Jefferson City Board of Education candidate interview: Michelle Rodemeyer

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

ABC 17 News is talking to candidates in select April election races about their positions on key issues.

Below is the transcription of the full interview with Michelle Rodemeyer, a candidate for the Jefferson City Board of Education. Rodemeyer is one of seven candidates seeking three seats.

LUCAS GEISLER: Welcome, everybody, to the ABC 17 News, Your Voice, Your Vote voter guide for April 2026. I'm Lucas Geisler. Thanks for joining us here on ABC17News.com. I am with Michelle Rodemeyer. Michelle, would you mind introducing yourself and what it is you're running for?

MICHELLE RODEMEYER: Sure. My name's Michelle Rodemeyer. I am running for the Jefferson City School Board.

GEISLER: Why do you want to run for school board?

RODEMEYER: We've got two boys. One graduated last year from J.C. High School and the other one is at Lewis and Clark in eighth grade, and I've been involved with the schools since my oldest was in kindergarten, through PTOs and helping out at the schools. And I just felt like now is the right time for me if I was going to get involved to do it.

We live in Holt Summit, and there's not been anybody from Holts Summit on the board for over 10 years, so we'd like to bring that Holts Summit voice to the board.

GEISLER: If you wouldn't mind just telling us a little about your background in Jefferson City, how long have you been in town and what do you do around town?

So we've, I've lived in the Jeff City area all my life, almost all my life. We currently live in Holts Summit. We've been there for 26 years, and I retired from the state in 2023. I was a fiscal and budget manager. I also did tax returns during tax season for a firm, and after I retired, I moved over to that firm and worked there semi-full-time, and do taxes there as well. But I've been a CPA for over 30 years.

GEISLER: That's great. Let's talk about budgeting for a second if you don't mind. On that, the Jefferson City Schools [are] offering big raises coming up for next year as they've rolled out their budget ... for next year. It's certainly something the district, though, and other districts are thinking about, how to see rising expenses, come in with questions about what funding is going to look like in the future. So, if elected to the board, how do you handle the issue of budgeting for a district like Jefferson City and managing some of those headaches in some cases?

RODEMEYER: Yeah, they are [growing], and they have a big budget. There's, I don't know the exact number, it's over $100 million, I believe. I've, I've managed a budget when I was ... at the state health lab during COVID. And so our budget blew up from $13 million to about $26 million almost overnight, so there are a lot of challenges to managing that kind of budget. But I know my way around the budget, so I'm not afraid to go in and take a look at it. It's going to be a learning experience, because I don't know the ins and outs of that budget... It's possible there could be some budget issues, so it's going to be, I have to take a careful loo, at the whole picture to see where everything's at.

GEISLER: What do you think is the most pressing issue for Jefferson City Schools at this point?

RODEMEYER: That's a good question. You know, there's a lot of things I think on, coming in,I think the AI is going to be huge, and I think that needs to be something the district kind of gets ahead of., if possible. Transportation is always an issue, and Holts Summit brings its own, it has its own transportation issues just being north of the river, and getting our kids over to the middle and high school. And then I think teacher retention and recruitment is going to be key, and I know the raises are one way that they're trying to retain those teachers and attract the teachers, the future teachers, so yeah, I think those are probably some of the big things that are coming.

GEISLER: On teacher recruitment and retention, again, something every district across the country is thinking about having to do. You have any specific ideas in mind that you'd like to, if elected to the board, you want to advocate for or anything that you want to ask questions about in regards to trying to keep staff and faculty around?

RODEMEYER: I'd like to see what they're doing right now because I don't have that full picture, but I think there's some things. Hopefully, and maybe they're already doing these, but we have Lincoln University in Jefferson City, so maybe attracting some of those future teachers to stay in Jefferson City if they're not from here. And then, again, the pay, but yeah, I think I, I don't know exactly what they're doing right now. I know that the Jeff City Early Childhood Center is a good perk for the teachers with young families because they get, their kids can go there once they're 3. So I think that's a, a really nice perk for those teachers.

GEISLER: I do have to ask because you're the first person I've talked to you that's brought up AI when I've asked it like, 'What's the issue, what's the big issue here?'

Is there anything about AI that you, if elected, would like to start a conversation on, continue a conversation on? What is the thing you think AI poses for a school district like Jefferson City?

RODEMEYER: I think ... it's been a while since we were in school. Me anyway, but you know, when the Internet came in, you had to just, you had to make sure that it was being used correctly, and that it was safe for the students. And so I think we just need to look at it that way. It's not something that's going away, so we need to teach them to use it well, and make sure they're safe when they do it and have policies in place for that.

GEISLER: I know something that's usually on the minds of lots of people when it comes to schools is safety -- students, faculty, staff, parents. What would you like to do as far as school safety if you're elected to the board?

RODEMEYER: Again, I'd like to see what they're doing now, but I know they have resource officers in most of the schools, or that share schools. But I think teaching the kids, teaching the students, giving them, preparing them to be safe, both on the Internet and with AI, and, I know they do this with health in health classes too with teaching them about the dangers of drugs and alcohol and things like that. So I think seeing what they're doing first, I think they're doing a lot of things now, and there might be more we can do, but just listening and finding out more about what they're doing.

GEISLER: What do you think is the current relationship between the school board and the public? You think it's a good relationship?

RODEMEYER: I think it's pretty good, not to say that it couldn't be better... A lot of people have questions and, hopefully, they're getting those answers, but I think the more transparent we can be with decisions as we can, the better the public will understand what the district's doing and have maybe trust, have the trust built there. I think the district is going in the right direction. I think a lot of good things have been happening, and so I just like to keep that train going in the right direction.

GEISLER: What are some of the things that, specifically, that you see, that you think is working well, that you'd like to advocate and push forward on more?

RODEMEYER: The trend for graduation rates is going up, and that's great, yhe four-year graduation rate. Attendance has been trending upwards, so that's a good thing too. The district offers a large number of advanced placement courses, and the students are taking advantage of that. We've got a big increase in the number of the types of courses, the number of courses, and then those participating, and so that's a good thing. And then, Nichols Career Center has really got a lot of great programs going. They have a lot of programs that get those kids ready that aren't going to go to college and can be workforce ready when they leave, so that's another good project.