DELAND — The District 1 Volusia County School Board race features a two-term incumbent running on a record that includes two consecutive district A grades and a continuing expansion of career-tech programs in high schools.
But Jamie Haynes’ two opponents say the district is not producing enough graduates who are proficient in English and math, and the Volusia district needs to pare back its administration in favor of hiring more teachers.
Businesswoman and former Volusia County teacher and administrator Brenda Beery and DeLand-area super-volunteer Jaclyn Carrell argue they can help the Volusia school district serve its community better, and hope to unseat Haynes by winning the Aug. 18 election.
Here is a look at the candidates, their priorities, and positions on teacher pay and student success.
Florida law limits school board terms. How is Haynes eligible to run?
A 2023 law reduces term limits for school board members from 12 to eight consecutive years.
In Volusia, Haynes and Ruben Colón were first elected in 2018, and are thus grandfathered into the previous 12-year limit. So it’ll be up to voters whether they are among the last to serve three terms. An upcoming News-Journal article will compare Colón and his District 5 opponent, Dean Condon.
Haynes, 60, started 40 years ago as a teacher in Volusia County Schools after earning a bachelor’s degree at the University of Tennessee, later earning a master’s degree from Nova Southeastern University. She has taught at all elementary grade levels except 4th, as well as algebra, geometry and exploration math in the secondary level. Haynes also served as an academic coach, trainer, and federal programs and grants administrator before her election to the School Board.
On the board, Haynes in 2019 supported the firing of Superintendent Tom Russell and the hiring of Scott Fritz to the top job. Three years later, Haynes made the motion to fire Fritz, then joined in a unanimous 2022 vote to hire Carmen Balgobin as superintendent weeks later.
Balgobin has gone on to lead the district to the two straight As and earn multiple national recognitions, including superintendent of the year.
“Vote for me because I have the experience, the knowledge, and I do that daily work,” Haynes told attendees at a July 15 forum hosted by West Volusia Patriots Club, an independent Republican organization.
Brenda Beery, former teacher, touts budget experience
Beery, 53, is a lifelong DeLand resident who graduated from the University of Central Florida before earning a master’s in educational leadership from Stetson University. She taught at four Volusia County Schools before serving as assistant principal at Holly Hill K-8 and River Springs Middle School.
Beery left education in 2022 to help run a family business, Beery Roofing & Redesign, while participating in a variety of local organizations, including the West Volusia Chamber of Commerce, where she serves on the Education Committee. Her business has formed partnerships with six Volusia County schools, supporting welcome-back events and Christmas parties.
“I’m all about celebrating teachers, because a happy teacher makes 20 to 25 students happy, and that’s really important,” she said. “What makes me stand out is I do manage a $4 million budget.”
Jaclyn Carrell says lack of district experience is strength
Carrell, 38, of DeLand, touts a long list of community service activities, including serving as president of the Fall Festival of the Arts in DeLand in 2024 and 2025, Rotarian of the Year in 2022-2023, and judging Volusia County Schools’ career and technical education pitch competition from 2023 to 2026.
Carrell, a mother of four, challenged Haynes in 2022 and got 10.4%, finishing fourth in a field of five. At the West Volusia Patriots forum, she called it a “passion project rooted in parental rights.
“I have … been a school and community partner to the district, but I think one of my major strengths is that I have never been employed directly by the district,” Carrell said. “So I’m actually really proud of that, because I can bring that perspective. … I never had to climb the ladder internally with the district, so I can look at things with fresh eyes and I’m not scared to do what’s right when it needs to be done.”
Volusia candidates’ priorities for schools
When she first ran for Volusia County School Board in 2018, Haynes said her top three priorities were: ensuring safe school campuses, fiscal oversight while providing teachers what they need, and expanding vocational and technical opportunities in high schools.
In recent years, the district has greatly expanded its career-tech offerings, with all of the high schools in West Volusia offering one or more, such as HVAC, electrical, and plumbing, new this fall at University High School, Haynes said.
“My goal is to continue to provide pathways for students other than college or university. Every student should have a passion, and we should fulfill that.”
A second priority, she said, is a continuous focus on student safety. The Florida Department of Education audited the district’s security programs, and the district passed every one, she said.
