2025 Parkland School Board Director Candidate

Occupation: Parent of 11-year-old son and 7-year-old daughter, Sr. Marketing Manager at Verizon Corporate Headquarters, Global Head of Operations of VALOR, Verizon’s Military ERG, Board of Director member of We Salute (formerly Veterans Advantage), Published Author, President and CEO of Caruth Consulting, and former Vice President and Treasurer of Coldwater Crossings’ Master Association Board.

Education and Qualifications: B.S. B.A., Kutztown University of Pennsylvania (Dual Major: Marketing and Management); M.B.A., Rosemont College; Doctorate of Philosophy (PhD), Capella University (Business Management). 6+ years of board member experience w/ current board member role (We Salute) & former role (Coldwater Crossings). 12+ years of corporate sales and marketing strategy, budget balancing, and corporate, non-profit, and gov’t (state, local, and federal) partnership procurement, oversight, & management.

Intent: My name is Dr. David M. Caruth and I am enthusiastically running for a position on Parkland’s School Board. I want to take a brief amount of time to tell you a little bit about myself, my experience that makes me a perfect fit for this board position, and what my intention on the board would be if elected. I hold a PhD in Business Management and my several-year study that awarded me my doctorate was based on the cognitive psychology of priority balancing, or in other words, decision making. My study was grounded by the diffusion of innovations theory, the how’s and why’s behind technology adoption.

You may ask yourself, how that pertains to being on a school board. Well, besides the highest educational achievement aspect that comes with a PhD, a board, a school board, is comprised of community members that all do one thing, and that one thing is to make decisions. Those decisions are made based on information provided to the board, and making such decisions have impactful outcomes on all members of the community, with the most important members being our children.

As a father of an 11-year-old at Spring House Middle School & a 7-year-old at Fogelsville Elementary, both whom are active in South Parkland Youth Association sports, and one that is special needs, like any father, or mother, I/we want the best for our children. That is one of the many reasons I planted roots here in the Parkland School District, as it is/was known as being one of the best. And our children deserve the best.

Like the majority of our current & past board members, I am running dual party, as party politics have no place in our children's schools. Rather, the collective voices of parents & engaged community members should drive our oversight & decision making. I will apply pressure on the officials of Lehigh County, Harrisburg, and Washington, to better reach across party lines, work to remove the line, & bring forth a survey of our parents & tax payers, doing what's best for our children & future prominent members of our community.

Beyond education, I have a wealth of experience in decision making, planning, budgeting, and countless business and community related transaction experience. I am a 19-year veteran of Verizon, where I currently work as a Sr. Marketing Manager at our corporate headquarter & am the Global Head of Operations of our Military Employee Resource Group. I also sit on the board of directors of a veteran benefit corporation called We Salute & was formerly the Vice President and Treasurer of my former community’s Home Owner’s Association Board. In these roles I have seen great success: from Verizon with perpetuating my organization’s growth & veteran employee retention rates to my board experience at We Salute bringing benefits to veterans nationally, and at my former HOA where we eliminated non-sense spending, balanced the budget, and gave money back to our community via a 33% fee reduction sustained for 10-years. Would be nice if we saw such reductions in our school taxes, but that’s another item to tackle. What is realistic however is the opportunity we have here. An opportunity to have fresh, experienced eyes on the decisions that need to be made.

My primary objective to be on Parkland’s School Board is to create an environment where each and every child has an equal opportunity to succeed. To accomplish this, we need to collaboratively require adequate classroom sizes, rich curriculum, consisting of diverse electives and advanced placement, and additionally career-technical and vocational courses. We need to also leverage more technology and review our operational effectiveness, put into place best practices from other districts, as we should not recreate the wheel. We need to make investments from the classrooms to the weight rooms, labs to the fields, and most importantly in our teachers and administrators as the success of our students & our schools rest in their hands & we need to not only give them the right tools but compensate & provide the right incentives to fuel and overdrive the passion they already have.

I strongly support the education of anti-bullying for all (special needs, ethnicities, gender, sexual preference, race, and religion) to ensure a safe learning environment. The right curriculum and having a safe learning environment are two strong components to provide success, however fiscal responsibility is one that also needs strong attention, as it is paramount to ensure each dollar is wisely spent benefiting students first and foremost. Therefore, I will vote against wasteful spending and offer my corporate experience in budget balancing to ensure any financial investments we make have a fruitful return. To meet any future, potential funding gaps, I will vote against raising taxes, as we’ll save money by better balancing our budget, streamlining our operations further, & obtain additional funding from state & federal programs based on success and awards we can achieve & obtain. Additionally, attracting more residents to move to our district out of desire/have what we have at our schools for our children, will drive incremental tax revenue from said additional households – a new, funding revenue steam for us. We need to advertise, promote, and market our district as a destination: being bold & boisterous.

In conclusion, I have the experience to manage during tough economic times and cut costs without jeopardizing operations, providing the necessary returns on valuable investments. Additionally, I am a dedicated, compassionate, detail-oriented leader with expert financial and managerial negotiation skills. Working together with the other board members and most importantly the community, we all can tackle the quality-of-education, equity, and fiscal challenges, while representing the diverse interests of all parties. I would be humbly honored by your vote to serve the community on Parkland’s School Board.

Thank you for these few minutes I had to introduce myself and I look forward to putting my experience to much greater deeds, and bettering the great district we are all here to support, for our children, and children to come. Thank you.

Humbly, & Let's Go Trojans!!!

Dr. David M. Caruth