One Montgomery County Board of Education member is not seeking reelection, and two other members opted to run for seats on the county council. With the deadline to register as a candidate passed, 12 candidates are running to fill four seats.
The board of education race is non-partisan and all registered voters are eligible to cast ballots.
Board President Grace Rivera-Oven is seeking reelection for a second, four-year term, in District 1 and has no challengers.
Also unchallenged is Elma-Lorraine Diggs, who is running in District 5. Vice President Brenda Wolff, who is finishing her eighth year on the board, is not seeking reelection. Diggs has no challengers.
Diggs’ two children attend Montgomery County Public Schools. She is a global health policy advisor.
Board member Julie Yang is seeking a seat on the county council, and therefore not seeking reelection.
Sharon Creed, Brett DiResta, Andrew Frykman, Sally McCarthy and Cassandra Sung have all filed to run for the District 3 seat.
DiResta is a college professor and baseball coach and has three children attending MCPS schools. He has his own consulting firm, The Maccabee Group, which is involved in Democratic campaigns.
McCarthy’s two children are MCPS graduates. She cofounded a nonprofit, worked as a policy and planning researcher for the Association of Land-Grant Universities and was a legislative manager for a state government relations firm. according to her website.
Sung is the mother of two and is a Chamber of Mothers Co-Facilitator, which supports D.C. area families and advocates for legislative changes surrounding maternal health, paid family leave and affordable childcare.
Five candidates are hoping to fill Karla Silvestre’s at-large seat on the board of education. Silvestre is a candidate for county council. They are Wylea Chase, Brenda Diaz, Omar Lazo, Rosarie Tucci and Tiffany Wicks.
Chase has four children, two attend MCPS high schools and the other two are graduates. She is an NAACP parent council rep and a member of MCPS’ Hate Bias Task Force, Anti Racist Audit Advisory member and Boundary Study Analysis Team.
Diaz is founder and director of Heart of Joy Learning, a farm and forest program for homeschooled elementary school-age children. She is also a middle and high school social studies teacher at Fusion Global Academy. She previously taught at MCPS and ran for school board in 2024 in District 2.
She has three children, one is a MCPS graduate, the second is a MCPS high school senior and the youngest is homeschooled.
Lazo is the father of three MCPS students and is a Montgomery College Board of Trustee. He owns Los Chorros, a Salvadorian restaurant in Silver Spring that his parents started.
The Montgomery County Education Association announced its support for Rivera-Oven in District 1, McCarthy in District 3 and Lazo for the at large seat. They will be on the union’s Apple Ballot.
