Dear Target Range neighbors,

You should receive your ballots for the Target Range School board election in the coming days. I’m writing to let you know I’m running for re-election to the Board.

A little about me: My family has lived in Target Range since 2015, and our two boys, 8 and 10, love their school and their teachers. I’m originally from Germany and came to the U.S. in 2005. I work in forestry science, play novice hockey, and spend my free time pulling weeds in the garden.

My past three years on the board were full of challenges but were deeply meaningful to me. We’ve done a lot to strengthen the school administration, including hiring a new superintendent and business manager, and we’re in the process of completely revising our strategic plan for the next five years. We have also started careful indoor air quality improvement work (think wildfire and pathogens) and safety-focused renovations to the building.

The cohesiveness of the current board helped me to get a running start. My personal engagement included:

•    Serving as the financial auditor in my first year;
•    Serving as the vice chair in my second year;
•    Participated in public school trustee trainings and annual meetings from several public school organizations;
•    Representing the board during contract negotiations with unions and staff twice;
•    Producing an analysis of school financing, including quantifying the beneficial financial impact of out-of-district students.

I am particularly proud of the way TRS stayed unified in handling the difficult and constantly evolving COVID situation since the beginning of this school year. The inclusive approach to engaging all staff in decision-making allowed us to open the school in January without backlash, while at the same time tapping into everyone’s capacity as much as possible while we were teaching remotely.

If reelected, I will continue to focus on budgeting, transparent communication with parents, neighbors, and taxpayers, a renewed effort for a building bond, and doing everything I can to keep the TRS community strong – all with the goal to help our students excel.

You can find bios from all four candidates running for the two open seats on the Target Range website.

I would be honored to receive your vote. Please feel free to share this email with friends and neighbors in the District as well. My fellow trustee Sharon Sterbis has my endorsement for the other open seat on the board. If you have any thoughts on the above or about Target Range School in general, I also would love to hear back from you.  Please use the form below to contact me.

Best,

Thomas Buchholz