Nicole Gutierrez Miller is a testament to how hard work, persistence, and endurance pays off with dedication and a drive to succeed.
The first college graduate in her family and working mother of two, Ms. Gutierrez Miller has long supported her children’s public education, seeing it as a gateway to a better future for them and the local community.
It is that perspective along with the wish that all children, regardless of ability and status, are equipped academically, physically, and emotionally to receive a first-class public education that will propel them to success, that has convinced her to run for a seat on the Tempe Union High School Governing Board.
Ms. Gutierrez Miller graciously took the time to respond to questions about her candidacy for the Tempe High Governing Board.
The questions and her responses are below.
- What are at least two reasons you would like to run for election to the Tempe Union High School District Governing Board?
“I am running because I deeply value education. As a first generation American and the first in my family to graduate from college, I have seen the ways in which education can uplift families. For me it was in large part thanks to Pell Grants and a lot of hard work including taking classes while working full-time and working with a toddler at home, that I was able to graduate from ASU with my bachelor’s degree. Being able to graduate with my toddler daughter with me during the ceremony was an absolute core memory for me. I always try to teach my children and instill in them that education is power. Education is the way that we not only gain knowledge, but also uplift ourselves as members of society. Having her there with me was just really the culmination of a lifetime of hard. I also want to acknowledge that I do understand that college isn’t the ultimate path for every student and I think we need to be very respectful and conscious of that. I have seen the district’s increased efforts towards elevating Career Technical education classes, the CTE classes, and also working to support students who would like to go to EVIT so that they can find and channel their passions. I think we need to to elevate that work and be respectful that college is not everyone’s chosen path.”
“I also deeply value our Public Schools, which are by design meant to be environments welcoming of anyone regardless of their socioeconomic status, their religion, their race, etc. I have been an active parent volunteer. I’ve donated my time and my money, in helping my children within their classroom, within the both the Kyrene School District, and now the Tempe Union School District, through that, I’ve been able to work with and learn from and get to know some incredible educators who have helped shape the direction of my children’s future in the best and most positive ways. I’m endlessly grateful for the work that they do. I’ve also been able to work with and get to know so many staff, specifically at my children’s elementary school where I spent a lot of time volunteering my time. My son is a third grader now and seeing everything, from the small acts of kindness from the front office staff, to the cafeteria workers who know my son’s name and when they see him in the community constantly make sure that they that he feels seen and feels important, to the crossing guard who always greets us when we come, like these people and these interactions make such a huge impact on the students every day. That can’t go without recognition and without notice.”
“The second official reason that I’m running is because I know that as a community, we can go further to better engage our community. My experience as a new parent in the district has been one of researching and engaging the phone tree so that I can find out information. I have experienced that while the district is working to better engage families, there are still voices that are not represented and families that are still missing out on opportunities to better support their learners. By design and the nature of public education, we’re serving so many different people with diverse needs and diverse experiences, and we have to make sure that we are prepared to meet them where they are at. To provide them the information and the entry points to what it is that they need for their students to be successful and to just be available. We can and we absolutely have to do better so that we can ensure our students have all the resources, all the supports, and everything that they deserve through the public education system. Just kind of just a side note that I made engaging parents earlier in the conversation surrounding concerns with their students is vital and it will only ultimately serve our Learners and it will serve our community at the end of the day. So we’ve just have to be more proactive with that.”
- If elected to the governing board, what are two education-related issues you would promote as a member?
“When I was thinking about this question, the first thing that came to mind was, access to menstrual health products for all our Tempe Union High Schools. There are just too many students who are missing class time that don’t have access to materials that they need in order to be able to come to school ready to learn and have their personal needs met and I believe as a community, as administration, or as a school board member, I want to elevate that. I think we need to be more flexible and creative when it comes to providing learning environments for students with differing needs. I want to make sure that we’re supporting our learners, I believe that we can work with community partners and introduce more supportive learning environments for all students.”
