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January 2010
“My background in education is that I have five sons,” she muses. A self-described “professional volunteer,” Winkler first became involved in public schools as a volunteer in Alief ISD, where all of her sons attended school. She was elected to the Alief ISD school board in 1997 and is now the president. On Oct. 4, Winkler took office as president of the Texas Association of School Boards. Elected to the TASB board in December 2001, she previously has served as vice president and has participated in the association’s School Board Advocacy Network. She also is a director on the executive board of the Gulf Coast Area Association of School Boards, and she has served her community as an active member of numerous civic organizations. “My heart is in volunteer work,” says Winkler, who also is heavily involved in the Alief Mentoring Initiative. Winkler started volunteering as a mentor to young girls 11 years ago because, as the mother of five boys, she wanted a change of pace. “It was my only chance to be around a little girl until I had a granddaughter,” says Winkler. As part of the initiative, she meets with her mentees at school for one hour a week; she has mentored as many as four girls at once. Right now, Winkler has two mentees, in second and third grades, respectively. However, she also stays in touch through Facebook with several other girls whom she once mentored and whom are now grown. Working as a volunteer mentor gives Winkler a prime opportunity to see her district through the eyes of the children. Alief is a large urban district, encompassing 36.6 square miles and a diverse student enrollment of 45,000. As a mentor in a district of this size, Winkler gets to pay regular visits to some of Alief ISD’s 41 campuses to see how the district is functioning from the ground level. Winkler’s goals for her term as TASB president include drawing on her experience as a volunteer mentor to illustrate the statewide organization’s mission “to provide, through our own conduct, an example of citizenship at its best.” Every school district needs volunteers, and volunteering is a way to get parents and people in the community involved in public education. “We need to get the public more on board with what’s going on in public schools,” Winkler says. She says that school board members in Texas can support the survival and success of public schools “People need to know where their taxes are going,” she says. “If people don’t have kids in school, they don’t know what’s going on.” Unfamiliarity with public schools makes people more susceptible to negative stories in the media. Winkler says school districts must take action to combat these misperceptions. As president of TASB, Winkler will encourage trustees across Texas to engage in more creative and strategic means of communication to reach the public. She would like to see more districts reaching out to people directly with technologies such as Facebook, Twitter and email. Winkler is not only a passionate supporter of public education, but also a beneficiary. She graduated from Churchill High School in Northeast ISD in San Antonio, where she grew up. She earned a bachelor’s degree in economics and managerial studies and a master’s degree in accounting from Rice University, where she also met her husband of 35 years. After raising five boys, she recently became a grandmother to a girl, Sloan. When she isn’t too busy with school or family, Winkler says she loves spending time with the children she mentors. “It’s almost like a physical pain when I can’t work with them,” she says. In her downtime, she enjoys reading mystery novels written by women. (“No blood and guts,” she explains.) One of Winkler’s former mentees now works as an ESL aide in the elementary school where she attended. As an aide, she encourages other bilingual students — including her younger siblings — to focus on education. She and another young woman whom Winkler also knows through the mentoring initiative worked on Winkler’s most recent school board campaign and attended the swearing-in ceremony. “She kept me going during the campaign,” says Winkler of her former mentee. For Winkler, seeing these girls grow up to make a difference in the lives of others makes every minute of her volunteer service worthwhile. SARAH ORMAN is a freelance writer in Austin. She formerly worked as an attorney in Oakland, Calif. |
Sarah Winkler has spent years working tirelessly on behalf of Texas public school students. Where does she get her passion for education?