phone
785-493-2981
Campaign Phone
785-825-7135
phone (work)
785-309-0390
phone (home)
785-825-7135
Personal Biography
Ann Zimmerman, Salina, elected to her third term on the Salina school board, has a deep understanding of what works and what doesn’t in Kansas public schools. She graduated from Salina public schools, from K-State (Manhattan) in elementary education, and later from Harvard with a law degree. Her law practice is in mediation. She is also a singer-songwriter, performing dozens of school programs yearly. She knows the heroic efforts and remarkable success of teachers and staff at Kansas schools.
Community/Public Service
Ann has served on Salina’s school board for eleven years. She volunteers with the League of Women Voters, registering voters, urging them to get informed and vote. She teaches children’s Sunday school. She helped start the Salina Initiative for Restorative Justice (SIRJ) and mediates between juvenile offenders and their victims. She mentors new mediators and trains others in dispute resolution across Kansas. An award-winning singer-songwriter, she performs across Kansas and around the country.
Education
Salina High School South, diploma. Kansas State University, Manhattan, B.S. in Elementary Education. Harvard Law School, Juris Doctor degree, plus 38 years of continuing legal education.
Ballot City
Salina
County
Saline
Home Phone
785-825-7135
email_added
ann.zimmerman.music@gmail.com
Kansas schools need a champion who will support public schools and work to improve them, not destroy them. I have a deep understanding of teaching, learning and the need for a great education. Three times, Salina voters have elected me to our school board, so for eleven years I have studied what works and what doesn’t in public education. I went to public schools in Salina and have degrees in both elementary education (from K-State, Manhattan) and law (from Harvard). My legal practice is in mediation and dispute resolution. I will use those skills on the Kansas Board of Education (KSBE). Each year, I make dozens of presentations in schools. My opponent has opted her children out of public schools and homeschools them.
1) First: Funding. The legislature determines funding. Schools have been shorted on special education funds for over a decade. The legislature adequately funded gen. ed. only after being forced to in lawsuits filed by underfunded districts. KSBE will provide accurate data to legislators.
2) Next: Teacher/staff shortage. Better funding would help a lot, and anti-public-school dark-money groups must stop twisting facts to undermine confidence in public schools. KSBE will provide accurate facts.
3) Finally: The continued effort to teach literacy. This is an ongoing struggle. In our society, fewer and fewer people read text longer than a social media post. Recent literacy training requirements for teachers pre-K through high school should help.
Students who feel welcome and accepted, who feel like they belong in their school, excel over those who feel like outsiders alienated from the rest of the school population. The students of course also need to have their basic needs met for food, shelter and clothing.
KSBE, along with the Kansas Department of Education (KSDE), can provide reliable information and data to legislators. That is already happening. In recent years the voice of reason has been hard to hear over the din of misinformation provided by well-funded anti-public-schools groups. The U.S. Supreme Court says that money equals speech. In Kansas, an extremely rich few are working to tear down public education - their wealth has given them an overwhelming volume of “speech.” The legislature has mostly listened to them rather than to the good data collected from our public schools and presented by KSBE and KSDE. Kansans must elect public-school-friendly legislators and public-school-friendly KSBE board members.
