Back in October, I wrote about the renaming process underway for the Woodstock Child Development Center (WCDC), which houses a childcare program and the Alameda Unified School District’s special education preschool program.
As noted in the original column, AUSD Board of Education members had expressed interest in naming the school after Ardella Dailey, the former WCDC director who also worked as an AUSD principal, administrator, superintendent and board trustee, due to her experience in special education; her passion for equity and social justice; and her deep commitment to the students, staff and families in our community.
After a period of family and staff engagement — including meetings, a call for new name suggestions and a vote on the names suggested — the AUSD superintendent at the Oct. 11 Board of Education meeting recommended that the child development center be named the “Alameda Child Development Center” and the preschool be named the “Dr. Ardella Dailey Preschool Program.”
A public comment period on this proposal has been open since Oct. 12 and will close Dec. 10. The public is welcome to contact the board with their comments (board email addresses are available online at alamedaunified.org/board/board-of-education).
The Board of Education will vote on the new names at its Dec. 13 public meeting, and the agenda for that meeting will be posted to the AUSD website on Dec. 7. A timeline, board presentations and more details are available on AUSD’s WCDC renaming webpage at bayareane.ws/WCDCrenaming.
Also at the Dec. 13 meeting, our new Board of Education trustee, Ryan LaLonde, and our newly re-elected board trustee, Gary Lym, will be sworn in and will begin their four-year terms. We congratulate them both on their election success and look forward to working with them over the coming years.
Board members will also choose the committees on which they want to serve and their schedule of meetings in 2023, and the assistant superintendent of business services will also present the first interim budget report for 2022-23.
The AUSD board’s meetings, which are held on the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month, continue to be held via Zoom (and live-streamed on Facebook). The Zoom information is included in the agendas, which are posted online at alamedaunified.org/board/agendas-minutes.
Susan Davis is the Alameda Unified School District’s senior manager for community affairs. Reach her at 510-337-7175 or SDavis@alamedaunified.org.
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