Ryan Jurek
Please tell us a little bit about yourself and your family.
My name is Ryan Jurek. I am 29 years old and have lived in the Foley and Duelm area my entire life. I attended, and graduated, from Foley High School in 1997. From there I attended St. Cloud State University in the aviation program. Currently I am employed by Knife River Corporation in the concrete division. I live in Duelm with my wife, Emmylou, and our 3 children Taylor (10), Kaylee (6) and Abbey (2). Taylor and Kaylee both attend school at Foley and my wife Emmylou works at the Foley Intermediate School as a Paraprofessional.
What experience do you have that prepares you for public office?
Experience that I have that prepares me for public office comes partially from my experiences in the business world. Here I've had to deal with a wide variety of people, as well as budgeting issues and cutbacks. Having lived in the Foley community for the last 29 years, I have a good understanding of how the community feels about the issues and what their values and beliefs are. In my opinion, this is probably the most important aspect of my experience that I bring to the table; real world experience, as well as a good understanding of the community and its people. Being a taxpayer and a parent to 3 children who are, attending, or will attend, Foley schools are my greatest assets in guiding me, if elected. We have to give value to the taxpayers of our district without forgetting what the schools are there for; the children of this community.
Why you decided to run for this office.
My choice to run for office came because of my children and the opportunities that will be afforded to them in the future. For the last two years I have attended many of the school board meetings concerning the budget. I have seen many opportunities, including teachers for our children, being cut without much discussion or challenge from the board to our leaders. I want to make sure that our kids will be afforded all of the programs and opportunities that we were afforded not that many years ago. During the past two years that I have gone to the school board meetings, I have realized that something needed to be done about our schools and the decisions being made. The current school board had a lot of nice people on it with the right intentions, but many were unwilling to stand up for the community and its values. Standing up and speaking out is not an easy task, but I feel that is what the people on the school board are supposed to do. This helped me decide to run. I figure, I could sit back and talk about what things need to be changed, or I could be elected and do something to help.
Top three issues you would tackle, if elected.
The top three issues I would address if elected are as follows. First, I would address our schools budgeting issues, including our administrative costs. Over the last several years, Foley has had to make budget reductions to remain fiscally responsible. Looking into the future, the next four years will be challenging ones, with budgets getting tighter and costs continuing to rise. I don't feel that raising taxes or creating levies will be an option, so budget reductions are inevitable with each becoming more and more painful. This is where we need a school board that is strong and willing to challenge leaders to make different changes. In my opinion, our administrative costs in the school have not been addressed enough in the past. Last year, at the budget cut meetings, it was brought up that some felt that Foley was doing pretty well at controlling our administrative costs. Our administrative costs, as a percentage of the total budget, put us just below average among other schools in the state. This means that half of the schools are doing worse than we are in this aspect. It also means that just over half of them are doing better than us as well. In my opinion average is not good enough. It is my belief and opinion that those schools doing better than us at controlling their costs, will probably perform better than us in student achievement as well. These schools can now spend more money in the classroom and programs which directly affect students. For both taxpayers' and students' sake, we need to do far better than average and become the leaders in the state going forward. The second issue I will address is to protect student class sizes. I feel that this is one thing Foley has been able to pride itself on in the past. By controlling our costs in other areas this is something we can continue to do in the future. It is my opinion that smaller class sizes and more student/teacher time will benefit students academically and socially. If a teacher has too many students to deal with, he/she will spend more time managing their classrooms and less time teaching which will not help our district in the short or long term. The third issue I will address is to protect student opportunities. I feel that students coming to Foley need to be afforded the opportunity to succeed both academically and socially through sports and extra curricular activities. Many educators will agree a district will succeed if it sets the focus on developing the whole student rather than just educating them academically. If elected, I will tackle these three items, as well as any others that may arise in the future. I will always do what's best for the students and taxpayers, by questioning and challenging our leaders. The thing to remember is who will just do what they are told and who will stand up for our students and our community. With your support, we can make Foley a leader and not just average at best.