When the majority of the School Committee cut off public comment and walked out of a meeting last September to the protest of participants, Karen Bachus remained behind. She stayed to listen to disgruntled parents and teachers about their concerns with the teachers contract. Now with election season approaching, Bachus hopes the city’s voters will stand behind her and re-elect her to one of the two at-large seats on the committee.

Bachus, 53, grew up in Newport, graduating from Rogers High School in 1981 before attending Providence College to study english, Education and theology. After a few years of teaching in both elementary and high school, she would pursue a graduate degree at Westchester University. Bachus received a master’s in clinical psychology.

Bachus returned to Rhode Island in 1989 working as a family therapist for a non-profit for a brief time before being hired by the state as a social caseworker for DCYF. She would spend time at the ACI, the Rhode Island Training School and Eleanor Slater Hospital, working in positions as both a clinical psychologist as well as a clinical social worker. She served as a child protective investigator for DCYF for 13 years before she was offered a position to return to Eleanor Slater as a clinical social worker, a position she retains today.

Having most of her career concerning the welfare of children, Bachus has always taken education seriously. She moved to Warwick, her “adopted home city,” in 1997, always paying attention to the school committee, but over the past several years she became more concerned as the school committee began cutting programs and contracting out different services like bussing.

She began attending meetings regularly and then decided to run after the committee cut the marine sciences program at the high schools

“I was horrified,” she said. “We have 39 miles of unbroken coastline. We should be prioritizing a premier oceanography and marine sciences program to take advantage of this natural resource. It is a crime not to provide a program like that when we have all of this in our backyard.”

Bachus argues that living in the Ocean State there are so many job and educational opportunities for students in marine sciences, and it offers schools opportunities to partner with many professionals and businesses in the industry to offer future career paths for students.

If re-elected, Bachus intends to work on developing a pilot program for Warwick’s high schools. The cut to such a “vital” program is what inspired Bachus to run and subsequently win an at-large seat in the school committee in 2012.

Since being on the committee, the district has seen more changes and conundrums than it has in quite some time, and Bachus argued that the committee itself has been “rather divided” on many of the issues and concerns it has had to deal with. She called for a full investigation after Gorton science teacher Mario Atoyan was arrested on a second-degree sexual assault charge unrelated to the department.

Bachus sympathizes with the district teachers and is a proponent of a “fair and reasonable” new contract. She argues that the committee desperately needs to develop a better working relationship with the teachers union to “build up a level of trust.”

“Attacks by the school committee and some people in the public have caused a lack of trust and fear. The average teacher feels belittled and demoralized,” Bachus said. “We heard a lot of talk about work to rule, but in my experience we have the most dedicated teachers in the state and so many continued to go the extra mile for our students.”

Bachus is also concerned about the administration’s attempt to drop class weighting for students with various learning needs, and with individual education programs of IEPs. Although the thought is that brighter students will help bring those struggling students up, Bachus argues that isn’t the case, not only from her own experiences but her research as well. She said Warwick is not the first city to drop weighting for a “budgetary saving measure,” but when weighting is dropped and a teacher has to teach to “the middle” struggling students continue to decline and brighter students aren’t properly challenged. Although it may cost more money to have various leveled courses, “it is what our students deserve. This investment would make us stronger as a community when our youth gets the attention they need.”

Bachus said, “City leadership should stop looking at our schools and students as an economic drain. The future leaders of our community are coming from Warwick Public Schools.”

If re-elected, Bachus would work on the initiatives previously stated as well as restoring physical education, making a personal finance class mandatory for high school students, expanding the career and technical programs and continuing to work on a contract with the teachers union.

Bachus would like to reinvest in the district’s literacy programs, returning the literacy to an everyday course as well as seeing to restoration of Reading Recovery, a “tried and true program” at the elementary level.

“That program saved a lot of students and saves the city money because we can catch these students early and get them back to reading at grade level before we have to take more serious initiatives,” Bachus said.

She believes that reading, writing and arithmetic are still the foundation of education, and to not prioritize literacy is doing a “disservice” to Warwick’s students as reading is so essential in every aspect of life, no matter what students continue after school.

Lastly, Bachus would like to see the school committee as a whole expanded to have a representative from each ward to ensure more “equal and adequate” representation for the city

“It only takes three votes to win; there is no way three people should be able to decide on half of the city’s budget,” Bachus said. “Nor should three people alone make some critical decisions on curriculum, programs and the future of this city and its students.”

She believes by increasing the number of school committee to mirror that of the City Council the public can gain some of the trust they have lost in the committee over the past few years.

“People aren’t stupid; they know what is needed and who has the experience, education, knowledge and heart to fight for our students and schools,” Bachus said.