By Taylor Boyd
Caroline Jones is seeking the Smith River District seat on the Patrick County School Board in the November election.
Jones, 38, said she made the decision to run because she is concerned.
“I’m a parent of two kids at Woolwine Elementary School, and I’ve just been concerned about our kids’ education, their future, our school’s future, and our community,” she said.
Jones began talking about running for the position with family and friends last year, and decided to run because she feels like she would be a reliable advocate for teachers, faculty, staff, and other parents – something she attributes in part to her work background.
“I’ve worked in customer service for over 15 years. I do work for retail, but in my part of the business, I’m a market asset protection operations lead, so I work and supervise 10 separate stores in the area. I help to review processes and look for root concerns and come up with sustainable plans and so those are attributes I think would be good,” she said.
Additionally, “I’m an investigator for my work, so I look deeper than the easy answer, and I don’t take the quick and easy response. I think that those are things that are good, quality characteristics that would be beneficial to the school board,” Jones said.
A child’s education and the quality of education and experience they receive is the top priority, she said. “Secondly it’s our faculty and staff and our teachers. They need a voice and they need to be heard. They do tremendous amounts for our kids, and I can’t thank my school’s teachers, and kids, and staff enough for what they’ve done for my family,” she said.
Jones said her biggest concern right now is COVID-19 and how it is affecting the school system and youngsters’ ability to receive an education.
“I’d say most of the challenges that our school system is facing right now are due to COVID. Our kids’ education is being hindered due to the guidelines that we have to follow with COVID. Our teachers are stressed to the max and exhausted. Our kids are getting burnt out,” Jones said.
“I have a straight A fifth grader, and she is starting to have some Bs. I’m not giving her a hard time over that. I’m just concerned about the kids that truly struggle and if they are getting left behind,” Jones said. “I’d say some of the current struggles that we’re having is exhaustion from the side effects of strains and stress that COVID has put on our area.”
She said she does not have any particular policies to push, aside from allowing parents more decision-making power regarding the safety of their children, partly because she is not in the inner circle and does not know what opportunities are available.
“Obviously I think that our teachers need a voice and they need to understand and be valued and I don’t think that’s always the case,” she said.
Additionally, “If I should feel comfortable sending my kids to school, I should be allowed to do so, and if I feel like it’s not safe to send my kids as a parent, I should be able to make the decision to keep them at home,” she said, adding the school board has already approved the four-day in-person education option.
“I obviously want to do what I can for our school and community to help keep a positive outlook and help keep our county healthy to help keep all of our schools open,” she said.
