Voters casting ballots this election will notice a change when selecting candidates for the Detroit Public Schools Community District (DPSCD) board. Instead of a single race, there will be two separate contests on the ballot.
Thirty-one candidates are vying for four seats, each carrying a four-year term. In a separate race, three candidates are seeking one seat with a partial term that will conclude in 2028. The candidates for this partial term are home health aide Ijazz Jackson, education advocate Aliya Moore, and By Any Means Necessary (BAMN) organizer Shawn Vaughn.
This election is expected to reshape the board, as only two incumbents, Bessie Harris and Steven Bland, are running for reelection. The board's current leaders, President LaTrice McClendon and Vice President Corletta Vaughn, are not seeking new terms. The total of 34 candidates running for the school board represents the largest slate seen since DPSCD was established in 2016, a year when more than 60 individuals sought seats on the new district's board.
The partial term seat became open after Sherry Gay-Dagnogo departed the board last year to become the ombudsman for the city of Detroit. According to Superintendent Nikolai Vitti, Gay-Dagnogo, a former teacher and state lawmaker, was reelected in 2024, leaving two years remaining on her term. While retired special education teacher and principal Bessie Harris was appointed to fill Gay-Dagnogo's seat last October, a Michigan Association of School Boards policy limits appointed members to serve only through the end of 2026 if a regular board election is scheduled the following November. This policy requires appointed members to run in the election if they wish to serve a full term.
Another seat opened when longtime board member Angelique Peterson-Mayberry resigned last year following her appointment to the Wayne County Commission. Her term expires at the end of this year and is not included on the ballot. Pastor Steven Bland was appointed in July 2025 to take Peterson-Mayberry’s place. The fifth open seat was held by Iris Taylor, who passed away in July. Daniel Baxter, chief of operations for the Detroit Department of Elections, confirmed that candidates were given the option to select whether they wished to run for a two-year or four-year term.
Sheila Cockrel, CEO of the civic nonprofit CitizenDetroit, has expressed concerns that the presence of two distinct board races could potentially confuse voters. Cockrel stressed the importance of voters understanding which race each candidate is participating in, noting, “We have to let Detroit voters know that if you want to learn about who the candidates are, you have to learn about them in the context of which race they’re in.” She voiced apprehension that voters might focus solely on the four-year term group, inadvertently voting for five candidates instead of the allowed four, or overlooking the candidates for the two-year term.
To help educate the electorate, CitizenDetroit has launched a YouTube series featuring 25 of the school board candidates. The organization is also hosting a sold-out speed-dating-style event on October 1st, where 16 candidates are scheduled to participate. At this event, candidates will be provided with six questions in advance, and attendees at each table will choose which questions to ask during rotations. Additionally, Cockrel plans to utilize CitizenDetroit’s social media platforms to further clarify the differences between the four-year and two-year term races for voters.