Mayor London Breed has announced three appointments to take the place of the recalled San Francisco Unified School District Board of Education.
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Ann Hsu, Lainie Motamedi, and Lisa Weissman-Ward have been selected to fill the vacant positions left behind after school board President Gabriela López, Vice President Faauuga Moliga and Commissioner Alison Collins were recalled.
Breed made her picks public in a ceremony on Friday at Galileo High School.
Those three were the only ones of the seven board members eligible for recall in the special election in February. They were recalled in a landslide after several months of community members voicing dissatisfaction with the school board's response to the pandemic.
Since even before the election, Breed has met with parents, community members, and education groups to determine what qualities the new candidates would need to have in order to better meet the educational needs of the city, according to a press release issued by the Office of the Mayor on Friday. Interviews of candidates have taken place over the last three weeks.
"As we emerge from this pandemic, we need to focus on delivering on the basic services our residents deserve, and I know these three women will be intensely focused on meeting the urgent needs of our kids and our schools, while also focusing on the long-term health of our public school system," said Breed in the statement. "There's a lot of work to do, and some tough choices ahead, but working together we can make sure our schools are moving in a positive direction."
The three appointees are all parents in the district's school system and have diverse backgrounds and professions. They hail from equally diverse neighborhoods in the city – the Richmond, the Inner Sunset, and the Mission.
Ann Hsu, originally from China, has been very involved in the school community's organizing efforts and has a lengthy background in tech, co-founding and leading a company for 13 years. Lainie Motamedi is no stranger to public service, and has previously served as Co-Chair of the Public Education Enrichment Fund Committee (PEEF), leading to a wealth of experience in budgeting and programming. Lisa Weissman-Ward works as an immigration lawyer and educator and serves as the Associate Director of the Stanford Law School Immigrants' Rights Clinic.
"I'm looking forward to working collaboratively with the current and incoming School Board members to make sure that we do right by our public school children and their educators," said Weissman-Ward in the statement. "The challenges of learning loss, mental health, the opportunity gap facing many students of color, and the district's finances are real, but so too is our sense of hope and commitment to turn things around."
And the new members have their work cut out for them. The district is not only facing financial challenges, but also needs to fill the role of Superintendent and continue to work on transitioning learning out of the pandemic.
The three newly appointed members' seats will be up for election in November and all three have said they intend to run.
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