Elyse Dashew

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Elyse Dashew

Prior offices

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education At-large

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Education

Bachelor's

Brown University

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Elyse Dashew was a member of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education At-large in North Carolina. She assumed office in 2015. She left office on December 12, 2023.

Dashew ran for re-election to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education At-large in North Carolina. She won in the general election on November 5, 2019.

Elyse Dashew won the general election on November 3, 2015.

The North Carolina Department of Public Instruction released a report showing North Carolina's teacher turnover rate tripled from 2010 to 2015. Following the state-wide trend, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district lost a 12-year high of 16.5 percent of their teachers in 2015.

Biography

Email [email protected] to notify us of updates to this biography.

Elyse Dashew earned a bachelor's degree in anthropology from Brown University. Her career experience includes working as a production assistant for the television show Northern Exposure and as the chief operating officer for Beowulf, Inc. Dashew has served as the co-founder of MeckFUTURE, as co-chair of the CMS Bond Oversight Committee, and on the boards of Generation Nation, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Housing Partnership, and the Charlotte Advisory Board for North Carolina Outward Bound School. She was first elected to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education in 2015 and served as vice chair.

Elections

2019

See also: Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, North Carolina, elections (2019)

General election

General election for Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education At-large (3 seats)

The following candidates ran in the general election for Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education At-large on November 5, 2019.

		Candidate	%	Votes
✔		Elyse Dashew (Nonpartisan)	12.9	35,021
✔		Jennifer De La Jara (Nonpartisan)	12.4	33,583
✔		Lenora Shipp (Nonpartisan)	10.6	28,611
		Stephanie Sneed (Nonpartisan)	10.5	28,416
		Monty Witherspoon (Nonpartisan)	8.6	23,155
		Annette Albright (Nonpartisan)	7.3	19,836
		Gregory Denlea (Nonpartisan)	6.5	17,659
		Donna Parker-Tate (Nonpartisan)	6.1	16,528
		Queen Thompson (Nonpartisan)	5.7	15,378
		Jordan Pineda (Nonpartisan)	5.7	15,355
		Olivia Scott (Nonpartisan)	4.8	12,906
		Jenna Moorehead (Nonpartisan)	4.7	12,743
		Duncan St. Clair III (Nonpartisan)	3.9	10,623
		Matthew Ridenhour (Nonpartisan) (Write-in)	0.0	5
		Other/Write-in votes	0.3	854

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	Incumbents are bolded and underlined. The results have been certified. Source	Total votes: 270,673
= candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey.
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2015

See also: Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools elections (2015)

Three of the nine seats on the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education were up for election on November 3, 2015. The seats represent the district at-large.

The seats of incumbents Ericka Ellis-Stewart, Mary T. McCray, and Timothy Morgan were up for election. Morgan did not run for re-election. Ellis-Stewart and McCray won re-election to their seats. Newcomer Elyse Dashew won the open seat left by Morgan. The other six candidates—Angela Ambroise, Janeen Bryant, Larry Bumgarner, Levester Flowers, Jeremy Stephenson, and Amelia Stinson-Wesley— were defeated in the election.

Results

Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, At-Large, 4-year Term, General Election, 2015
Candidate	Vote %	Votes
Ericka Ellis-Stewart Incumbent	18.3%	36,922
Elyse Dashew	14.9%	29,955
Mary T. McCray Incumbent	13.8%	27,709
Jeremy Stephenson	11.8%	23,701
Larry Bumgarner	10.9%	21,964
Janeen Bryant	10.6%	21,270
Amelia Stinson-Wesley	7.4%	14,979
Angela Ambroise	6.3%	12,775
Levester Flowers	5.7%	11,530
Write-in votes	0.23%	453
Total Votes		201,258
Source: North Carolina Secretary of State, "11/03/2015 Official General Election Results," accessed November 30, 2015

Funding

Dashew reported $45,174.75 in contributions and $41,145.51 in expenditures to the Mecklenburg County Board of Elections, which left her campaign with $4,145.21 on hand during the election.

Endorsements

Dashew received an official endorsement from the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Educators Association.

Campaign themes

2019

Ballotpedia survey responses

See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection

Elyse Dashew did not complete Ballotpedia's 2019 Candidate Connection survey.

Campaign website

Dashew's campaign website stated the following:

“	Elyse is a tireless and proven champion for all children of Mecklenburg County and in 2017, led the school board’s successful $922 million bond referendum. As a fierce advocate for public education, Elyse collaborates effectively with elected officials and community partners throughout the county, state, and country to create the opportunities that CMS students need and deserve.	”
—Elyse Dashew’s campaign website (2019)

2015

Dashew highlighted the following priorities on her campaign website:

“	Our schools are a community investment that pays dividends in economic opportunity, business recruiting, and healthy families and neighborhoods. We must be careful stewards of tax dollars. We must invest wisely to… 1. Improve teacher pay and pipeline 2. Build new schools to relieve overcrowding and prepare for growth 3. Address deferred maintenance of aging facilities We must follow the evidence showing what leads to student success and use that evidence to inform all school policies, including… 1. Student assignment 2. Curriculum 3. Testing To advocate effectively for all children, the school board must clearly and courageously join forces with family, business, faith, philanthropic and other community and government partners. We must work collaboratively to do what is best for students and… 1. Communicate clearly our schools’ successes, challenges and priorities 2. Engage and inform CMS students, teachers, staff, and families 3. Engage and inform public school supporters and community partners	”
—Eylse Dashew's campaign website (2015),

What was at stake?

