Ogden School District board members sworn in, board president selected
Arlene Anderson is sworn in as a member of the Ogden School District Board of Education on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2020, in Ogden.
Amber Allred is sworn in as a member of the Ogden School District Board of Education on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2020, in Ogden.
The Ogden School District Board of Education is pictured after a meeting on Thursday, Jan. 7, 2020, in Ogden.
OGDEN — “Estimados padres, estoy aquí para representar ustedes,” said Arlene Anderson after being sworn in as an Ogden School District board member Thursday night.
In English, her words translate to, “Esteemed parents, I am here to represent you.”
In a district that is majority-Hispanic, with 50.9% of students falling under that demographic, Anderson is the first Hispanic board member in 12 years. She and Amber Allred are the newest members of the board.
At the Thursday night board meeting, Anderson and Allred — representing District 1 and District 4, respectively — swore to obey and defend the Constitution. Anderson repeated the words a second time, in Spanish.
She isn’t the first to take the oath in Spanish. In December 2019, Jeremy Shinoda also did. Allred defeated him in last November’s election.
“I wanted to make sure to let Spanish-speaking constituents (and members of the audience) know they could come to me with any questions — that they had someone on the Board of Education with whom they could communicate,” Shinoda said in an email.
As a daughter of Mexican immigrants, including Spanish-speaking parents in the board’s decision-making process is one of the platforms Anderson ran on.
When she and her sisters were students in the Ogden School District, her parents struggled to understand English but still made an effort to attend every parent-teacher conference, she said. Anderson hopes to make it easier for families with backgrounds similar to hers to engage in their students’ education.
According to state school board data, approximately 19% of students in the district are learning English. The majority of those students’ first language is Spanish. Among the things she hopes to accomplish, she said, is “build bridges in bilingual communication where we can work together for the success of all our children.”
“Your voices matter and should be heard in the decisions made by this board,” Anderson said. “Together, we can work to make continuous improvement in the education of every student in our district.”
Allred, in her speech, also highlighted the importance of listening to constituents. During her time campaigning, she said she spent a lot of time speaking to people who live in her district. She heard complaints and concerns, as well as positive stories about the district.
“The more individuals I listened to, the more connected I felt to my district and the stronger my desire became to serve them,” she said.
Anderson defeated incumbent and former board President Don Belnap to secure her seat, so the school board voted Thursday night for his replacement. They selected longtime member Jennifer Zundel, who represents District 3.
Joyce Wilson, who has also been a member of the school board for over a decade, was selected as vice president, despite Anderson throwing her hat into the ring.
“We’ve come a long way in the last 16 years that I’ve served on the board, but we have further to go,” Zundel said. “Things are always progressing, things are always moving forward.”