Nancy Peterson has worked as a volunteer at Montgomery Elementary for 12 years. She has seen Montgomery become the first campus in Davis to enter Program Improvement status and has become a fierce advocate to at-risk and Title I children.
She brings to the school board race a candidate whose own children have been at Montgomery and who has a firsthand view of what happens when a school goes through program improvement.
In an interview with the Vanguard this week, she attributes that fierce advocacy to her upbringing and her experience watching how her father related to disadvantaged children as a pediatrician at Columbia University’s Presbyterian Hospital in New York.
For 47 years his specialty was juvenile diabetes.
“Families that have a child with diabetes, it’s a big change in the lifestyle because you have to get used to your medications and keeping your blood sugar level,” Nancy Peterson told the Vanguard.
A doctor who works with children, often disadvantaged children, does not have a traditional job where you arrive at work at 9 am and leave your work behind at 5 pm.
For Dr. Peterson, his day would begin at 6 am.
“My dad would begin his call hour at 6 am when kids would be getting up and getting ready for schools,” she said. “So the phone would start ringing and my father would be talking to parents about sending their kids to school and getting ready for the day.”
Her father would work with both private patients and at the diabetic clinic, which he ran at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center for thirty years.
“His clinic patients and his private patients all had his home phone number,” she said. “Because to my dad it didn’t matter what your background was, what your economic situation was, every child deserved the same treatment in order to be ready to go to school to have their life.”
“I learned from a very early age that everybody’s important and that your background has no bearing as to how you should be treated as a person,” she added.
Nancy Peterson remembers one critical moment in particular. It was a Friday night and her family had always had dinner together. But this time, her father came home late. She asked him when he finally came home what kept him so long.
It turned out one of his patients did not come at his appointed time. He would not arrive until two hours past his appointment hour.
Nancy Peterson asked her father why he didn’t just go since the boy had missed his appointment.
Her father responded, “He’s not responsible for the fact that his parents could not get him to the clinic on time. He is my patient.”
“From that period I realize that kids all deserve the best that we can give them, irrespective of whether their parents are able to do or not to do – all kids deserve an equal chance to be as successful as possible,” Nancy Peterson says. This is the lesson that she learned from her children that she now applies to today, working with Title I parents in South Davis and district wide.
Throughout her time in New York, she went to public school from kindergarten all the way through high school graduation.
She attended junior high in the Washington Heights area of New York where she lived. Almost the entire school, about 95 percent, was Title I, low-income families.
She remembers that the entire school got free lunches through the Title I program, regardless of income.
“The numbers were so high for the poverty families it was more work to try to weed out the few families that did not qualify for free lunches than to just have everyone get free lunch,” she said.
Nancy Peterson relates another story from her childhood. It was junior high and she entered the restroom only to find that two girls were attempting to set another girl’s hair on fire.
“Part of me wanted to just get out of the bathroom right now,” she said. “But I thought, ‘I cannot leave with this happening, I have to try to stop it.’ “
She didn’t exactly know what to do and she says she didn’t do much other than to say, “I don’t think that’s a good idea” or “I don’t think you should be doing that.”
She said that fortunately, at that point, she was already quite tall at 5 feet 9 inches in height. She said, laughing ironically, “I don’t know if I was an intimidating person, as my knees were shaking. But they looked at me and the two girls left the bathroom.”
“It was that moment in my life when you realize you just can’t walk away when things are bad, you have to try to fix it,” Nancy Peterson added. “As scared as I was, because I thought this could be a beating for me, I just thought I just can’t leave that girl in the bathroom by herself.”
She doesn’t know what happened after she left the bathroom other than her being relieved that the incident was over and resolved without a physical altercation.
Nancy Peterson, even at this young age, observed the struggles that these families had to go through to get by. They were coming from backgrounds where many were immigrant families, many were just struggling to get by.
She was a lucky one. She had a supportive family, with monetary means and not having to struggle to put food and basic necessities on the table.
“It’s always made me very cognizant and sympathetic towards a family, that things are much more of a struggle for them,” she said arguing that this why she has always been an advocate for Title I families and those with struggles in this community.
Poverty is not the only reason for struggles she said, but she has always wanted to help people as much as she can.
