44°
The 40-year-old has lived in the district for four years and has one child who currently attends C.E.T., and another who is a preschooler.
Alpher has a BA in History and Philosophy from Tel Aviv University, an MA in Social Sciences from the University of Chicago, and a second MA in Sociology from the New School, where he also completed Ph.D coursework in Sociology (all but dissertation).
He is currently a strategic consultant and market researcher, and over the years has worked closely with many education organizations, including the College Board and the New York City Department of Education. His work in the field has included implementing education technologies (gradebooks, parent portals, collaborative learning platforms), developing college and career readiness models, evaluating virtual classrooms and remote learning solutions and launching peer networking environments for educators and counselors
Alpher is also a Distinguished Fellow at the Ponemon Institute, one of the nation’s leading research centers on data management, security and privacy, and has an in-depth understanding of the challenges facing student data privacy.
Why did you choose to run for the board of education this year?
Our district is facing very real challenges –from curriculum to budgeting – and I feel a sense of responsibility to put my skills to service. With younger kids, mine is a long term commitment to ensuring our District continues to offer the highest level of education to each and every child, while not breaking the bank. When I take my professional experiences in education, my deep familiarity with the issues and my professional skills managing budgets and complex initiatives (as a former V.P. for two multi-national companies) – I feel I can make a very impactful contribution to this community.
What issues in particular would you like see addressed?
Each and every child is unique and we must provide each student – at every grade – with the opportunity to explore their interests, at their pace through individualized learning and competency based learning. Additionally, we should focus on boosting our childrens’ non-cognitive skills (soft skills), such as problem solving, stick-to-itness, time management, etc. Finally, we should strive to lower our budgetary dependence on taxes from 84% towards 80% through long term planning for targeted alternative revenue streams (grants, donations, etc.), as well as increased collaboration with neighboring districts to potentially share certain administrative and service-related (non-program) costs.
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