“I also want to bring a continued emphasis on our student’s mental health needs. The impacts of COVID are not going away from our educational system. Our students are still struggling to catch up and grapple with the changes that COVID brought to their educational journey: from students still being behind and needing to catch up from what we would have expected them to be, to students still grappling with the mental health effects that the isolation of lockdowns and all of those things brought so many of our students. Many are struggling with serious mental health issues and they need continued support. I personally would like to see Care 7, Tempe’s program expanded and I would like to see the city work with Tempe Union to continue to provide increased funding for this critical program. Our family has experienced directly, the impact of this program and having social workers who are trained in trauma-informed practices be able to come and work with students on their campus is just critical work. It’s intervention that is going to keep students in school, that’s going to keep them feeling supported and is going to keep serious situations from happening.”
- Would you care to comment on both the Republican and Governors, proposals to expand Prop 123 as well as Republican legislators attempts to ban certain books, promote a distorted view of history, and also promote policies that discriminate against members of the LGBTQ community. Please explain.
“The proposed Republican changes to Prop 123 in keeping the distribution at 6.9% and seeking to limit the distribution to teachers only. I feel like it’s shortsighted, while vouchers continue to cut the bottom out of our public schools and funding continues to be diverted into charters and private schools, we absolutely have to do everything that we can to support our Public Schools specifically including supporting our teachers and support staff. Crucial positions, like guidance counselors, nurses, special education aides, and social workers should be eligible for the same increases, as they are vital positions that address needs that keep kids in school, keep them engaged, make them feel supported and seen. Going back to my previous experience with support staff, all of them have made a positive impact on my kids, and I know that they positively impact the daily lives of students that are at the schools. Leaving them out of that conversation is not right. I don’t support that.”
Regarding banning certain types of books or materials and regarding teaching history, I know that our students are brilliant, capable leaders. They have been given the tools and abilities that they will take into this world and help us create a better society. Those tools and abilities were given to them through our public schools and instilled in them in their homes. I trust our students to engage honestly, to engage critically with texts and with historically accurate information. I trust that in reviewing both of those things, they’ll be able to become more critical thinkers. Critical thinking is a skill that is extremely difficult to teach. It’s a skill that is crucial to future leaders and future workers in a future job market and I think that in limiting them from being able to be exposed to information, I think that we’re limiting their ability to be able to be true critical thinkers. I trust our students and I trust that they’ll be able to decipher information that is presented to them.
On Republican policies that may discriminate against members of the LGBTQ community.
“From my perspective, there’s just no place for hate in our school’s, period. For any marginalized community, but especially for those who are from the LGBTQIA community. Again, we should be seeking to send compassionate people into society. As adults we need to have some honest conversations within ourselves. We need to evaluate openly the language that we are using, that is being used around our children. Fear-mongering around students who identify as LGBTQIA is harmful and we have already seen as recently as a couple of weeks ago, with the death of Nex, the transgender student in Oklahoma, that these hateful policies and violent rhetoric breeds violence within our society. I just struggle and really shudder to think about and grapple with the fact that this this person was murdered at the hands of another student and that this happened following anti-trans policies that were enacted in the state. I hope and ask for adults to really think about that and to really ponder on what we’re teaching future generations. One of the governing models that are part of the Tempe Union District is enacting is a student-focused governance model and through that model the tagline is “student outcomes don’t change until adult behaviors do” and how can we, as adults, expect for students to grow up to be compassionate loving supportive people that are going into society when we ourselves are not living those values. So we really need to grapple with that as a society and as adults.”
- Is there anything that I covered in the first three questions that we like the readers to know about you and your candidacy for the Tempe Union High School Governing Board? Please explain.
“I’d like to take time to shout out and thank AGUILA Youth Leadership Institute for creating a way for me to attend college. Had it not been on the shoulders of people who came before me, and the mentors that helped me, I would not have attended, and certainly would not have graduated. I was part of the first cohort, and I really leaned upon the knowledge of the mentors that were in that program to be able to help me as a first-generation student navigate this process. They helped me decode the tangled web that is college admissions, including what that means for me as a first-generation student. As an adult, I’m now a volunteer with them and trying to pay it forward. My daughter is now a participant in the program, and I’ll have my son participate when it’s time as well.
I’m just so grateful, because truly if it had not been for their advocacy and for the mentorship that I received, I would not have gone to school because I did not see a four-year university as an environment that was meant for me, because it was not a part of my family’s history. “
Please click on the below social media site to find out more information about Nicole Gutierrez Miller and her candidacy for the Tempe Union High School Governing Board.
https://linktr.ee/nicolefortempe
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