She believes, regardless of economic and ethnic backgrounds, “All parents want the same thing… they want them to have a better life, a happy and as easy a time as possible, we all want that for our kids, but for some it’s harder to give that to them or to have the resources to allow them to reach their potential.”
She believes when that occurs, it falls to the community to step up and give the kids the resources they need in order to be successful in life.
Many residents may believe that Davis does not have a Title I population at all. However, there are pockets of poverty even within Davis. For instance, Montgomery runs at nearly 50 percent Title I students and other schools have as much as a quarter of their populations being Title I students.
“As the economic downturn has lasted longer than any of us have hoped, many more families are struggling with different issues – loss of jobs, lower salaries, so there are a lot more people feeling the pinch of economic trouble,” she said.
This perspective is one that Nancy Peterson believes is missing from the school district right now.
“As a community grows in the number of second language learners and also grows in the number of Title I families,” she said, she has seen both in her youth and as a parent that impact on a community and she feels she brings that perspective that is sorely lacking from the school board currently.
“There is a strong need to have a long term strategic plan for all of our schools, and particularly when things are changing or so fluid at different sites that you need to be able to react to the changes and have a strategic plan for where each is going to go,” she said, referring to the whole district.
“I think that our long term vision has been lacking for some time,” Nancy Peterson concluded.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
I met her recently at the Wednesday Farmers Market and at a social function. She impressed me with her knowledge of the issues, and long term track record of working with kids and families. She understands not all kids in Davis have an upper middle class background and are destined to go to UC with + 4.0 GPAs and one year of college done because of the AP classes at Davis High. She seems like a caring, loving person.
She does not view the DJUSD Board as a career political stepping stone to the City Council or other elected position.
I put her signs in my yard across from the Co-Op, and recommend that all readers try to meet her and take a serious look at supporting her.
I’m sure she will work hard for all the kids and I’m not opposed to her as a candidate but I am dismayed by the notion that those who have observed the less fortunate understand what its like to be underprivileged. The daughter of a doctor who holds a Ph.D may have a sense of noblesse oblige that is greater than Mitt Romney’s. She may even be better suited to the task of serving 100% of the children, but, the notion that she understands the hardships of the day to day struggles of those unlike herself is difficult to swallow.
By the way, I have seen this before on the school board when Sue Chan challenged the status quo of Board President Joan Sallee and David Murphy, the reaction from the powers that be was akin to how dare she protest, doesn’t she know we are doing what we can for people like her.
I remember when I was on the CC that the DJUSD was pushing hard to open new schools. They based the need on a large influx of new students from the growth model that the 2002-3 CC put into place (Covell Village and 1800 new homes). I knew it sure as day that when the new schools were in place, and CV was soundly defeated 60/40 by the voters, that the better organized and vociferous parents in the newer neighborhoods that had the new schools would force the DJUSD to close Valley Oak, not a new school that was overbuilt on a whim and prayer that CV housing would come on line. The children from the older, poorer neighborhoods in Davis lost their neighborhood school.
It was completely, totally predictable to me as far back as when Ruth and Ted were elected in 2002 and came up with that completely irrationale 1% assumed population growth model, which even now is being used by the water plant proponents to justify the need for a much too large and expensive surface water plant.
That’s why I find it offensive when DJUSD candidates/members take a pass on giving opinions on the most important urban planning issues with the City. Urban planning necessarily involves a head count of new people, and that directly effects the DJUSD planning function. Those five DJUSD Board members are fiduciaries to the interests of the children, and they have to be true to that overriding requirement.
Conagra is going to wreck the safety of the streets from that parcel all the way to the downtown for kids and others on bicycles; we all know the service levels are going to F, just like Covell Village would have done, yet here the DJUSD sits there, mute. Sad and disappointing.
Mr. T: [i]I am dismayed by the notion that those who have observed the less fortunate understand what its like to be underprivileged.[/i]
I don’t know that I specifically relate to her experiences growing up, but I have seen her in action as a volunteer at Montgomery and with the Davis Bridge Foundation. In either case, you cannot be a diligent leader and volunteer and not confront the Davis version of poverty. To me she has some credibility on those grounds.
