Stressful relations with former colleagues and the challenges of spring campaigning are among the reasons the Arlington School Board’s chair says she isn’t seeking another term.
“If I didn’t love the work so much, then the toxicity aimed at me, personally, from some of my former colleagues would have driven me out the door already,” Kadera told members of the Arlington County Democratic Committee on Wednesday (Dec. 8) as she announced she won’t be running for re-election this year.
Nearly simultaneously, Kadera sent a full statement out to supporters, which listed additional reasons including the challenge of balancing a family and a 9-to-5 job with School Board responsibilities such as upcoming budget deliberations.
Adding running in the Democrats’ springtime caucus would be too much, Kadera said.
“I need to acknowledge my limits,” she said.
Whispers about more than typical levels of tension within the ranks of elected school leadership have been circulating for months, according to several individuals with indirect knowledge of the situation.
“It’s terrible what a couple of the members aimed at her,” one civic activist told ARLnow. “She didn’t deserve that — no one does.”
Several sources pointed to disagreements between Kadera and her former colleagues Cristina Diaz-Torres and David Priddy, both of whom left the School Board at the end of the year after failing to seek re-election.
Diaz-Torres and Priddy left the board Dec. 31 after serving single terms each. They, and now Kadera, join a growing list of Board members to serve just one one term before moving on. Tannia Talento and Monique O’Grady also are recent members of that club.
In her remarks to Democrats, Kadera didn’t rule out another bid for office at a later date.
“This is the most purposeful, fulfilling work I have ever had,” she said. “I hope that sometime in my life I will have the opportunity to do it again.”
Though she has served only three years so far, Kadera currently is the Board’s most senior member, having joined the body in January 2022.
Bethany Zecher Sutton arrived in January 2023, Miranda Turner in January 2024, and Kathleen Clark and Zuraya Tapia-Hadley were elected last November with terms starting Jan. 1.
Like her four colleagues, Kadera’s general-election victory of 2021 came only after emerging victorious in the Democratic caucus earlier the same year. But in March 2022, as Arlington Democrats debated whether to continue to endorse candidates for School Board through caucuses, Kadera came out in favor of scrapping them.
At the time, she said:
“To those who feel like my change of heart is ‘too little, too late’ — I can only agree that, yes, it took me a while to land in this spot, but that hasn’t been for lack of interest or careful study.”
Despite her opposition, Democrats voted overwhelmingly to retain the party-run caucus to select School Board endorsees.
Kadera and Turner squared off in the 2021 caucus, where the school system’s response to Covid took center stage.
After defeating Turner in the caucus, Kadera received 77% of the vote against Mike Webb in the general election.
In her Jan. 8 remarks and statement, Kadera reiterated concerns about the caucus process, but expressed appreciation that Democrats in 2022 made reforms to it.
Virtually all Arlington School Board members of the last quarter-century won the Democratic endorsement prior to general-election victories. The lone outlier was Dave Foster, who ran as a Republican-backed independent and won races in 1999 and 2003.
Prospective Democratic School Board candidates are likely to announce their intentions at the February Democratic Committee meeting.
The deadline to file for the caucus is Feb. 28, with voting taking place online from April 19 to May 10 as well as in person at Washington-Liberty High School (slated for May 4) and Dr. Charles R. Drew Elementary School (May 10).
James “Vell” Rives IV, who ran for School Board as an independent in 2022 and 2023 and in affiliation with the Forward Party in 2024, said Arlington residents should be appreciative of Kadera’s service.
“I appreciate her thoughtful, sensible approach to our many challenges, and she has set a new standard for community engagement and inquiry,” Rives said in a statement. “I hope we will make the most of having her on the Board for 2025.”
Kadera was selected last summer by her colleagues to serve as chair, and likely will relinquish the post to current vice chair Bethany Zecher Sutton in July. Her term runs through the end of the year.
