Sendhil Revuluri on Chicago school board president race

Cinda, what are your thoughts on how the night is shaping up, possibly for Jessica Biggs? It's great to see you, Anita. Thanks to everyone for being here. I think given how much money was spent on this campaign and as was just mentioned against Hilario's campaign, it would be really shocking if she didn't win. I have maintained that the question as always is what she's going to do if she's board president to help our students succeed. There are tough choices coming, regardless of who's sitting in that seat, regardless of who's in the other 20 seats on the board. We have to make them so that our students succeed. Will she do that, or will she be bound by commitments she's made to her backers, which, as you've all discussed, is a pretty small, concentrated group of special interests, political actors? You've also highlighted that. The other candidates have well-documented issues in their past, professional and otherwise. And we need to make some choices in our city, just like every other district in the country does. We have smaller enrollment than we used to. We have aging buildings. We have students who are not thriving in large parts of the city. And to make those choices, the board, and especially the board president, need to have the trust of the community. Will the people on the board Demonstrate the integrity that they need so that they can make the choices that are needed so that our students really succeed. And I'll just say, today's election day, everyone's really fired up for it. I know there were plenty of people, contrary to what we just heard from Ms. Lum, they're not just saying, oh, these other candidates are bad. They've been on on board with the message that we need to prioritize our student success. From the get-go, from last year, and I'm honored to have thousands of votes from them as well, even though I did suspend my campaign before voting began and was not able to put out the hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars in mailers and TV and video ads that other candidates had going for them. Sendell, Brandon Pope here, you mentioned you did drop out of this race. People still ended up supporting you. I don't want you to, you don't have to tell us who you voted for, but at the end of the day, did you find yourself leaning one way or another? What were your conversations with your friends about when it came to making a decision for yourself at the polls? Brandon, I'm happy to tell you, I voted for myself. Because it's not about strategic vote. It's about voting for the person who is both going to have the integrity and the competence to actually make decisions for our students' success. And I talked with all three other candidates, had extensive conversations with each of them, shared my questions, shared my concerns, asked about their plans. I believe any of them could choose to lead with integrity, to decide based on student success. Ultimately, I did not get to the point where I was confident that they will do so, but I'm going to keep working on it, and I hope you all do, too. Well, that's why you're here, because we knew you would continue to be a vocal advocate for the students in this district. I am wondering, the biggest issue that you feel this president is going to have to tackle first. This president is going to have to rebuild trust. With the entire community across Chicago, and that will be about showing that they have integrity, that they're willing to accept reality, and that they're going to make choices based on what students need so that they succeed, not based on what interest groups want, what influential backers who may have poured hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars into the campaign want. I'm not saying that they necessarily want something else, but I think we've seen from the last two years that often the board doesn't talk about student success, talks about everything else, not about that. And when it comes time to make choices, they're often deciding based on what serves other priorities, not our students. There are thousands of other districts in this country, over 13,000. Most of them have elected school boards. Some of them make it work. We're not like in, you know, outer space where we've landed on a new planet. We just have to get this board to do its job. And so, as you said, Anita, I plan to stay very engaged. I want the public to be informed and engaged because all this money, it wouldn't matter. If the public were actually on board to say, we believe that the board can do a good job, and in fact, we don't just believe that, we are going to demand it. We are going to hold this board and its members accountable, not just today, but every election and every day in between, that they're actually doing their job to make sure that students succeed, because that's why we have public schools. Well, you've been following this campaign, and you're a part of this campaign yourself. Lots of rhetoric back and forth, and sometimes I had a lot of discussion about the actual issues. Having served on the board yourself, what's the biggest difference between the campaign and the values propositioning and actually sitting on that board and making some of these tough choices you referenced? Like, there's $150 million that's budgeted for CPS that isn't banked from Springfield just yet. Yeah, that's a great point, Brandon. I think we've seen in the last couple of years that sometimes there is no difference. The rhetoric trumps reality, and the board doesn't do its job. What needs to happen, what boards can do, what boards should do, what many boards across the country do on a regular basis is to stay focused on the main thing, which is defining and monitoring and ensuring our students' success, and then doing the core jobs effectively. That means actually watching the results that our students get. Asking the hard questions about that, spending more board meeting time on whether we're on track to achieve those goals, and less micromanaging district leadership, principals, and everyone else, and actually having a coherent, consistent, aligned CEO evaluation process. It sounds wonky, it sounds minor, but it's actually the biggest lever that effective boards have. When they say, this is what success looks like. And this is how we expect you to deliver. That makes it very clear to the CEO and to everyone else up front what they need. And that's what we deserve as Chicagoans. That's what our students deserve. Cyndale, thank you so much for joining us tonight. I hope that you will visit us again here on Fox Chicago. We appreciate your contribution. Thank you so much. Thanks so much, Anita, Brandon, everyone else. Look forward to being back. Take care.