Resident volunteers to run for school board

I would like to thank Debbie Musial for the suggestion in her letter to the editor in the Bonners Ferry Herald on Feb. 21, and the same by Susan Stolley on Feb 28, for me to become more involved as a volunteer in the Boundary County School District.

I now plan to do just that. I believe it is important to be involved in one's community, especially when there is a definite need.

While living in Fresno, Calif., more than 11 years ago before moving to North Idaho, I spent 10 years as an unpaid reserve police sergeant for the Fresno Police Department. While living in Cocolalla, I spent eight out of nine years as a volunteer for the Festival at Sandpoint as chairperson for Backstage Hospitality, and did the same for Sandpoint's ‘Lost in the 50's'.

I also served on the Bonner County Association of Realtors Board as a director and am presently serving as a director and secretary on the Selkirk Association of Realtors MLS Board of Directors. I have also been asked to serve as a panel member for the Professional Standards and Ethics Committee.

I am also a volunteer for the Idaho Real Estate Commission Education Council in Boise, where we create courses, draft legislation, certify providers, instructors and curriculum for 12,000 Idaho real estate licensees in order to raise the “bar of excellence” of their education.

As an education council member, I represent the seven northern counties of Idaho. I am also a member of the Bonners Ferry Rotary, the Friends of Downtown Bonners Ferry, the Bonners Ferry Chamber of Commerce and have been a contributor for a number of years to Sandpoint's and Bonners Ferry's Festival of Trees, as well as a number of other worthy causes.

So, as Ms. Musial and others can see, volunteerism is not new to me.

Also, I would like to correct Ms. Musial on the misinformation she included in her letter regarding some facts:

I have never criticized the teachers in this community. I simply believe that how a teacher instructs students outweighs the subject matter that they teach, and that teachers can be an inspiration to our children.

Succinctly expressed by one of my ancestors, Samuel Clemens, aka Mark Twain on “Teaching: To be good is noble, but to teach others how to be good is nobler - and less trouble.”

If you check with the Boundary County District Court, no lawsuit(s) have been filed by us.

I absolutely do criticize the administration and some of the Boundary County School District trustees for their lack of accountability to the citizens of this community. For their reactive instead of proactive responses to issues.

I am taking Ms. Musial's suggestion to heart, “to be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem,” with my issues and concerns revolving around the Boundary County School District trustees and administration.

I feel the best way to affect a change in the present autocratic and arbitrary functioning of our school district, is to do so from within the system. So, as Ms. Musial so eloquently put it, I am going to “do something positive or shut up.”

Therefore, I hereby announce my candidacy for Boundary County School District Trustee for Zone 2 in the upcoming election to be held on May 20. My goal will be for the betterment of the Boundary County School District educational system through leadership, fiscal responsibility, an unerring willingness to listen, and a promise to try and create the best environment for our children to learn to be productive, responsible and well-educated young adults.

And I leave you with a final quotation from Mark Twain: “In this country we have one great privilege which they don't have in other countries. When a thing gets to be absolutely unbearable the people can rise up and throw it off. That's the finest asset we've got - the ballot box.”

Donna Capurso

Bonners Ferry