The Spotsylvania County School Board has found itself embroiled in various controversies over the past several years, many of which involved board members with opposing political and ideological beliefs.
Each of the three candidates running for the Battlefield District school board position said they would strive to collaborate with anyone, regardless of political affiliation.
Jennifer Morgan Craig-Ford, Nick Ignacio and James King are vying for the seat that will be vacated by Nicole Cole, a Democrat who is running against Republican Bobby Orrock to become a state delegate representing the 66th District.
King, a pastor at the Land of Promise church off Smith Station Road, is endorsed by the county’s democratic committee. Craig-Ford said she is “non-partisan,” while Ignacio is the former Fredericksburg Regional Tea Party chairman and describes himself as “very, very conservative.”
“I know there are different ideologies and beliefs. They’ve always been here. They will always be,” King said last week, during the Free Press candidates’ forum. “But when it comes to our school system and our children, we must be able to sit down and collaborate together with our children in mind. I think that our school board ought to be a place where our views and perspectives can only enhance the development and the growth of our school system.”
James King
Ignacio, who failed in attempts for the House of Delegates in 2017, the board of supervisors in 2021, and the clerk of courts in 2023, said he’s matured since those election cycles.
He said the primary difference is that he’s no longer enamored with the Republican Party, stating he is “disgusted” by some of its actions.
Ignacio did not attend the Free Press forum but said in a telephone interview that his approach to working with individuals with opposing views is to understand that they each have the same goal in mind.
“Let’s just say I’m in a room with a whole bunch of people who want lots of gun control,” Ignacio said. “Here’s what I learned when I start to talk to people: Everyone wants the same damn thing. The only difference is people have different ideas about how to go about it.”
In Ignacio’s example, he noted that his position may be “I want all the good guys to have guns,” but others may favor gun control. He said both sides want the community to be safe.
“People just have different ideas about how to reach that goal, and that’s what I’ve learned in my years of politics,” Ignacio said. “Unless something’s wrong with you and you’re like, ‘I want everyone to be sick, unhappy and dying, everyone wants everyone to be happy, have a good life and succeed. I may think there’s a different way to do that. So, that’s how I work with people.”
Nick Ignacio
Craig-Ford said in a Facebook post that she’s been accused of being a “covert Democrat” and a “covert Republican.”
She said she’s spoken with both groups in the county with the hopes of working collaboratively for the benefit of the school division.
“I’ve been running nonpartisan from the beginning,” Craig-Ford said. “I’ve spoken with Democrats. I’ve spoken with Republicans. I’ve spoken with a number of people who are just fed up with politics in our schools to begin with and don’t want to identify with anything.
“I just want to get back to the business of running the schools, providing the students and teachers what they need, so we can get back to a love of learning for our kids. So, we can get back to teachers who like showing up to their jobs. So, we can get back to schools that are equipped to provide what all our students and our teachers need going forward.”
All three candidates also discussed the need, or lack thereof, to implement social initiatives in the school division.
King said the county has become “very, very diverse over the last decade” and that school officials must come together to support students of various backgrounds. Ignacio said that while he would love to see schools focus strictly on academics, that’s not realistic in the current social climate.
“It all starts at home, everyone knows that,” Ignacio said. “But we really can’t regulate what goes on at home. So, unfortunately, yes, I do believe we need those sorts of [social] programs to fill in the gap and maybe get these kids exposure to information and guidance that they may not be getting at home.”
Craig-Ford said she is wary of schools getting away from the core focus of education. Craig-Ford said she was “homeless and hungry” as a youth but was saved by quality teachers who taught her how to learn.
“It’s hard for me to say that I don’t think schools should be a place where I think we’re substituting social workers for teachers because of where I came from,” Craig-Ford said. “However, given my experience, looking at the state of schools, we have gotten away from the basic purpose of schools, and that’s to educate our children and provide them with an academically excellent program.”
