about the Charter School movement? If charter schools were used as they were originally envisioned—as places of innovative teaching and learning—they could be an effective part of the public school system. Many low-income and families of color are attracted to charter schools because our public schools have been defunded and are struggling. The reality, however, is that charter schools have increased income and racial segregation in schools. Rather than offering more choice to those who need it most, they tend to siphon public resources into schools that serve the more privileged. When charter schools don’t offer transportation, free and reduced lunch, special education and ELL services, they are not functioning in the way they were originally envisioned. 8. What is your opinion about school vouchers? Our state constitution says that public money must be used exclusively for public schools. Vouchers are clear violation of that law and an attack on public education. School vouchers are part of a privatization agenda that furthers inequality and tries to take advantage of the legitimate concerns of low-income communities and communities of color. Rather than taking more resources out we need to re-invest in the public school system. 9. As a board member how would you lead the decisions addressing the needs of the students who are at risk for low achievement and dropping out? First, low achievement and student self-confidence is directly related to how we value and measure learning. Low test scores aren’t necessarily an indication of how much or how well students are learning. When high stakes tests are the key measure of our student’s ability, we create an environment that pushes kids towards dropping out. Drop out rates are also very connected to suspensions. Addressing the problems in our suspension policy is one major step towards tackling these issues. 10. Why do you think that parents choose to take their children out of the public schools in Durham or don’t choose them at all? How would you address this issue? The issue of parents taking their children out of public schools relates back to the question about segregation and resourcing all of our schools fairly. To investigate what resources our schools need I would ask the stakeholders. This would allow the board of education to fully understand the unique needs of each school and allocate resources accordingly. 11. If you could do three things to improve Durham Public Schools, what would they be? The first thing I would do to improve Durham Public schools be to make parent, teacher, and youth engagement a regular part of school and school system decision-making. Truly strengthening school-based management through effective School Improvement Teams made up of students, parents, administrators, and community representative. Unfortunately, not all schools use School Improvement Teams as they should. These councils need to have real decision-making power; they should do more that just “advise.” We have the mechanism in place. Now we just need to improve it. Second, I would bring back the teacher mentorship program that was phased out in the last few years of budget cuts. Good teachers are the lifeblood of strong schools and again and again I have heard from high-performing educators that the teaching mentor program was key to their success and their decision to stay in Durham Public Schools. Third, I would deepen the partnership between DPS and pre-k early literacy programs. Too often children are already behind when they arrive in our kindergarten classrooms. By the time our students reach high school, the problem has often deepened leading to increased suspension and drop out rates. We can avoid problems that are a decade away by ensuring all our students have a strong educational foundation. |
” |
| —Sendolo Diaminah's campaign website, (2014) | ||
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ The News & Observer, "Durham Public Schools board taps Bettina Umstead for vacant seat," October 5, 2016
- ↑ Sendolo for School Board, "Resume," accessed April 8, 2014
- ↑ Durham County Board of Elections, "2014 Organizational Disclosure Reports," accessed May 6, 2014
- ↑ The Herald-Sun, "Durham educators issue endorsements," April 7, 2014
- ↑ Wes Platt, The Herald-Sun, "People’s Alliance releases Durham endorsement slate," April 4, 2014
- ↑ INDY Week, "Durham school board: We recommend a clean start this election," April 23, 2014
- ↑ Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ Sendolo for School Board, "Our Issues," accessed April 8, 2014
| 2014 Durham Public Schools Elections | |
| Durham County, North Carolina | |
| Election date: | May 6, 2014 |
| Candidates: | District 1: • Incumbent, Omega Parker • Mike Lee • Thomas Poole
District 2: • Sendolo Diaminah • Jimmy Doster • Donald A. Hughes • DeWarren K. Langley • Terrence R. Scarborough |
| Important information: | What was at stake? • Key deadlines • Additional elections on the ballot |