Carrell said her top two priorities are transforming public schools’ curriculum to “classical education foundations,” and establishing “governance you can trust.”
“Literacy is very important. If you can read really well, you can learn anything. And our literacy proficiency rates are egregiously low. We are graduating students out of Volusia County below 50% of where they should be within reading proficiencies.”
She supports returning phonics to early-learning programs, and several initiatives backed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, including returning cursive-writing skills to elementary schools, and an added emphasis on civics and speech.
“I want to bring truth and transparency. I want to advocate for a line-item budget,” she said. “I want people to feel that when they come to the School Board to speak that they’re being listened to.”
Beery said her first priority is improving student success by raising the number of teachers in classrooms.
“Right now, we have numbers that say we’re successful with our graduation rate, but they’re actually not. They’re not at 50%. If you start looking at third grade, that is such a decider of what is going to happen in that child’s future. So we could take a lot of our district staff and let’s put them in K-3.”
Beery also advocates for fiscal responsibility, calling on the district to make its budget more transparent, so the board can better evaluate programs and spending.
“Right now, I don’t know how much people at the district make. It’s so hard to get a hold of those numbers,” she said.
Graduation rates and measuring student success
Beery and Carrell questioned Volusia’s practices in earning that under the Florida Department of Education’s accountability system. They argued students are proficient at reading and math, and suggested the district’s budget is not transparent and spends too much on administrators and not enough on teachers.
Volusia County Chair Jeff Brower, who hosted the West Volusia Patriots Club debate, asked all the candidates about the high school graduation rate, which he noted was at an all-time high. “Are you positive that all the students have earned their diplomas?”
Beery and Carrell said no. Haynes said yes.
Brower followed up by asking if the candidates believe enough of the school district’s budget goes to the classroom.
“Can I just say, hell no?” Beery said.
“We have so many district staff, many making six figures or more. We don’t know. We can’t see it,” Beery said. “… Do you remember the old one-room schoolhouse where you had a teacher that taught. We didn’t need all of this overhead.”
She acknowledged that school districts do need superintendents and staff.
“But it has gotten out of hand. If you watched any School Board meeting in the last year, you will see there’s appointments every single week for supervisors, for directors, assistants to directors, to supervisors. I can’t even keep up.”
“We’re so top-heavy,” Beery said, “we’re going to fall over.”
Haynes said throughout her 40-year career, it’s always been a struggle to adequately equip teachers with classroom supplies. When she first ran, teachers were not being provided supplies or textbooks. A few months into her first term, the district started ordering textbooks and resources. “And we continue that.”
Haynes added that the board has evolved to start allowing parent involvement in textbook adoption.
“Do we have everything we absolutely need in the classroom? No,” she said. But she said when she started as a classroom teacher nearly 40 years ago, she had 36 students in her kindergarten class and not all of the supplies needed.
She noted that while state regulations allow more flexibility to steer funds to classrooms, there remain limitations, such as the funding for capital projects, which must be used on capital projects like building or improving schools or adding or upgrading technology.
“With what we receive, we do the very best that we can.”
Carrell is critical of Volusia district officials for failing to keep funding focused on the classroom, and creating a “top-heavy” structure with too many administrators.
“I’ve done a lot of work peripherally with the district through organizations that I’m a part of, and community projects and things like that, and so I see a lot of what’s going on,” she said.
“I believe that administration positions are being used as the dangling carrot. One thing that this administration is really, really good at is creating loyal soldiers, and that’s why we have such a toxic culture,” Carrell said.
“If you keep your head down and you be quiet, and you play the game, you have an opportunity to possibly go from making say $50,000 a year to over six figures. That’s life-changing for somebody, and that’s a good incentive to sit down and be quiet,” she said. “And that needs to change.”
− Mark Harper covers politics, government, and education for The News-Journal, with a focus on Florida, mostly in Volusia County. He can be reached at mark.harper@news-jrnl.com
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Volusia School Board District 1 rivals make cases to voters
Reporting by Mark Harper, Daytona Beach News-Journal / The Daytona Beach News-Journal
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By Mark Harper, Daytona Beach News-Journal | USA TODAY Network