2015

Election trends

See also: 2013 school board elections

The 2015 school board race saw more candidates per seat than the district’s last election in 2013. The 2013 election had 12 candidates running for six seats, averaging two candidates per seat. The 2015 election had nine candidates for three seats, raising the rate to three candidates per seat. With one new member joining the board in 2015, a third of the members had joined the board since 2013. The other two-thirds of the members had an average of six years of experience as a board member as of 2015.

Issues in the district

Jones appointed to empty seat on board

Ruby Jones

Board member Joyce Waddell resigned from her District 3 seat on the school board when she was elected to the North Carolina State Senate in November 2014. The board was required by law to appoint a new member to fill the empty seat. The board originally split their votes 4-4 between possible appointees Pat Martinez and Levester Flowers. After two votes with the same result, the members decided to reconvene the next week to vote again. The third vote resulted in a 5-3 vote in favor of Ruby Jones over Pat Martinez. Flowers received no votes in the third round of voting.

Jones worked in education in various roles for over 40 years. She previously worked in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school district as a teacher and an administrator. At the time of her appointment, she worked as an adjunct professor at Central Piedmont Community College. Jones finished Waddell's term and was up for election in November 2017.

Comparitive statistics on teacher attrition in North Carolina
District	Total Teachers	Teachers Leaving	Leaving with Career Status	Turnover percentage
State Average	1,887.3	276.7	200.7	14.3
Northampton County Schools*	155	52	28	33.55
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools	8,609	1,420	858	16.49
Graham County Schools**	87	5	5	5.75
*Highest turnover percentage **lowest turnover percentage

Teacher turnover hit 12-year high

North Carolina saw the number of teachers leaving the state triple over a five-year period, according to a 2015 report by the state’s department of public instruction. In an effort to retain more teachers, the General Assmebly approved a starting salary increase from $33,000 to $35,000 for new teachers. While the state's school districts saw some of the largest teacher salary increases in the country in 2015, districts like Charlotte-Mecklenburg still fell below the national average for teacher lifetime earnings when salaries were adjusted for cost of living. The report also showed an increase in teachers who left the profession entirely. In 2015, approximately 1,200 teachers reported leaving North Carolina school districts for a different profession. That number was 366 in 2010.

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg School District saw a teacher turnover rate of 16.5 percent in the 2014-2015 school year, compared to the state average of 14.8 percent. That was the highest rate for the district in 12 years. Over 48 percent of teachers cited "personal reasons" as their reason for leaving the district. The district had the 31st-highest turnover rate of the 115 school districts in North Carolina between 2010-2015. It also had the fourth-highest turnover rate of the 14 school districts in the Charlotte metropolitan area in 2015.

North Carolina teacher attrition data, 2015
The graph above displays the teacher turnover percent in 2015 for the ten largest schools by enrollment in North Carolina. The table below shows 2015 teacher attrition data for the 39 North Carolina schools that are included in the largest 1,000 schools by enrollment in the country. Click [show] on the right to expand the table.

North Carolina teacher attrition full data, 2015
District name	Total teachers	Teachers leaving	Leaving with career status	Turnover percent
Alamance-Burlington Schools	1,507	231	166	15.33
Brunswick County Schools	805	120	94	14.91
Buncombe County Schools	1,672	217	163	12.98
Burke County Schools	847	79	78	9.33
Cabarrus County Schools	1,895	264	206	13.93
Caldwell County Schools	838	63	52	7.52
Catawba County Schools	1,050	124	105	11.81
Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools	942	175	133	18.58
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools	8,609	1,420	858	16.49
Cleveland County Schools	1,115	144	117	12.91
Craven County Schools	948	167	115	17.62
Cumberland County Schools	3,650	641	483	17.56
Davidson County Schools	1,204	112	86	9.3
Duplin County Schools	643	92	62	14.31
Durham Public Schools	2,389	488	326	20.43
Gaston County Schools	1,906	247	190	12.96
Guilford County Schools	4,984	745	534	14.95
Harnett County Schools	1,370	266	158	19.42
Henderson County Schools	921	121	98	13.14
Iredell-Statesville Schools	1,300	191	155	14.69
Johnston County Schools	2,292	321	230	14.01
Lee County Schools	636	118	66	18.55
Lenoir County Public Schools	581	75	48	12.91
Lincoln County Schools	789	81	68	10.27
Moore County Schools	833	144	114	17.29
Nash-Rocky Mount Schools	947	174	128	18.37
New Hanover County Schools	1,686	212	176	12.57
Onslow County Schools	1,589	246	163	15.48
Pitt County Schools	1,638	286	196	17.46
Public Schools of Robeson County	1,511	240	162	15.88
Randolph County Schools	1,193	153	116	12.82
Rockingham County Schools	881	93	71	10.56
Rowan-Salisbury Schools	1,300	183	144	14.08
Union County Public Schools	2,567	401	312	15.62
Wake County Schools	10,144	1,355	1,057	13.36
Wayne County Public Schools	1,218	142	106	11.66
Wilkes County Schools	631	63	39	9.98
Wilson County Schools	747	124	88	16.6
Winston-Salem/Forsyth Schools	3,826	472	364	12.34

See also

2019 Elections

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Newsletters

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• Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, North Carolina
• Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools elections (2015)
• Incumbency no guarantee of success in Nov. 3 school board elections (November 6, 2015)
• What happened in Nov.'s top board elections? (November 4, 2015)

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