Miami-Dade County School Board, District 1
School board members set the district budget and school-tax rate, hire the superintendent (where appointed), approve school boundaries, curriculum policy and construction, and set district policies. Nonpartisan. Term: 4 years.
Partly verified. Either the November opponent could not be confirmed from available sources, or only a few positions are documented. Confirm the full candidate list on your county sample ballot; unknown positions are shown as such.
How we verified who is on the ballot
Candidate list taken from the Florida Division of Elections, 2026 general election candidate list on 2026-09-18 ; both candidates are marked Qualified, which for a nonpartisan seat means the August vote did not produce a majority winner (or the seat is decided only in November). Check the county Supervisor of Elections sample ballot.
Candidates
Report an error ↗Linda Cothiere
Cothiere was born in Haiti, raised in Carol City and graduated from Miami Carol City Senior High. She has spent more than three decades in Miami-Dade education, starting as a paraprofessional and now teaching first-grade math, science and social studies. She co-hosts a community talk show for immigrant families and is…
Katrina Wilson
Wilson has worked more than 30 years in Miami-Dade County Public Schools, starting as a clerk at 18, teaching for 11 years at Miami Killian Senior High and serving 15 years as principal and CEO of Liberty City Charter School, Florida's first charter school. She was elected to the Miami Gardens City Council in 2018 and…
Side-by-side on the major issues
Each row is a statement. The chips show how each candidate's stated positions or record relate to that statement. Expand a row to read the evidence and sources. "No public position found" means we could not find a statement or record on the topic, not that the candidate has none.
| Issue | Linda Cothiere Nonpartisan | Katrina Wilson Nonpartisan |
|---|---|---|
| Taxes & spendingCutting taxes should be a top priority, even if it means less government spending on services. | No public position found | No public position found |
| Property taxesFlorida should eliminate or sharply reduce homestead property taxes, even if local governments must cut services or find other revenue. | No public position found | No public position found |
| Education & school choicePublic money should follow students to private, charter or home schools (universal school vouchers). | Leans disagree· stated position The Miami Times reported that Cothiere criticized charter school expansion and the lack of community consultation behind it, while calling for more questions about how the district responds to declining enrollment. | Mixed / neutral· stated position Wilson spent 15 years leading Florida's first charter school and helped found a charter-school consortium, but says she wants public education to evolve rather than be privatized and has defended her record against suggestions that her charter background is a liability. |
| Gender identity lawsFlorida's laws restricting gender-affirming care for minors and classroom instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity should remain in place. | No public position found | No public position found |
| Library and classroom materialsParents' objections should be enough to pull a book or lesson from a school, even when other families want it kept. | No public position found | No public position found |
| Teacher and staff payRaising teacher and staff pay should be the district's top budget priority, even if other spending has to be cut. | Strongly agrees· stated position Cothiere's platform calls for directing local dollars to competitive pay and retention, protecting the voter-approved teacher-salary referendum and closing the pay and working-conditions gap with neighboring counties. | Leans agree· stated position Wilson has suggested the district look at non-salary supports for educators, including affordable housing vouchers and rent breaks, alongside teacher compensation as a campaign priority. |
| School safety approachCampus safety depends more on police officers and firm discipline than on counselors and mental-health staff. | Leans agree· stated position Cothiere has asked whether the district can add security staff or police officers at school access points, and her platform calls for full compliance with Florida's Marjory Stoneman Douglas safety law, including a safe-school officer, a single point of entry and Alyssa's Law panic alarms in every building. | No public position found |
Where they sit on the map
Each candidate is placed by the average of their documented stances. It is a summary of the table above, not an extra judgment.
How the axes are computed
Each axis is the average of a candidate's coded stances (+2 to −2) on a fixed set of statements, so it comes straight from the documented positions and nothing else. A candidate needs at least three documented statements on an axis to be placed.
Economic issues (toward "Smaller government (lower taxes, less spending)"): Taxes & spending (agree), Property taxes (agree), Health care (disagree), Housing affordability (disagree), Property insurance (disagree), Energy & utilities (disagree), Social Security & Medicare (disagree), Teacher and staff pay (disagree).
Social & legal issues (toward "Conservative side of the statements"): Immigration (agree), Abortion (disagree), Guns (disagree), Education & school choice (agree), Elections & voting (disagree), Crime & policing (agree), Gender identity laws (agree), Marijuana (disagree), Environment & water (disagree), Trump administration (agree), Library and classroom materials (agree), School safety approach (agree).
| Candidate | Economic issues | Social & legal issues |
|---|---|---|
| Linda Cothiere | not enough data | not enough data |
| Katrina Wilson | not enough data | not enough data |
Other issues the candidates have raised
Priorities each candidate has brought up on their own, beyond the major-issue list above.
Linda Cothiere
- School safety, teacher pay and charter costs — Cothiere asked whether schools need more security or police officers, said the district is losing good teachers 'because they cannot afford to stay here,' and said charter schools using district buildings should pay their own bills.
Katrina Wilson
- Enrollment, closures and teacher retention — Wilson calls declining enrollment and its budget impact the district's toughest issue, says school-consolidation decisions cannot be made without involving the community, and floated smaller classes and housing help such as tax breaks or vouchers to retain teachers.
- Declining enrollment and school consolidation — Wilson calls falling enrollment the district's toughest issue; first-day enrollment was down nearly 19,000 students for 2026-27. Both runoff candidates said communities should be consulted before schools are closed or reorganized.