Tom Stone decided to run for the Wasatch County School District’s Board of Education because he feels like it’s his time to do his community part.

“I love this place,” he said. “We all take turns. Someone did it for me, and I think it’s my turn to do it for someone else.”

The Wasatch High School graduate entered the race for Seat E, along with Brad Ehlert. The position is currently held by board President Tom Hansen, who did not file to run for another term after this one ends at the end of the year.

Stone, his wife and their kids have all attended the Wasatch County School District. His granddaughter is in preschool and will begin kindergarten next year.

Stone said he focuses primarily on when he was in high school and began making “real life decisions.”

He said he has been involved as a coach and volunteer for the district’s Center for Advanced Professional Studies, which he said he’s been a part of since its beginning. Considering his kids’ success, he said he feels obligated to give credit first to their mother, but then to Wasatch County High School and the district experience as a whole.

“Two of them have graduated from university and now own their own businesses. My third one is in university in a program that is exceptionally hard to get into,” he said. “My experience was very, very positive, and I want it to continue. … I’m grateful again that not only they did it for me, but people did it for my kids.”

Stone said when people notice a need for change, he believes they should be at the forefront. When his kids were in elementary school, he said he grew worried that software programs and other learning tools were taking the real-life aspects out of their learning.

“Through volunteering, I’d see these kids graduate out of the system, even go to university, and then not be able to get a job,” he said. “They’re not sure what the next steps are.”

He approached the district with his concern, and he said the CAPS program evolved from that conversation.

Students in the program are able to better understand what it’s like to operate in different professional fields when they are given the chance to work with peers to perform projects for local companies, he said Last year, Stone said there were 85 projects.

“It’s the safest place to say, ‘I’m going to try engineering. I’m going to try agriculture,'” Stone said. “What we train and teach is not necessarily skill-based. We want them to be the leaders.”

Stone helps kids interested in business create their own businesses, complete with advertised services, websites and, most importantly, clients other than their moms and grandmas.

He knows it makes high schoolers uncomfortable, and that’s the point.

“I want a child to leave high school confident,” he said. “Otherwise, they put ceilings on themselves.”

While Stone focused on expanding student opportunities to make sure kids are ready for what hits them on the other side of a graduation walk, he also mentioned his ability to look toward the fiscal standing of the school district as it grows.

“I’m a mortgage loan officer, I’m a mortgage banker, and I’ve done it for 30 years here in Wasatch County. And every fall, I get the same phone calls, not from the same people, but the same type of phone calls,” he said. “‘What just happened to my payment? I thought I had a fixed interest rate?'”

He frequently finds himself explaining to people that their taxes have increased.

“My clients that are older especially are saying four-letter expletives, not necessarily at me, but about the situation,” Stone said.

As a business property owner, he’s also seen tax expenses jump on a personal level.

“I am 100% against any tax increases,” he said.

Instead, he believes the school district should begin looking at how it can better use available resources. 

The majority of taxes, he said, goes to payroll.

“Everyone is worried about the building and the schools and stuff like that. That’s less than 8%,” he said. 

He mentioned how the school board has made it a point to pay its teachers competitively compared to other districts throughout the state.

“There’s this competition for teachers and they’ve been increasing every year quite a bit. Now on one side, you can say that’s how you get the quality into it, but it’s costing money,” he said. 

While he specified that he doesn’t want teachers to feel they are having money taken from them, he does want to look into potentially adjusting retirement benefits in order to accommodate higher salaries.

He admitted he doesn’t have all the answers, but amid enrollment growth and the need for more schools, he said such conversations will need to happen.