The Board of Education Vote on May 8th Is the Final Vote for 2 seats on the board. Brandon Whitaker is running for Board of Education. The May 8th election is the ONLY election for Wilkes Board of Education. If you have kids, grandkids, or know any kids at all in the Wilkes County schools, we urge you to vote "1 and done" for Brandon Whitaker, the ONLY democrat running in this non-partisan race.
Whitaker attended C.B. Eller Elementary, graduated from East Wilkes High and attended Wilkes Community College before enrolling at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering.
Whitaker, son of Paula Norman and the late Wade Whitaker of Elkin, has lived in Wilkes County most of his life. He and his wife, Kimberly Whitaker, have two children, Brittany, a fifth-grader at C.B. Eller Elementary, and Chandler, a senior at East Wilkes High School.
“I am running because we have two children in the Wilkes County Schools. We have experienced what it is like to have a struggling student and a successful student. Fortunately, we were blessed with some outstanding teachers and administrators during the struggles,” said Whitaker.
“My training and work experience make me uniquely qualified for this position. Engineers are expert problem solvers. It’s what we do for a living. As a career state employee, I know how government works and sometimes doesn’t. I am responsible for managing multiple multimillion-dollar projects every day and have been for most of the last 23 years. I know how important it is to be good stewards of our limited tax dollars. I must make decisions every day to make sure we use those dollars in the most efficient and effective way possible. I think my skills as a problem solver and a steward of our tax dollars are exactly what the board needs,” he said.
"I think by now we know the recurring theme from all my posts; the need for more, more security, more school nurses, more school psychologists, more teacher assistants, more school resource officers, more parental involvement, more vocational training, more teacher pay, more of lots of things.
The question is how do we do that. The answer is not simple. The Board does not control how much money is allocated by the county, state, or federal government. They do act as advocates and ask other government officials for the funding required to meet those needs.
So, why are we not meeting all those needs? I think the most obvious cause is the failure of other elected officials to recognize those needs and fund them. It just isn’t the priority it should be. We all should be advocates and call our elected officials to tell them we need more. If they continue to fail to meet those needs, we need to find other candidates that will. We all need to be involved and be more vocal with our concerns.
Our democracy is supposed to be by the people and for the people. It really doesn’t seem to be that way much anymore. I think sometimes we forget that we all have a duty to be involved, after all, we are the people. That is one of the reasons I am running for this office. We should no longer be silent and just accept that this is the way things are. We ARE the people."
~ Brandon Whitaker
Whitaker attended C.B. Eller Elementary, graduated from East Wilkes High and attended Wilkes Community College before enrolling at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering.
Whitaker, son of Paula Norman and the late Wade Whitaker of Elkin, has lived in Wilkes County most of his life. He and his wife, Kimberly Whitaker, have two children, Brittany, a fifth-grader at C.B. Eller Elementary, and Chandler, a senior at East Wilkes High School.
“I am running because we have two children in the Wilkes County Schools. We have experienced what it is like to have a struggling student and a successful student. Fortunately, we were blessed with some outstanding teachers and administrators during the struggles,” said Whitaker.
“My training and work experience make me uniquely qualified for this position. Engineers are expert problem solvers. It’s what we do for a living. As a career state employee, I know how government works and sometimes doesn’t. I am responsible for managing multiple multimillion-dollar projects every day and have been for most of the last 23 years. I know how important it is to be good stewards of our limited tax dollars. I must make decisions every day to make sure we use those dollars in the most efficient and effective way possible. I think my skills as a problem solver and a steward of our tax dollars are exactly what the board needs,” he said.
"I think by now we know the recurring theme from all my posts; the need for more, more security, more school nurses, more school psychologists, more teacher assistants, more school resource officers, more parental involvement, more vocational training, more teacher pay, more of lots of things.
The question is how do we do that. The answer is not simple. The Board does not control how much money is allocated by the county, state, or federal government. They do act as advocates and ask other government officials for the funding required to meet those needs.
So, why are we not meeting all those needs? I think the most obvious cause is the failure of other elected officials to recognize those needs and fund them. It just isn’t the priority it should be. We all should be advocates and call our elected officials to tell them we need more. If they continue to fail to meet those needs, we need to find other candidates that will. We all need to be involved and be more vocal with our concerns.
Our democracy is supposed to be by the people and for the people. It really doesn’t seem to be that way much anymore. I think sometimes we forget that we all have a duty to be involved, after all, we are the people. That is one of the reasons I am running for this office. We should no longer be silent and just accept that this is the way things are. We ARE the people."
~ Brandon Whitaker
