Interviewer: What do Detroit students need more of?

Liana Mulholland: I think our students really need more equality, which I know is a broad word, but I think that we need to be really fighting for a big picture and not just narrowing things down. And I'll just expand on that by saying that we're like extremely underfunded compared to surrounding districts. And yet we have some of the highest need.

And I think that that is because we have de facto Jim Crow segregation in the metro Detroit area. It's maybe not quite as extreme as it was when I was growing up, but it's definitely still there. And we know that separate can never be equal. And that's something that, you know, the slate that I'm running with the BAMN slate really believes in, and that is our platform.

And I think that equality means equal funding. It means integration, which I think would look something like the model that we have from the LA Unified School District, where it's not just the city and then the suburbs are separate, but it's a unified metro area, and it includes bussing and a real expansion of our magnet programs. And I also think, like really having an expansion of special education, which is definitely a very personal issue for me.

The programs that are really the things that make people feel passionate about coming to school, and are the things that make people really reach for the stars. The arts, music, sports, robotics programs, whatever that is for an individual. I think we really need more of that, and that's the kind of school district everybody should have.

And I think we if we are really using our platform as school board members to rally Detroiters to come to Lansing and fight for that funding, then I think that we can really build a movement to get it.

Interviewer: I'm going to ask you to finish this sentence. “As a student” -- this is when you were a student -- “I wish my school had...”

Liana Mulholland: When I was a kindergarten through part of third grade, I was at Golightly the K through 12 magnet, and during that time I was diagnosed with severe dyslexia. I really could not read at all at that time. And Really in third grade the school just said, oh, the hand holdings over and made it very clear that if you had a disability that that that you just didn't belong there.

And so that sort of began my journey as a lot of parents and students go on, which I call taking the tour where you're going from school to school, from district to district, private schools, whatever you have to do, trying to find the services that you need and that your children need. And I think a lot of people experience this, and I ended up going to a small private school who did nothing for me, and eventually I ended up at a very expensive school in Birmingham called Eaton Academy that was so expensive that my parents had to get on financial aid.

It drained their savings. We had to like, commute with a few other kids who were from Detroit who went there, and that did result in me learning to read at age 12, which is great. But when I once I did have that ability, I made the decision to come back to DPS and go to Cass, which is where I graduated.

And although I'm happy that I learned to read, there's two things I really took away from that. One, I really think about the roads not traveled. Had my parents not been able to send me that school, what would have happened? Very likely, I either just would not have graduated high school, or I would have just been sort of pity passed through and just had a really just not the future that I deserved and that people in my situation deserve.

And I'm just like, how much wasted potential is out there? And so that's one thing. And the other thing is I really saw the contrast between the separate and unequal segregation, you know, lightly was almost all black. I ended up in the suburbs and the school was almost all white, and socially speaking, it was pretty wealthy white kids who were my classmates.

And I mean, I did not fit in there. People always had racist things to say about Detroit. It was not a great place to be. So I was very happy to come back to the district, and I really shouldn't have had to go through that. We should have a services like that inside the district for free, and it shouldn't just be this extreme between mainstreaming or you're in a school like Drew that is just only for students with disabilities and quite severe disabilities, and those are the only two options that you have.

I just don't think that fits everyone. So I think we really have to expand special ed. So I wish that I had been able to receive those districts with or excuse me services. I wish I would have been able to receive those services within Detroit Public Schools. That would have made such a difference to my life.

But having went through that, and I think a number of people in BAMN actually have similar stories where we experienced both sides of the segregation that we have in Detroit, and it really made us feel like we had to fight for integrated, equal education and be believers in integration and Brown versus Board.

And that's been a lot of our experiences that contrast where you're like, oh, okay, it doesn't have to be this way. And why do these kids have this? And why do these kids not have this? And I know that's not right. And it really shapes who you are. So that's that's what I would say to that.

Candidates appear in ballot order, alphabetical by last name.

Vote for not more than 4

• Natalie Bien-Aime*

• Steve Bland Jr.

• Michelle Broughton

• Katrina Brown

• Cidney Calloway

• Bobby Christian*

• Nicole Conaway

• Vilma Escamilla Duran

• Daniel Ferguson III*

• Duane Larry Grigsby Jr.

• Bessie L. Harris

• David Harris

• C. Allan Hubbard

• Henrietta Ivey*

• Tabrian C. Joe

• Shinese Johnson

• Theodore Jones

• Georgia Mae Lemmons

• LaMar D. Lemmons

• Clement O. Lett*

• Phil Lloyd II

• Darious Morris*

• Liana Mulholland

• Tyshea Pope

• DaNetta L. Simpson

• Tawanna Simpson

• Jameel Montgomery Smith

• Calesther Smith-Arnold*

• Terry E. Whitfield

• Elizabeth A. Williams

• Theresa Williams*

* Did not participate in the CitizenDetroit candidate video series.

Ijazz Jackson*

Aliya Moore

Shawn Vaughn

* Did not participate in the CitizenDetroit candidate video series.