Recently Appointed Local Has Spent A Lifetime ‘At School’ In Alameda
PART 1: A Bio Of Extraordinary Community Connectedness
By Larry Freeman
Margie Sherratt, Alameda’s newly appointed School Board Member, has a vast professional and personal lineage with Alameda Schools tracing back to her Kindergarten year at Alameda’s Franklin School over half a century ago.
During her deep and wide journey across the many worlds of public education, the Alameda High graduate learned the ins and outs of Alameda schools from personal immersion and involvement in nearly every capacity imaginable.
As a new Sixth Grade teacher at “The New Wood School,” she took to the classroom in 1970 where, in her second year, she caught the eye of the School’s Vice Principal, the late Don Sherratt.
Don’s interest was both professional and personal, and, before long, the personal part blossomed and two decided to marry.
Looking askance at the couple’s new dynamic, District Administrators concluded that having a spouse as her work superior “wouldn’t work” according to Margie Sherratt.
“I couldn’t be there with him, and I was then sent to Paden School “ to do a one year stint with Fifth Graders,” she said.
Following that, she transferred to Washington School (now Maya Lin) to work with Seventh and Eighth grade Middle School students, her preferred age level.
During the seven or so years she spent there, she and Don had their two children who also attended Alameda Public schools, with her son eventually going into the teaching profession.
Teaching permitted Sherratt to enlist in the “supermom” generation of the era, balancing child rearing with a career involvement that permitted eight years of part time teaching at her former classroom home while a student at Lincoln Middle School,
Sherratt, never one to grow moss, decided she wanted a change of career impact and earned a degree in School Counseling at Cal State East Bay.
Counseling panned out, adding another ten years in AUSD schools, as Head Counselor at Alameda High, another alma mater.
Sherratt then decided to give working at The AUSD District Office a shot, and after one year in her first time being off school site, she took the helm of Alameda High School as Principal for five years before retiring as a professional educator in 2004.
After some years passed, the classroom and students called to her again. “I decided that I really missed being a part of education,” and she decided to throw her hat in the ring to take a shot at School Board membership during the General Election in November of 2010.
Just as she did in her most recent contest to fill the vacancy in the AUSD Board, winning the interim position by a unanimous vote of Board Members, she sailed to success in 2010, as the top vote getter for two seats in a field of six candidates.
Sherratt earned over a third of the popular vote, racking up 10,512 compared to about 6,500 for the second candidate chosen.
This time, her succession to The Board came as an appointment by AUSD’s existing Board on 12/13 of last year. Sherratt prevailed over eight other applicants with her thick resume and personal passion for education – most recently enhanced by her membership as a Board Member for The Alameda Education Foundation — clearly sealing her selection.
In an AUSD Press Release, Board President Jennifer Williams noted Sherratt’s readiness to be “someone who could hit the ground running.”
Her new stint on the board was spurred by a need to fill a vacancy through November of 2024 after Board Member Megan Sweet had to relinquish her seat due to moving out of Alameda, where local policy contains a residency requirement.
“I have a lot to look back at and look forward at,” said Sherratt regarding her reprise.
To gear up for her return, she met with District Superintendent, Pasquale Scuderi whom she described as “ easy to talk with and a man who is very bright and very thorough.”
The two discussed “What are some of the biggest things we have to look to and to get through,” said Sherratt of the challenges that lie ahead in her interim tenure.
Sherratt recognizes that her wealth of experiences in the school system will help provide valuable insights and perspectives into matters that might not be so readily apparent compared to those who might come mostly from a business world, parent or community participant background.
“I think being an educator for over thirty years, and having been a School Board member (will inform her perspectives.) I’ve lived through the union meeting and asking for more salary, for what we needed for new educational, instructional materials, of the way in which we ran and worked our different schools at different levels; so I think I have a lot of background and understanding for educators,” she said.
Now, Sherratt has come full circle as an AUSD School Board member for her second stint adding to her almost lifelong, deeply personal connection to Alameda schools.
“That’s something to be proud of,” she laughed reflectively , “and maybe that’s something to think, ‘well maybe she should have branched out a little bit.’ But Alameda is still my home,” and the schools will continue to be a part of that for some time to come, she mused.
END OF PART 1
LOOK FOR PART 2, ‘INTO THE THICK OF THINGS ’ COMING SOON.