By Gina Edwards

Naples City Desk

Erika Donalds raised more money than any School Board candidate in Collier County history, but she’ll have to beat retired Immokalee teacher Kathy Ryan, who raised roughly a tenth of Donalds’ money, in a November run-off in order to gain the District 3 School Board seat.

Donalds said Ryan has run for School Board three times, and she believed that gave her an advantage over the other candidates in the four-way race. The race included teacher union backed JB Holmes and immigrant parent Luis Bernal. Ryan couldn’t be reached for comment.

Donalds, the wife of former congressional candidate Byron Donalds, raised $46,000 to Ryan’s $5,000. Holmes raised $25,000 and Bernal raised $14,000.

“What we’ve been doing is getting people involved in a School Board race who’ve never been involved before,” said Donalds, a founder of the parent organization Parents ROCK that formed to protest changes to after-school programs used by working parents.

Donalds received 47 percent of the vote and Ryan came in second with 27 percent.

Across the board, however, turn-out in the election was low: Only 21 percent of registered voters cast ballots. The School Board races and judges races were open to voters countywide.

Political newcomer and charter school founder Kelly Lichter won the District 1 School Board seat while incumbent board member Roy Terry retained his District 5 School Board seat.

What gave Lichter the edge?

“The fact that I’m a mom with children in the system,” Lichter said.

She said the race was a battle for the “hearts, minds and souls of our children” and on the campaign stump she touted the need to return to a classical style of liberal arts education in which children soak up and memorize knowledge when they are young.

“It’s about going back to what works,” Lichter said. Both Lichter and Donalds are against implementation of the Bring Your Own Device Program in elementary grades and they signed a parent’s platform “contract” that included what became a controversial textbook review proposal to eliminate “political indoctrination” and factual inaccuracies.

The contract also advocated returning the schools to basic math fact memorization and memorization of the multiplication tables and returning to teaching phonics. Another proposal would revoke Superintendent Kamela Patton’s four-year contract extension that was passed by the board in June, ahead of the election.

In the District 4 County Commission race, former Naples City Councilwoman and photographer Penny Taylor beat nurse Lavigne Kirkpatrick to take over the seat being vacated by Fred Coyle. Taylor won with 55 percent of the vote.

This story is free. Access many more stories when you subsribe to Naples City Desk. Contact Gina Edwards at gina@watchdogcity.com or by phone at 239-293-3640.