Job opportunities for young people are what public education should be about, says Monica Tell. The long-time Oakland resident is campaigning for the Trustee Area 3 seat on the Peralta Community College Board of Trustees in the November 2nd general election.

Peralta trustees were recently the subject of a critical report by the Alameda County Grand Jury that cited the lack of fiscal controls, mismanagement, interference in hiring decisions and cronyism. “It’s so bad the colleges are threatened with loss of accreditation,” says Tell.

“When community colleges fail, our communities suffer,” she adds. “Community colleges should be about opportunity, job training and economic security – not waste, fraud and no-bid multi-million dollar contracts for political supporters.”

Tell is a graduate of UC Berkeley and a former student at Laney College, a Peralta institution. In total, the Peralta Colleges serve more than 30,000 East Bay students.

“In an economic crisis, we depend on colleges like Laney and Merritt, but the old leadership has let us down,” says Tell, who currently works for PG&E.

Tell says that the current board of trustees isn’t working for the community and that if she is elected, she will challenge the board to do the right thing. “They were all elected to represent their constituency. We are here to serve - we are serving the 30,000 students to get an excellent education, not just an education,” says Tell, who has been endorsed by Alameda County Superintendent of Schools Shelia Jordan.

Defining the priorities of the board would be her focus if elected she says. “The first priority is to get a focused budget – to look at what money is there and how it’s being used.”

Tell adds that she would also work to help bring in a good chancellor to lead the district, which currently has no-one in the chancellor position.
Looking to election day on November 2, Tell says, “Whether or not I win, people are paying attention now – it’s brought to light a lot of the issues and made people aware of what is happening.”