| Job History: |
 | Mark Sanchez is an openly gay Latino public school teacher and a long-time Mission resident and activist. He has twice been elected to serve on the San Francisco Board of Education. For the past two years he has been elected unanimously by his colleagues to be Board President based on his ability to unify a historically divided board.
During his tenure on the School Board, Mark has worked tirelessly to implement a vision of social justice and to hold the school district accountable to progressive San Francisco values while managing a half a billion dollar budget. This work is challenging in the face of constant education cuts by conservative forces in Sacramento and Washington.
Mark is also one of the most prolific legislators on the Board, authoring proposals to promote educational achievement, social justice, sound fiscal management practices, open government, environmental justice, immigrant rights, youth and parent rights, and teacher housing. He authored legislation on the small schools by design initiative; the LGBT family diversity curriculum; opposition to the War on Iraq and military recruitment in public schools; the construction of "green" school buildings; and the rights of immigrant parents to vote in school board elections.
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| Important Issues: |
| Mark co-founded Teachers 4 Change in 1999, an activist group of teachers that picketed in front of San Francisco City Hall to shed light on the lack of public school funding, classroom conditions and the eviction of teachers throughout the city caused by the dot com boom. In 2000, he co-founded Teachers 4 Social Justice, an organization that provides educators opportunities for development, leadership, and community building to promote substantive change in the classroom, school, community and society. At one action with Teachers 4 Change, Mark met D9 Supervisor Tom Ammiano, who urged him and other progressive teachers to seek a seat on the Board of Education. It was at that point, that he decided to take his experience in the classroom to the boardroom. In 2000, Mark was elected to the San Francisco Board of Education and was subsequently re-elected in 2004.
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