VOTING DATES AND LOCATIONS
Early Voting: April 24 - May 2
VOTE AT ANY OF THESE PLACES:
- SBISD West Support Center, 2100 Shadowdale
- St. Jerome's Catholic Church, 2749 Hollister Rd.
- Holy Cross Lutheran Church, 7901 Westview
- Wayne F. Schaper, Sr. Leadership Center, 955 Campbell Rdc
- Don Coleman Coliseum, 1050 Dairy Ashford
- Piney Point Village Municipal Bldg, 7676 Woodway
Election Day: Saturday, May 6
VOTE AT YOUR ZONED MIDDLE SCHOOL:
- Northbrook Middle School
- Spring Oaks Middle School
- Spring Forest Middle School
- Spring Woods Middle School
- Spring Branch Middle School
- Memorial Middle School
- Landrum Middle School
Focus
The SBISD Board of Trustees is empowered to set district goals, to oversee our superintendent and to set our district’s budget. That’s IT! The Board’s foray into national news debates, decisions about libraries, and gender politics are distractions – pure and simple. Becky will keep the Board focused on the things that matter, and steer conversations away from nonsense.
Collaboration
Ideally, The members of the Board should reflect the various areas within the school district they serve, using their knowledge and experiences to work together to improve the district as a whole. This is best accomplished when different neighborhoods and school zones are represented. Becky lives in and can best represent the needs of a currently underrepresented part of the district. She will bring that much-needed diversity of thought and experience to ensure a larger portion of the district is reflected in the Trustee membership.
Transparency
The Board is many things, but one thing it is not is a secret society! Sharing of information is vital to the success and enduring improvement within the school district, and Becky will ensure that every person in every neighborhood in the district will have access to information about what the Board is doing, what decisions are being made, and what steps are being taken to make Spring Branch ISD its best!
WHY I'M RUNNING
Over my years as a Spring Branch mom and resident, I have been amazed by the students in SBISD, as well as the educators and administrators throughout the district who support them. We have an exciting opportunity, made possible by the new growth and development in Spring Branch, and we’re poised to make our community and our schools even stronger. The values articulated by Spring Branch ISD provide a solid road map for how to grow strong schools that are capable of protecting every child.
While the majority of our teachers are committed to ensuring that students receive life-changing experiences, and students have exceptional experiences on every SBISD campus, the school board has, for too long, allowed SBISD to develop as two different systems. While one side has some of the highest-achieving schools and most impressive campuses anywhere in Texas, the other is grappling with poverty and instability that often means learning comes secondary to addressing students’ basic needs.
14 SBISD campuses received grades of A or B by Children at Risk, a statewide nonprofit that evaluates school quality. Only one of those is located north of I-10.
That same organization rated 16 SBISD schools with a D or F. All but two of those campuses are located on the north side of the freeway.
Almost every member of the SBISD school board lives in a community with highly successful, and well-resourced neighborhood schools, and they seem content to ignore the glaring problems in half of our district, while they spend time with irrelevant national political distractions. Our community deserves better. We should work to protect every child.
Through my decades of non-profit leadership, I have developed the ability to build unity, focus, and purpose in organizations. I will bring this expertise to the Board of Trustees.
MEET BECKY
Rev. Rebecca (“Becky”) Downs is a Presbyterian minister and long-time resident of Spring Branch. She and her husband of 30 years, Rev. Mark Downs, have two daughters, one a graduate of Stratford and one a senior in the class of 2023 at Spring Woods. As the daughter of one educator and the mother of another, Becky has a passion and commitment to public education.
Becky grew up in north suburban Houston, graduated from Haverford College in Pennsylvania, and received her masters degree at Columbia Theological Seminary in Decatur, Georgia. She and her husband Mark have lived and ministered in a number of places around the country, but came back home to Houston in 2007. Becky was called as the pastor of John Knox Presbyterian Church, on North Gessner, in 2011 and has served the church and the Spring Branch community since then.
Becky is constantly amazed by the students, faculty, and administrators who make SBISD the unique, exceptional, and diverse learning environment in which her children thrived. She believes that with new growth and development in Spring Branch, the district is poised to become even stronger. Reliance upon the district’s historical core values and the expertise of its trained professionals will help to ensure SBISD remains focused on the needs of the students, educators, and families rather than becoming preoccupied by partisan, time-consuming distractions. Such issues serve only to disrupt progress and create controversies with no meaningful impacts on the learning experiences of the students of the District. Through her decades of non-profit leadership, Becky has developed the ability to find consensus, build unity, and maintain focus. She will bring this much-needed expertise to the Board of Trustees.
Becky’s combination of experience in leadership and love for the community and public schools make her a perfect candidate for the SBISD Board of Trustees. She will work with integrity and diligence to enable every child to reach their full potential.
