About Peggy
Peggy is a mother and a teacher
Peggy is the proud mother of two children, Case who is in 3rd grade at Bishop Elementary and Andi, who is in preschool and will be entering Kindergarten in the Fall. Peggy believes parent involvement is important and is grateful to be able to volunteer at her children’s current and future schools, Bishop Elementary and Columbia Middle School.
She taught 8th grade English Language Arts (ELA) and 2nd grade for a total of 8 years in a neighboring school district – Mountain View Whisman SD. She understands how challenging teaching is and recognizes the need to attract, retain and value great teachers.
Peggy is present and engaged
She knows that by being in schools with students, teachers and families, she can hear and represent all stakeholders. She has found that being directly involved in the communities provides great perspective and has guided thinking about ways to improve educational experiences and outcomes. Our public schools will serve all families better when diverse voices and perspectives are honored and we look at education with equity in mind.
Peggy brings community together
At Bishop Elementary, two very committed parents, who have been running the parent teacher organization for seven years, are leaving as their kids are moving on to middle school after June, 2024. Peggy recognized the urgent need to establish a wider-reaching and sustainable parent group to support the school community.
She began by organizing parents to provide monthly Staff Appreciation snacks for Bishop’s staff and teachers. Throughout the year, she has worked with others to identify parents willing to take on leadership roles to help form the first Bishop PTA. She has been elected as the founding president and plans to step aside for other parents to lead after the transition from PTO to PTA is complete. Peggy is excited for the Bishop community to grow stronger together.
Peggy advocates for equitable school funding
Peggy serves on the board of Sunnyvale Education Foundation (SEF), a non-profit organization that supports enrichment for students in all schools in the Sunnyvale School District. She was key in the recent update to the SEF mission to include advocacy, fundraising, partnerships, and collaboration. Peggy took on the role of Vice President in July, 2024. In the previous 3 years, she served as the organization’s first Grants Administrator. As GA she improved the system for awarding and documenting grants for all 10 schools in the Sunnyvale School District. She has supported a change from an equal distribution of funds to each school to a system that awards more funds to schools with greater need.
Peggy fights for underserved communities
Peggy believes that access to school and representation on governing bodies contribute heavily to students’ success and sense of belonging. In October 2022, she learned that The Kings Academy, a private school which is a 10 minute walk from their house, used to be Sunnyvale High School. This spurred Peggy and a few others to bring more attention to the impact of this school closure on the North Sunnyvale community for decades. Out of this advocacy group formed the group, Sunnyvale for Equity in Education (SEE). SEE has been instrumental in improving transportation for high school students north of El Camino Real. She and the group have also championed the recent move from at-large to by-trustee-area districts in the Fremont Union High School District. This push will allow for the first representative from the northernmost zip codes to be elected in November, 2024.
Peggy is a team player
Peggy joined the committee to support the passing of Sunnyvale School District Measure C, which was voted on in March, 2024. She shared information about the measure and the importance of the funding. She reached out to all the school communities to ensure everyone was in wide support of the measure. The measure passed by 70%, far exceeding the required 55%.
Peggy believes democracy requires active participation
In addition to the advocacy work Peggy has done through the creation of Sunnyvale for Equity in Education (SEE), she is proud of the platform SEE has built to share information to the wider Sunnyvale community. SEE raises awareness of what is happening at the elementary/middle and high school districts. We strengthen our educational systems for the entire community when people inform policy that impacts our children, especially those that are historically underserved.
Peggy is a board member of the Democratic Club of Sunnyvale and is a member of the League of Women Voters of Sunnyvale and Cupertino. She firmly believes in the need for representation and participation in order for our democracy to be strong.