ELECT DAVE WILLIAMS FOR ASHLAND SCHOOL BOARD

A letter to Ashland Families

Friends and Neighbors,

I’m asking for your trust and support as I run for the Ashland School Board this November. As a parent of two students in our district, I’m deeply committed to ensuring that all of our children receive the education they need to thrive—not just now, but after graduation as they enter the world. I believe that together, we can reimagine and reshape Ashland Independent Schools into a district that provides even better opportunities for all students.

Over the coming weeks, I will be sharing my vision for how we can achieve this, and I invite you to join the conversation. I want to hear your thoughts, concerns, and hopes for our schools. A great resource for evaluating our district is the Kentucky Department of Education’s “Report Card,” which offers valuable insight into how we measure up to other districts across the state. It’s time to make every student’s experience a priority, let’s make every student relevant.

Here are some of my top priorities:

School Safety: We need to identify and address the vulnerabilities in our schools. By bringing in experts to assess our buildings, we can create meaningful solutions that will ensure our children’s safety.
Transparency: We must put an end to “emergency special meetings” for non-emergency matters. For example, the Board of Education held a special meeting on September 13th, just 10 days before today’s regularly scheduled meeting, to approve the purchase of a new Central Office. This building had been on the market for 835 days, yet a special meeting was called at noon on a Friday, limiting public discussion.
Vocational Opportunities: Our community is feeling the impact of a shortage of skilled tradespeople like plumbers, HVAC technicians, and electricians. By expanding vocational programs in our schools, we can prepare our students—both male and female—for careers that are in high demand locally. I have a plan to secure the old Ashland State Vocational-Technical School on Roberts Drive (currently part of ACTC), read about my plan below.
Fiscal Responsibility: We must be more careful stewards of taxpayer money. On August 26th, the Board approved a 4% tax increase, but this decision wasn’t documented in the meeting minutes. Boyd County Schools passed a similar tax increase, which was publicly discussed. Compare their modern school facilities to Ashland’s, and it’s clear that we need to ask hard questions about where our tax dollars are going.

I’m committed to making Ashland schools the best they can be, but I need your help. Please feel free to share this message and reach out with your thoughts as we work together for the future of Ashland’s students. Thank you for your time and consideration.

Let’s build a better future for our children.

Dave Williams

A new Vocational School is POSSIBLE!

Everyone agrees our country is desperate to fill the void of many skilled trades retirees and Ashland is seeing this shortage too. Ashland Independent School district does not have a dedicated building specifically designed to teach these important Vocational Trade opportunities. However this has changed in the last month and I have a plan to prepare Paul Blazer graduates for meaningful careers.

ACTC recently announced their Roberts Drive campus (AKA, Ashland State Vocational-Technical School), will be vacated in the Fall of 2025. Because Paul Blazer students attended the Roberts Drive campus from the mid 70's through the 90's it seems only fitting Paul Blazer students be allowed to access them again to be trained for great paying careers in high demand. I spent days scouring through legislative budgets and Kentucky Department of Education documents from the early 70's to find a written agreement of some kind that allowed Paul Blazer students to attend Roberts Drive campus and I found it! You can review this document by opening it at the bottom under Supporting Documents, file "Roberts Drive Promise".

The current board members have made minimum efforts on their own the last three years to add more vocational trade opportunities. The addition of HVAC and Welding programs would not have occurred without the consistent pressing from myself and a few other concerned citizens. Adding the two buildings on Roberts Drive, which total 35,000 sq-ft, will give our children a state of the art facility. But I need your vote on November 5th to be part of the decision making process. I will press the Board of Education to change curriculum to make every student relevant and ready for post graduation.

The Ashland Board of Education must begin working with ACTC immediately to secure the two vocational buildings as well as preparing a grant for $10 million dollars like Boyd County received in 2022. The 3rd and likely last Vocational School grant offering will be sent to remaining eligible districts in January 2025 and Ashland Independent is at the top of the list. I will ensure this happens if elected to represent your family on the Ashland School Board.

Our children are the future of our community, and I am deeply concerned about the Post Graduation Readiness data from the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE), which shows a large gap between male and female graduates from Paul Blazer High School. While our female graduates consistently rank in the top 20% of all Kentucky high schools, our male graduates tend to rank in the bottom 25% in terms of readiness for life after high school. When combined, this places Paul Blazer in the middle of all Kentucky high schools. This raises an important question: why is there such a significant gap between male and female graduates?

A key factor appears to be the need for more vocational trade curriculum opportunities that appeal to our male students. With the right opportunities, we could better prepare them for careers in the trades, and, ultimately, help replace the skilled workers retiring in our community.

Learn More

The post secondary information that I have referenced in my Vocational Trade Information can easily be found on the KDE webpage.

Find out more