On The Edge News

By Ari Ebert-Standard 

Update: Karen Ball did not win the school board seat. She received 24.1% of votes, according to Channel3000.

Karen Ball, Edgewood College director of academic success, is running for the Madison Metropolitan School District (MMSD) Board Seat 6.  Ball, a 2005 Edgewood College graduate, said running is something she is passionate about.  

She announced her campaign on Jan. 2. Ball said she has been thinking about running for school board for a while. When she saw seat 6 was open, she thought, “this is a think I want to talk about it, and this is the place I want to do it.” 

Ball said she is “the product of really good teachers, really good social workers, and really good schools.” Her campaign is inspired by her family and students.    

The message of Ball’s campaign is #OneRelationshipAtATime. She said the hashtag is intended to reach her audience and portray that she believes in fast change through forging relationships. 

Ball’s campaign has three priorities: 

1. Building infrastructure around systems to support teachers, administrators and community members to do the work to close the opportunity gap. “Teachers are operating from such a fear-based lens right now,” Ball said. “We need to protect them.”  
2. Managing the transition with the new MMSD superintendent. Ball said she wants to help effectively manage change and prevent backtracking. 
3. Prepare for the referenda. Ball wants to keep the board accountable to the community when asking for investment into schools. She said she wants to ensure that “what I am investing in is working.” 

Ball took some time off before college after being “on the cusp of not graduating” high school. She came to Edgewood College in 1996. Ball said that a class with current Professor of Mathematics Steven Post is what saved her, and she pursued a major in Math Education.  

“It helped me organize my thinking about the problems in front of me in a way that I had never been taught,” she said.  

The problems Ball was faced with at the time begin when her father, who was in the Navy, was assassinated in 1979 during a terrorist bus ambush in Puerto Rico. He was a Navy Cryptologist working in security and was killed alongside a radioman.  

Ball said the event is “such an important part of my identity and who I am” because of how it influences her decision making – something she thinks is important in her school board campaign.   

The day after the assassination, Ball’s family moved from Italy back to Madison. “From there, my mom tried to do the best she could as a parent,” Ball said. “It was a struggle and we struggled all the way through.”  

“I have always operated my work from this lens of, I can’t look backwards,” she said.  

After getting her degree in Math Education, Ball found her sweet spot in helping students with the transition between high school and higher education. She said though most people say graduating high school is the “finish line,” she believes it’s the “starting line.” 

Ball said if she is elected to the school board, she will still be working at Edgewood College. “This is my place,” she said.