I’m sure she has some sensitivity to issues of poverty its just that having your father come home late for dinner is not the same as there being no dinner.
I guess what bothers me is if she will think she can better represent the interests of those who have less to the exclusion of being able to hear and truly understand the needs and desires of those she claims to want to champion.
It seems if the achievement gap is the defining issue of our time Fernandez may actually be a better fit. i need to look at his background again.
It’s a touching story, but does it qualify someone to be on a school board? Perhaps I’m naive, but I think members of this governing body should have exemplary experience in higher education, from kindergarten to university. Obviously, no single person can do it all, but at the same time I don’t want someone on training wheels driving the DJUSD bike. It’s funny/tragic that two candidates actually have devoted a substantial amount of their adult lives to delivering education and have the best credentials of all, but either don’t have or won’t spend the money it takes to get elected. Our loss.
Shane: [i]…I think members of this governing body should have exemplary experience in higher education, from kindergarten to university.[/i]
Don’t know what you have in mind when you speak of exemplary experience, but Peterson does have a PhD.
[i]…I don’t want someone on training wheels driving the DJUSD bike.[/i]
In this case I find the sum of Peterson’s volunteer work to be substantial and relevant — site based (Montgomery, Harper, & DHS Blue & White Foundation) and district based (Superintendent Parent Advisory Committee, Davis Bridge Foundation) plus other groups. I’m convinced she is the most knowledgeable of the newcomers on district budget, curriculum, social climate, and pedagogical.
[i]…tragic that two candidates actually have devoted a substantial amount of their adult lives to delivering education and have the best credentials of all, but either don’t have or won’t spend the money it takes to get elected.[/i]
College level teaching and experience does not necessarily mean one is ready to handle K-12 issues.
“its just that having your father come home late for dinner is not the same as there being no dinner.”
I think you miss the purpose of her story it’s not that she understands what it’s like to have no food, it’s that she understood from her father’s behavior the obligation of citizens to help those less fortunate. And that obligation doesn’t end at dinner time. I hope I am successfully able to teach my own kids that lesson.
Certainly David, someone as critical of Murphy and the board that supported him as you were should understand the danger of confusing being a do-gooder and doing good. Of course as John F. Kennedy said “For of those to whom much is given, much is required.” My concern about my second vote is that between Fernandez and Peterson (because I don’t see Granda or Sherman as viable) who has the better ability to represent the needs and desires of those trying to bridge the achievement gap. My concern is that Peterson’s story might indicate that she confuses her vision and the vision of those she is trying to lift up as being the same. The question I need to decide is if we would be better served by someone who has actually bridged the achievement gap as opposed to someone who understands we need to bridge the gap, but, who has only seen it from above?
My only intention was to clarify her statement as I understood it.
My purpose here was not to settle that point. I don’t think that’s my place.
[b]wdf1:[/b] [i]Don’t know what you have in mind when you speak of exemplary experience, but Peterson does have a PhD. [/i]
A PhD doesn’t mean you know how to educate; it just means that you’ve had an education. If that’s what it took to be qualified, then a substantial proportion of Davis would be qualified. There’s a chilling thought.
I’m not even convinced that the volunteer work — [i]however laudable[/i] — is good enough. Experience has to be relevant and demonstrably outstanding. A lot of people in this country thought that GW Bush deserved re-election because his experience from his previous four years as president was better than changing course mid-stream. I personally thought my building’s janitor had better ideas and could have more easily passed an English college entrance exam. Then again, would you be better off with a lobbyist who worked for a firm with clients that included Philip Morris and PG&E (love what they did for Davis – or [i]to[/i] Davis). There’s “The Company You Keep.”
I suppose it’s debatable that college-level teaching qualified one to deal with K-12 issues. On the other hand, at a college you certainly see what’s coming up through the pipeline, and it’s a lot easier to look down from that vantage point than the other way around. To put it another way, having simply gone to college doesn’t qualify one to be a college educator, but a college educator probably has a much broader perspective on educating all students, whether pre-college or college.
