McHenry Times

Sleepy Hollow resident Laurie Parman is a candidate for a seat on the Community Unit School District 300 school board.

“Teachers are burned out for many reasons.  Among these reasons is the constant changing of reading series, information platforms, testing instruments," Parman, a retired teacher said. "These constant changes produce teacher exhaustion and make them like ‘first-year teachers’ every couple of years. Eventually, this shows up in the student outcomes.” 

“I am running for the District 300 School Board to highlight strategic issues such as student achievement, teacher burnout, and parent dissatisfaction,” Parman told the McHenry Times. “Before the COVID lockdowns only 38% of our students could read and write at grade level.  After the COVID lockdowns only 27% of students are literate. This should alarm parents and the community as well. Clearly, something is wrong when the academic mission of the district is a complete failure.”

She said that, “In District 300, parents are trying to register alarm with these issues, but in return for their concern, they receive the label, Angry Disrupters, while the school board continues to vote 7-0. on many issues.”

“If elected to this board, I may only be one vote, but I intend to vote as I see," Parman said. "I intend to faithfully wade through papers given before votes. Educational text can be very difficult to read. But I intend to read it before I vote.”

With her 30 years of teaching, she spent her last 22 years in the district. She taught both elementary and high school. Parman has a master's degree and a doctorate in Educational Leadership. She also participated in many and various district committees in the district, including two boundary committees, and Common Core alignment for literacy standards.

“I am the mother of five graduates of this district and I now have 10 grandchildren," Parman added. "My first grandchild entered District 300 this year and has had a very great experience despite initial challenges he came in with. They gathered a wonderful team around him. Over the next three years, I will have four grandchildren in the district. I am very invested not only in my family but in the families of all the children in the district.”

Parman is one of six newcomers seeking election to the board. There are four open seats. The other five newcomers are Olutola Makinde, Randi Gauthier, Robert Reining, Connie Cain, and Kristina Konstanty. 

District 300 includes all or part of Algonquin, Lake in the Hills, Carpentersville, and West Dundee.

Community Unit School District 300 is headquartered at 2550 Harnish Drive in Algonquin. It oversees 28 schools and 20,293 children. The district employs 1,431 classroom teachers and 1,172 other staff members.