Candidate Profile: Jenny Graham, Medford School Committee

MEDFORD, MA — Jenny Graham is one of 14 candidates running for School Committee in the Sept. 14 preliminary election, which will whittle down the field of candidates ahead of the municipal election in November. There will also be a preliminary election for the mayor's race.

Medford Patch asked candidates to answer questions about their campaigns and will be publishing candidate profiles over the coming weeks.

Graham is a current School Committee member and owner of Medford-based consulting business Zelus, LLC. She lives in Medford with her husband Scott and two children, Lila and Lucas.

Are you running for office in Medford? Contact Alex Newman at alex.newman@patch.com for information on being featured in a candidate profile and submitting campaign announcements to Medford Patch.

Age (as of Election Day)

44

Position Sought

Medford School Committee

Party Affiliation

Democrat

Family

Husband Scott, and children Lila (12) and Lucas (10)

Does anyone in your family work in politics or government?

No

Education

Babson College, Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with a concentration in Finance

Occupation

I am an operations and business consultant and I own a Medford based consulting business, Zelus, LLC, where I advise government agencies and businesses on strategic planning, core business functions, adult education and curriculum development. My business partner and I founded Zelus 17 years ago. We are a certified Women’s Business Enterprise.

Previous or Current Elected or Appointed Office

I was previously appointed by Mayor Burke to serve as a member of the Superintendent Search Committee in 2017.

Campaign website

Electjenny.org

Why are you seeking elective office?

Medford Public Schools is in a period of change, challenges, and opportunities that needs skilled leadership and commitment from its School Committee members. We’ve navigated the impacts of the pandemic over these last few years as carefully and thoughtfully as we possibly could. As an entrepreneur, owner of a Medford-based business consulting firm, and a committed public school parent who is deeply involved in our school district, I believe I have valuable skills and experiences to contribute to the work of our School Committee and help Medford strive for excellence for all children.

As a member of the School Committee for the last two years, the pandemic has undoubtedly taken the front seat. And the truth is that it will continue to do so for years to come. Our recovery from the pandemic is critically important to a generation of children and will not be accomplished in a month, or a year. As we look forward to this recovery, there will be a lot of decisions to make about how to recover. Going back to how things were before simply isn’t good enough for me. Before the pandemic, our schools were under-resourced and not operating at the best we can be for students. Moving forward, we’ll need to recover, but I believe we should take the opportunity in front of us to move forward in a significant way. The Federal Government has provided significant infusions of money to cities and towns through the pandemic and as we look forward. Decisions on how to spend those funds will be a central action for the School Committee elected in November, and I believe that I am well suited to consider the options and determine which will provide the best outcomes for students.

As a committee, we’ve done more than simply navigate the pandemic. I’m proud to have played a significant role in dramatically improving district wide communication. This work started with the reopening task force in the summer of 2020, where I was part of the communications subcommittee, and it has continued. The community now can rely on a weekly message from the superintendent. As importantly, I promised to work toward accessible communications and I am proud to say that all our district messages are not translated into multiple languages. We still have work to do, but I am proud of all that we’ve accomplished. I’m proud of the role I’ve played in making the discussion of the school budget a more comprehensive one, and I’ll continue to do just that. Last June, we were forced to make a 3.5 Million cut in our operating budget because the City’s appropriation could not keep pace with our contractually obligated cost increases. We did so with an eye toward minimizing impact to students. In that process, we outlined for the entire community what our unmet need really was, which had never happened before. This year, we’ve changed the process to ensure that the budget we request is reflective of what we see as the needs of our students and district. This is a huge change for Medford and will require an additional vote to determine how to change our budget if the City’s appropriation can’t meet our needs. This dialogue is so critically important and I’m proud of the role I’ve played to make it happen. As we look forward, we also need to resume our efforts to make a plan for Medford High School. I’m committed to that work and to making our choices carefully so that we spend Medford’s money wisely and the result of our efforts is a sustainable building that can be the pride of Medford as we continue our efforts to remain on the forefront of battling climate change.

In my professional work, I am the founder of an operations improvement consulting firm which employs nearly 20 professionals dedicated to helping clients in government and other industries manage and make change happen. I believe my expertise in implementing operations and process improvement, as well as the customer experience, would be a boon for our school district, which is in need of additional support to improve its communications and family support.

I graduated from Babson 22 years ago with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with a Concentration in Finance. I am a proud entrepreneur and business owner of Zelus Consulting Group, which is dedicated to helping clients in government and insurance manage change and MAKE CHANGE HAPPEN. We are implementers who can look at an operation or process and identify how to move it from where it is to where its leaders want to be. I am a certified PMP (Project Management Professional) and am designated a Certified Professional of Learning and Performance by the Association for Talent Development.

