The Rochester school board elected Van White to serve another term as board president in a 5-to-1 vote yesterday. Board member Liz Hallmark cast the dissenting vote. Long time boa rd member Willa Powell was elected board vice president in a 4-to-2 vote, replacing Cynthia Elliott. Improving communication between board members and Superintendent Barbara Deane-Williams […]
Cynthia Elliott
For Rochester school board: Elliott, LeBron, White
Rochester’s schools are one of the region’s most critical challenges. This city cannot reinvent itself until its students are graduating with the education they need and deserve. Improvements can’t come solely from the schools themselves; the city’s extraordinarily high poverty concentration has affected children and their families in ways that the entire community must address. […]
Despite student performance, voters have so far stuck with school board incumbents
While most of the attention during the Democratic primary and in the last weeks leading up to the general election has been on the twists in the mayoral race, thereโs been something equally unexpected about the city school board race. With such dismal performance of city students by almost every standard, the dissatisfaction with school […]
Rochester school board says there’s too much testing
Last night, the Rochester school board voted 6 to 1 in favor of asking Albany lawmakers and state education officials to develop a new system to evaluate student learning. The new policy, which was largely developed by board member Mary Adams, rejects the state’s reliance on standardized testing as the main way to measure student […]
Cynthia Elliott
Cynthia Elliott’s fed up. And she’s not the only one, she says. A look at the Rochester City School district’s graduation rates frustrates most parents and community leaders, she says. For Elliott, it was enough to get her into the race for a seat on the school board. “I’m disappointed in the graduation rate of […]






