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Sherri Wright, a retired teacher and former local school board member, will fill a vacancy representing Congressional District 3 on the Colorado State Board of Education. The seat was previously occupied by Stephen Varela, who resigned earlier this month.
Wright, a Republican from Cortez, is one of two candidates running for election for the seat on Nov. 5. The other candidate is Democrat Ellen Angeles.
Wright, 71, was appointed to fill the vacancy by a Republican Party committee. She was sworn in Monday and will serve until Jan. 8, 2025, when whoever is elected will assume the seat.
State board members typically serve six-year terms. But the winner of the election for the Congressional District 3 seat, which has seen a lot of turnover in recent years, will serve only until January 2027.
The last person elected to the seat was Joyce Rankin, whose second six-year term on the state board began in January 2021. Rankin resigned from the board in January 2023. Varela, a military veteran and father of four, was appointed that same month to fill the seat.
Now the winner of the Nov. 5 election — either Wright or Angeles — will finish that term, with Wright serving in the seat for the interim two months.
Wright taught middle school language arts for 20 years in Colorado and Texas, according to a press release from the Colorado Department of Education. She previously served on the Montezuma-Cortez RE-1 school board, the board of the Colorado Association of School Boards, and the board of the now-closed San Juan Basin Technical College, the release says.
In response to a Chalkbeat candidate questionnaire, Wright wrote that her top three priorities if elected to the State Board of Education would be parents’ rights, school choice, and making sure students can read by third grade and are taught history “so society will not make the same mistakes they have in the past.”
Melanie Asmar is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Colorado. Contact Melanie at masmar@chalkbeat.org