On Tuesday, February 15, 2022, the four current Coronado Unified School District Board trustees interviewed the applicants for the open CUSD Board seat and then unanimously selected Bruce Shepherd as the appointee.
The meeting opened with public comments while the seven applicants were sequestered in another room. About ten community members spoke on behalf of their favorite candidate. Then each of the candidates was brought into the boardroom and interviewed one by one, answering the same four questions as asked by board members.
The questions focused on qualifications for the school board, equity and inclusion, stance on Covid mandates, and the district budget. Following the interview process, each board member expressed support of one of the seven individuals. Pontes, Dr. Anderson Cruz, and Valdes-Clayton all expressed support for Bruce Shepherd, while Whitney Antrim chose Alexis Palacios-Peters. A Motion was made to appoint Bruce Shepherd, and the vote in favor was unanimous.
After the meeting, Shepherd commented, “I’m honored. I think that we really had a very good candidates. But I’m only going to do it for a limited time period. On we go, there’s work to be done.” The limited time period Shepherd refers to is because in the November 2022 election the interim seat he’s filling will be open (as will three others), and he previously stated that he will not run for a seat so that “the community can have the opportunity to watch potential candidates in candidate forums and the like, and to assess which candidates will be the best fit for Coronado voters going forward.”
