Stephen Smith (Texas)
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Stephen Smith was the District 1 incumbent on the Comal Independent School District Board of Trustees in Texas. He was appointed to the board in July 2011 and elected in 2012 without opposition.
He ran for re-election in the general election on May 9, 2015. He successfully won another term on the board.[1]
Smith participated in Ballotpedia's 2015 survey of school board candidates. To read his responses, check out his 2015 campaign themes.
Biography
Smith earned his bachelor's degree in business administration from Texas State University. He is a certified public accountant. Smith spent most of his career in various start-up telecommunications ventures. He served as president and chief operating officer of Classic Communications, a company he also co-founded. Smith also served as an officer of FNet Corporation, a voice-over IP company.[2]
Elections
2015
The general election on May 9, 2015, in the Comal Independent School District featured four seats up for election. In the District 1 race, Stephen Smith faced challenger Denise Cordova. The District 2 race featured incumbent David Drastata and challenger Cheryl Koury. Gwen Pain ran against incumbent Amy Freund for the District 5 seat. All three of those incumbents won re-election to the board. Incumbent Marty Bartlett was also successful in her bid for re-election. She ran unopposed and won a one-year term to the board in the District 6 special election.
Endorsements
Smith did not receive any official endorsements for this election.
Results
| Comal Independent School District, District 1 General Election, 3-year term, 2015 |
||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Vote % | Votes | |
| Nonpartisan |  Stephen Smith Incumbent |
82% | 396 | |
| Nonpartisan | Denise Cordova | 18% | 87 | |
| Total Votes | 483 | |||
| Source: Comal Independent School District, "Election Results," accessed May 9, 2015 These election results are not official and will be updated when certified results are available. You can submit certified results by contacting us. | ||||
2012
The board canceled the May 12 election due to all candidates running unopposed. Stephen Smith was elected to District 1, David Drastata was elected to District 2 and Amy Freund was elected to District 5. New board members were sworn in at the June 12, 2012, special board meeting.[3]
Campaign themes
2015
Ballotpedia survey responses
Smith participated in Ballotpedia's 2015 survey of school board candidates. The following sections display his responses to the survey questions. When asked what his top priority would be if elected, the candidate made the following statement:
| “ | Continuing the incredible improvement in academic performance that we have enjoyed under Superintendent Andrew Kim.[4] | ” |
| —Stephen Smith (2015)[5] | ||
He also included the following statement with his responses:
| “ | Our constituents are given a very clear choice in the coming election. To stay the course of continuing educational improvement, accountable governance and low taxes or to drift back into the old status quo.
|
” |
| —Stephen Smith (2015)[5] | ||
Ranking the issues
The candidate was asked to rank the following issues by importance in the school district, with 1 being the most important and 7 being the least important. This table displays this candidate's rankings from most to least important:
| Education policy |
|---|
 |
Click here to learn more about education policy in Texas. |
| Education on the ballot |
| Issue importance ranking | |
|---|---|
| Candidate's ranking | Issue |
| Closing the achievement gap | |
| Improving college readiness | |
| Improving education for special needs students | |
| Expanding career-technical education | |
| Balancing or maintaining the district's budget | |
| Expanding arts education | |
| Expanding school choice options | |
Positions on the issues
The candidate was asked to answer 10 questions from Ballotpedia regarding significant issues in education and the school district. The questions are in the left column and the candidate's responses are in the right column of the following table:
| Question | Response |
|---|---|
| "No need, Texas standards are superior." | |
| "No need, CISD academics now superior to most charter schools." | |
| "For public to public vouchers, against public to private school vouchers." | |
| "One accurate metric but must not be the ONLY metric used to measure student progress." | |
| "By measuring academic progress (value added) rather than raw scores as the true measure of success. The district, its schools, its teachers and students should be evaluated based on annual improvement rather than affluence correlated standardized test scores." | |
| "Expulsion should be used for serious offenses to ensure the safety of other students as well as the integrity of education at district schools." | |
| "Comal ISD currently boasts the best academic progress scores of any comparable school district in the area. The prospect of any CISD school "failing" is so wildly hypothetical as to be irrelevant to the coming election." | |
| "I support paying teachers enough to take the issue off the table. Teachers do not teach for monetary reward. I enthusiastically support the recognition of our "master" teachers." | |
| "Properly communicating their student's progress scores relative to those of other students and teachers will minimize underperforming teachers. Those teachers who continue to underperform should be provided additional training. If they continue to underperform after additional training they should be encouraged to seek other employment." | |
| "Through continual engagement of parents, community leaders and local business owners through focus groups and district committees. And by continuing to seek feedback from these stakeholders regarding our success in educating our students for success in college and the workforce." |
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Stephen Smith Comal Independent School District. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
- Comal Independent School District, Texas
- Comal Independent School District elections (2015)
- Decreased success for school board incumbents in Texas; 1/3 defeated in largest districts (May 11, 2015)
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Comal Independent School District, "Election Results," accessed May 9, 2015
- ↑ Information submitted on Ballotpedia’s biographical information submission form on January 25, 2015
- ↑ Comal Independent School District, "News Briefs for March 9, 2012," March 9, 2012
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Ballotpedia School Board Candidate Survey, 2015, "Stephen Smith responses," April 5, 2015
