Nkoyo-Ena Effiong Lewis

I was born and raised in Ogden, UT and the daughter of Nigerian immigrants who came to the U.S. in pursuit of higher education. As a child, I loved learning and I loved school. It was a place where I felt successful. When I came to Atlanta to teach, I was confronted with the reality that not every child had the same sense of boundless possibility that I grew up with and have spent the better part of my adult life working to change that.

I have sat on the City of Atlanta Civil Service Board and was former IEP Facilitator for the Georgia Department of Education. I am a member of Elizabeth Baptist Church.

With less than 35% of students proficient in reading and math, APS needs proven leadership to address this urgent crisis. As a teacher, attorney and parent, I understand the complexity of the challenges we face. For nearly 20 years, I have fought for equity and excellence in our schools. As the candidate for Seat 9, I have the experience, vision and stake in outcomes to lead APS forward.

While the national average term for superintendents of large school districts is five years, the turnover rate we experience in APS is self-induced. The next board must select an innovative leader who is willing to solve complex problems. Furthermore, the board must be prepared to support the superintendent with clear goals and accountability. Consistent leadership is key for a district in transition like APS. As a board member, I will focus on selecting and retaining a superintendent who can collaboratively pursue bold goals to improve our schools.

APS needs a superintendent that understands the Atlanta context and is ready to lead us into the next version of ourselves. The rate of change is accelerating and our students will confront a future that many of us cannot even imagine. Thus, the next superintendent needs to be prospective, focusing on improving timeless skills like literacy, math, and critical/creative thinking. They will need to be innovative, strategic, and committed to working with the community in our shared governance model. Most importantly, they will need to believe and embody the very things our strategic plan expects of its graduates to be: self-reflective, & globally connected, self-directed & goal oriented, resourceful & driven, and a critical thinker & a problem solver.

Our strategic plan lacks ambitious goals and metrics – anything less will not move the needle enough for children. With reading proficiency averaging 35%, APS must set bold, measurable targets for literacy, math and graduation rates. As a board member, I will work with my colleagues and the superintendent to focus the next 5-year plan on raising proficiency, starting with targeted milestones for early literacy and numeracy. We cannot lead from behind. It is time to confront our shortcomings and make the necessary changes to achieve excellence.

As a former teacher, I understand the skill and dedication of our educators. I also know that our educators face a different classroom reality than I did while I was teaching. To retain more teachers, we need to allow those closest to the problem to guide the solutions. The District can better address this challenge by bringing teachers from high and low turnover schools into the conversation and adopt proven strategies to slow the trend of teachers leaving the classroom.

Budgets are moral documents that reflect our priorities. APS must strengthen its commitment to students with disabilities. We need to hire, retain and equip qualified special education teachers to meet student needs. The district should partner with professionals who can provide the related services, therapies and training our educators and students need. As an attorney and mother of a child with a disability, I am committed to ensuring our students with disabilities are treated with dignity and receive quality instruction.

The pandemic has caused major learning disruptions that we have to acknowledge. And, if we are honest, we know literacy has been a challenge within APS well before the pandemic. Now more than ever we need to adopt creative new approaches to address this issue. We need a literacy policy that requires the district to closely monitor literacy outcomes and intervene with research-based tiered interventions as needed. Lastly, we must trust that teachers and principals understand their students and schools best, and include their voices in developing solutions for critical problems like this.

This is a priority for me; driven from my experiences fighting to be involved in my son’s education and the decisions made about him.

1. We must make information more easily accessible. The community should be able to locate key information quickly and simply.
2. We should show up in the community and in our schools regularly. Parents and caregivers should not only be asked to come to us. Engagement works both ways.
3. If we are truly committed to community engagement, we should allow for sufficient time to engage in a conversation, reflect on the feedback we receive and pivot when we do not have community support for an action.

There is no arguing that Atlanta’s residents are paying for the majority of the APS budget through their property taxes. Furthermore, the rise in property taxes is felt differently across the city. While we want to attract businesses to Atlanta to spur economic growth, it should not be to the detriment of Atlanta’s residents. Whether the burden is too high or too low aside, the real issue is that the community is not getting a return on their investment. That is the urgent issue we need to address.