I cannot think of a better way to use my skill set than to continue to serve Medford Public Schools.

The single most pressing issue facing our (board, district, etc.) is _______, and this is what I intend to do about it.

In 2019 I said that “the single most pressing issue facing our school district is the absence of a strategic plan to lay out goals in critical areas such as communication, teacher support, curriculum development, and building and grounds maintenance. Without a strategic plan, we seem to approach issues piecemeal and without a view towards the larger picture.” I am happy to report that we now have a strategic plan. While it was delayed from our original plan to complete it in 2019, we approved the strategic plan in June of 2020. As with all strategic plans, it is a living document, and we should expect it to continue to change and evolve. With this overarching plan in place, the single most pressing issue becomes our ability to implement and pay for the plans that we have outlined.

With a strategic plan to guide us forward the single biggest issue we face is having the resources required to execute the plan. We’ll need resources like staff, money, expertise, and buy-in from the community.

We’ve seen the consequences of a lack of resources in our schools over these last few years. Our building maintenance deferrals over the years delayed our ability to get kids back to school in the fall of 2020. The high school in particular lacks infrastructure like air conditioning and reliable internet. The state of the high school bathrooms is a well documented source of frustration for many. We need a real plan to think about the future of Medford High. The plan will undoubtedly include a proposal to the Massachusetts School Building Authority for partial reimbursement, but we will also need to rally as a community behind any plan to move forward. Of course we need to maintain our high school better in the meantime, but the time is now to get serious about the future of our flagship building. I’m committed to ensuring that the evaluation we complete is done without bias or opinion. We need to let the facts guide as we decide whether we try to renovate in place, to build and move on the existing premises, or to explore other site options which are very limited. As these options are vetted and costs are explored, I am committed to advocating for the best interests of our students and teachers and to keeping in our existing track record in Medford of building green, sustainable, carbon-neutral, and resilient buildings as we did with the police station and the library.

Underlying so many of the resources we need to execute the strategic plan is a discussion of budget and funding. Currently we are working implementing a series of expenditures thanks to funding from the Federal Government via ESSER for the schools directly, and at the city level through ARPA. We need to make sure that we aren’t creating fiscal cliffs when this one time money dries up which we are doing at the school level through a sound set of investments that help students recover from the pandemic and move us forward as a district. We’ll need to continue to advocate that the city increase funding to Medford public schools and make plans to offset one time funding so that we aren’t faced with another budget cut as we were in the 2020-2021 school year. The school committee needs to continue to articulate what is needed to achieve student outcomes and I’m proud of the work we’ve done in this area over the past two years. For the first time that I recall, it’s clear what the schools need to be successful regardless of how the city is able to fund our request. As we continue this practice over time, we are providing the community an important look at our work and the opportunity to support our students the way they need us too.

What are the critical differences between you and the other candidates seeking this post?

The candidates are all unique individuals and would bring different skills or capabilities to the School Committee. My husband Scott and I are products of public schools, and we believe in the power of education. I am a first generation college graduate with a degree in Finance from Babson College. Scott and I are the parents of two children in the Medford Public Schools. My professional background in Finance, Process Improvement, Change Management, and Learning Design and Delivery align well with the responsibilities of the School Committee. I own a Medford based consulting business where I advise government agencies and businesses on strategic planning, curriculum development, and change management. I am a certified PMP (Project Management Professional) and designated a Certified Professional of Learning and Performance by the Association for Talent Development.

If you are a challenger, in what way has the current board or officeholder failed the community (or district or constituency)?

N/A

How do you think local officials performed in responding to the coronavirus? What if anything would you have done differently?

My first term on the School Committee has been both challenging and rewarding. Almost immediately, we were faced with the onset of a global pandemic. The pandemic upended everything we all knew about public education and challenged our district in ways we may have never anticipated.

I’m proud of the work Medford has done to keep students at the center of our efforts as we navigated the pandemic. We prioritized our remote academy to ensure that our students remained within MPS and with teachers they know and recognize, when many districts around us turned to outside sources to manage students who preferred remote learning. Medford has led the way in the Commonwealth when it comes to reopening our buildings safely. Our buildings opened long before those in our surrounding communities, even though we would have liked to see them open sooner. We completed years’ worth of deferred maintenance to ensure our air quality standards were up to pandemic mitigation standards and that our air exchange rates were safe.

Our COVID testing program was used as a model by other districts during the 2020-2021 school year. I widely credit the diligence of our testing program with low incidence of positive tests in our school community and preventing systemic outbreaks that closed buildings in surrounding communities. This, paired with the diligence of our community, allowed us to proceed forward in an ever-changing environment to ensure our students could learn safely.