[b]Mr.Toad:[/b] Don’t be so quick to write off the two non-profligate spending candidates. Around 1/3 of Davis voters don’t like additional taxes, and Granda probably has a lock on those voters right off the bat because of his stand on Measure E. If many of those are single-issue voters, then they may only cast their vote for him, so he could be a wildcard. Plus, agree with him or not, he’s smart and well-reasoned and clearly altruistic, unlike some of his brethren who are anti-E. Sherman seems to be the brightest of all, and seems to trade the traditional route of meticulously building and currying support from the Davis power brokers in favor of taking an analytic, best-practices view of running a school district. I’m seeing her ideas all over the internet. If people prefer substance over style (glossy non-recyclable mailers, plastic signs, inane slogans that imply that people are too lame-brained to remember more than about seven words in a sentence or two) then you might be surprised next Tuesday.
one of my concerns with shane’s comments is that it seems to elevate the board member over the professional educator. we don’t need people who will be experts on education – that’s why the district has professionals making policy. the board’s job is to real manage the finances and to be the conduit to the public.
“Around 1/3 of Davis voters don’t like additional taxes, and Granda probably has a lock on those voters right off the bat because of his stand on Measure E.”
If that were true how come so many extra fees have passed with more than 2/3 in Davis?
Shane: [i]To put it another way, having simply gone to college doesn’t qualify one to be a college educator, but a college educator probably has a much broader perspective on educating all students, whether pre-college or college.[/i]
Having taught at the college level, I can offer these perspectives.
Sure you can understand where some students will end up, but college is a self-selecting population. You don’t see who is not there, and hence you don’t appreciate the alternative pathways and struggles that non-college-bound students take.
K-12 is compulsory, so you see nearly every kid in the community who comes through the door, college is optional.
K-12 you’re dealing with kids mostly under 18; in college you’re dealing with adults.
In K-12 you address and work directly with the student, but you’re also interacting with their parents. In college it’s mostly just the adult students.
In K-12 you deal with students who may not choose to go to college. How do you meet their needs vs. those who are on a college trajectory.
From a teaching perspective, there is a much bigger burden of classroom management in K-12 than in college. There is a lot more scrutiny of K-12 teaching than college. There is generally less pay to teach K-12 than college. To think that college level teaching experience uniquely qualifies one to understand K-12 issues is excessive arrogance.
Mr.Toad: [i]If that were true how come so many extra fees have passed with more than 2/3 in Davis? [/i]
Notice, [i]sir[/i], that I wrote “Around 1/3.” Measure A passed in 2011 with 67.2% of the vote. Measure C passed in 2012 with 72.3% of the vote. However [i]you[/i] want to parse it, there is a sizable anti-tax group alive and well in Davis, and they may very well throw their support behind Granda.
WDF1: [i]To think that college level teaching experience uniquely qualifies one to understand K-12 issues is excessive arrogance.[/i]
You seem defensive. I looked back over my posting and nowhere did I say “uniquely qualifies.” I did say it’s debatable, which you have now confirmed. I did say that a college educator probably has a broader perspective on educating all students because they see the [i]products[/i] of K-12 education, and if that is “excessive arrogance” then so be it. The variety of students that one sees in a junior college, for example, is enormous, and because all Californians can go to junior colleges that kind of higher-level perspective should be considered an [i]asset[/i] (certainly not a detriment, and your comments suggest you see this as either/or). Your points about “In K-12” are well taken, but they seem to be describing K-12 teachers, and that’s not the same as someone on a school board. I haven’t gone over everyone’s biography, but I don’t remember any of the top three fundraisers in this race being K-12 teachers. So I think your points would be more germane if some or all of them were (that would make them vastly more qualified), because no one is questioning the enormity of the contributions that public school teachers make.
Shane: [i] I did say that a college educator probably has a broader perspective on educating all students because they see the products of K-12 education,[/i]
Not all the products, only the ones that happen to come their way.
If I seem defensive, it is probably because I have engaged in a lot of on site K-12 volunteer work for the past few years, and I see where many of my previous assumptions (which seem to resemble yours) have changed. I also think volunteer work has been undervalued by many as worthwhile experience in a school board candidate. On this point I do appreciate Sherman’s value as a candidate, though I’m not convinced she has a grasp on the issues that get discussed in school board meetings.