By Caitlyn Meisner | cmeisner@alextimes.com

Ryan Reyna, a new candidate for the Alexandria School Board, is ready to bring his education knowledge to the Board, particularly with looming redistricting for the city’s schools. Reyna is also focused on strengthening school safety and delivering on collective bargaining.

“I had wanted to give more time and energy to the local community, because most of my work is nationally or in other states,” Reyna said. “… I’m excited about the ability to really take [my expertise] and hopefully help [the Board] address some of the big issues.”

Reyna was born and raised in Sacramento, California, but moved to Northern Virginia as a teenager when his father started a job with the federal government. He received his bachelor’s degree from the University of Virginia and his master’s in public policy from the University of Texas at Austin.

Now living in Del Ray with his wife and two daughters who attend Mount Vernon Community School, Reyna coleads the education consulting firm, Education Strategy Group, by connecting K-12 and higher education students with the workforce.

“I spend a lot of my time working with local leaders, state leaders, nonprofits and philanthropies, thinking about how to bring about more economic mobility and opportunity, especially for students of color and low income students,” he said.

Before his work with ESG, Reyna served in the Delaware Department of Education in the Office of Accountability and Data Management and in the National Governors Association Center as an education program director.

And for the past three years, Reyna has served as the chair of the Board’s budget advisory committee, which he said has given him an opportunity to understand the budget process and work closely with the Board.

Reyna said one of his top priorities is improving student outcomes by recruiting and retaining good educators. He also wants to focus on building a safe and welcoming environment for all students within Alexandria City Public Schools.

“That’s [done by] making sure that we’re prioritizing mental and physical safety,” he said. “It’s connecting students to mentors and to extracurriculars, into the things that help get them kind of ingrained and connected to the school community.”

Reyna said he wants to strengthen community connections to ensure there’s “two- way engagement.”

“We have such a wonderful and diverse community, and I really want to make sure that we’ve got strong bridges into all parts of that,” he said. “And part of that also is making sure that we’ve got a really strong and positive relationship with [City] Council as we think about how we are funding our schools and making sure that we have opportunities to continue to meet the needs of our diverse community.”

He said he first wants to tackle the overcapacity issues at schools within District A and continue the redistrict-ing process.

“We need to really get a handle on what our short-term and long-term vision is for how we are going to address that,” Reyna said. “A lot of that, I believe, will and should be addressed through the redistricting process that we’re about to step into. I’m looking forward to being able to be a part of that if I am elected.”

He noted he wants to deliver on the collective bargaining process that was started earlier this year by the current Board.

“We really need to deliver on the commitment … around the collective bargaining agreement, and make sure that we’ve got a strong agreement in place that is workable for both sides and puts everyone in a positive position for moving forward together,” Reyna said.

Reyna acknowledged that safety in schools was an issue within ACPS, and transparency surrounding these issues is important.

“We’ve seen more – even in this school year – transparency and quicker transparency when incidents are happening at the schools,” he said. “That being said, I certainly think there is more work that can and should be done. … I think we need to continue to work on that. That is something that I know that the superintendent and her staff are trying to get even better about.”