As we look forward, we need to reflect on our work and on the barriers that got in our way during the pandemic. Specifically, our efforts to open school were impacted by decisions of the past. Overcoming years of deferred maintenance was a significant challenge and it kept our high school students largely learning remotely for far too long. Our high school building has all the challenges one might expect from a very old building and it’s incumbent on the School Committee to chart a better course forward. We need to proactively maintain all our schools. We need to tell the community what that means and what it costs so the community can fully fund our schools. We need to talk seriously about the future of our flagship school and be committed to creating a learning environment for students that is modern, safe, and a source of pride for the entire community.

Describe the other issues that define your campaign platform.

Medford School Committee employs the Superintendent and oversees a more than $67 million budget for a school district of approximately 4000 children. In addition to more effective ongoing support for budget management and innovative initiatives, our district needs leadership on several key issues, which is why I am running for re-election. I will focus on the following priority issues:

Ensure pandemic recovery addresses the very different needs of our students. Investments made to accelerate pandemic recovery need to be targeted to the needs of the moment with an eye toward how they position the district for sustainability in the years to come.
Develop a comprehensive plan for our high school complex that identifies the best option for the community to ensure a flagship school that is carbon neutral, resilient, and a source of pride for the entire city.

Continue the progress we’ve made in improving relevant and accessible communication with families. Move beyond the foundations of good communication and toward authentic engagement between home and school.
Support our teachers with the resources they need and the budget they and our students deserve.

What accomplishments in your past would you cite as evidence you can handle this job?

For the last few years, I’ve worked hard as a member of the School Committee during the most unprecedented time in public education ever. The pandemic upended everything we know about how to educate students. Through it all, I’ve listened, learned, and pushed for the very best for our students and staff. We’ve made countless difficult decisions throughout the pandemic and I’ve done so because I am committed to making MPS the very best it can be. But we didn’t just navigate the pandemic, we’ve done so much more. I’m so proud to be leading our district forward in a number of ways including:

We went from a district that rarely communicated to one that communicated on a weekly basis. More than that, we provided our communications in multiple languages each time we did.
We held roundtables and listening sessions on topics ranging from COVID and back to school to the strategic plan for the future of our district.

We completed a comprehensive review of our curricula as an important first step to creating an ongoing structure for assessment, evaluation, and replacement of the curricula we use.
We are ending the practice of charging some families to get their children to high school this coming year.

We increased the pay of our after school staff and ensured all our workers are paid at least minimum wage (including our high school workers).
We told the community in plain language what we need and do not have. In 2020, that resulted in a no vote from me on a budget that cut too deep. In 2021, we changed how we managed the budget process to ensure we know what our authentic needs are, regardless of the funding provided by the city/mayor’s budget.

We committed the district to initiatives that ensure we are anti-racist in our operational practices and in our teaching.

We listened to residents and renamed a school with a name that honors those here before us and respects the deep history of our community.

And we did all of this while fixing 40 years of deferred maintenance, improving air quality in our schools, implementing testing, and getting our children back to school safely.

The best advice ever shared with me was:

For change to happen you have to put one foot in front of the other. Do this every day and you WILL achieve your goals.

What else would you like voters to know about yourself and your positions?

The last few years in MPS have made it clear that we have a lot of work to do to ensure that every student that passes through our halls is safe, cared for, and successful. How we do this looks different for nearly every student which makes the work very complicated. I will continue to support efforts to ensure our students are safe and cared for. This means making sure our students and residents don’t suffer from food insecurity. It means investing in mental health services and social emotional programming. Being successful means that we need to continue to look at our curricula and ensure it is working for us. Success means students reading on grade level by grade 3 and that we are focused on the science of reading. Success means that our vocational programming continues to evolve and grow. And most importantly, success means that we are creating lifelong learners with creative and intellectual passion to be the leaders we seek in the world.

But make no mistake, change is hard. It requires us to be pragmatic, and planful, and ask good questions. Big changes require a lot of what-ifing to be successful. I help clients make change happen every day. They will say to me “I need to improve my outcomes but I have 25 constraints, including a shoestring budget”. So we work with them to understand where they are at, and agree on that outcome they are seeking. And then we take steps, one at a time to move toward the outcome. It’s not easy, and it can take a long time, but there is always an opportunity to make progress. Together, we can move more quickly and with better results. As a member of the School Committee I will continue to bring my experience and my passion to the table to work hard, collaborate, and serve. You can find out more about me at www.electjenny.org. If you have questions though, don’t hesitate to reach out. I ask for one of your votes on November 2nd so we can keep moving forward together.