For the past few years, most of the attention and energy at Akron Public Schools unfortunately has focused on performance issues with the past two superintendents, the school board’s dysfunction and the unhealthy relationship between the administrations and board members.

This has cost the district financially – the contract buyout to part ways with Superintendent Christine Fowler-Mack in 2023 totaled $462,585.68, not mention significant legal fees. But more importantly, it has negatively impacted the education of the district’s 20,000 students. Yes, APS’s rating in this year’s state report card improved, but it also revealed that only 45% of the district’s third graders read at a proficient level.

In 2023, Gov. Mike DeWine took the teeth out of the state’s Third Grade Reading Guarantee when he signed a budget that, unlike before, allows parents whose children did not pass the third grade state reading test to sign a waiver to promote the child to the fourth grade anyway. The research is clear: promoting children to the fourth grade who cannot read at the third grade level significantly increases drop-out rates.

If the district’s current graduation rate of just under 89% is to improve, early literacy needs urgent attention. And that is but one complex issue facing the district. There are also financial concerns – rebuilding North High, construction of a building for the newly merged Pfeiffer and Miller South schools and a looming budget shortfall in 2028. Successfully addressing these issues and more requires strong leadership in both the administration and the school board.

Choosing board members, which voters are asked to do in the upcoming election, should be approached like hiring high-level personnel at a business with an annual budget of over half a billion dollars, because that’s what it is. What matters most are the qualifications of the candidates.

Fortunately, in this election highly qualified candidates are on the ballot, and Akron citizens have an opportunity to replace weak members with qualified ones, Phil Montgomery and Gwen Bryant.

For nearly four years, Montgomery has been Summit County’s director of finance and budget, managing annual budgets of more than $160 million. Prior to that, he was the chief financial officer for Summit County Job and Family Services with annual budgets around $45 million. The district needs the financial acumen Montgomery would bring to the school board as it makes the critical financial and infrastructure decisions it faces.

Bryant has worked in education for over 30 years, starting as a teacher in Akron’s schools. For the past 14, she has worked as an educational consultant at Instructional Empowerment Inc., whose mission is “to end generational poverty and eliminate achievement gaps through redesigned rigorous Tier 1 instruction.”

Bryant has worked with hundreds of school districts in cities across the country, including Chicago, DC, Baltimore, Detroit, Portland and Oklahoma City, to improve their educational outcomes. In electing Bryant voters would hire an experienced educator and educational consultant who will bring a sophisticated understanding of the educational problems facing the district and the best practices for solving them. 

Montgomery and Bryant must replace Diana Autry and Carla Jackson. Autry and Jackson were members of the school board that, in the summer of 2023, rushed through the hiring of former superintendent Michael Robinson despite community leaders citywide calling for the board to wait until after elections that fall. Throughout Robinson’s unendingly bombastic tenure, including the final weeks before he left following an investigation concluding he created a toxic work environment, Autry remained obsequiously deferential to Robinson.

Not surprisingly Jackson, who is principal of a private religious school in Akron that accepts vouchers, supports the school voucher program. This is why many find her position on the board of a public school district a conflict of interest.

The other sitting board member running for election is Pastor Gregory Harrison. Harrison was chosen last October to replace board member Job Perry when he stepped down to become a Summit County Court of Common Pleas magistrate. Harrison has been a fixture at school board meetings for many years, often as a vocal critic of both the district’s priorities and the dysfunction of its leadership. If anyone thought putting him on the board would keep him quiet, they were misguided.

Harrison, unlike some of his board colleagues, attends every board meeting thoroughly prepared to discuss agenda items. He is passionately committed to solving the problems of low student language and math literacy skills. Harrison deserves to remain on the board for a full term as the district continues to overcome past poor leadership and tackle the serious challenges it faces.

Early voting begins Tuesday, October 7.

This column was first published in the Akron Beacon Journal on Sunday, September 28, 2025.