Lemke for School Board

Why Run for School Board?

I truly relish the experience of learning which is fortunate because we spend every moment of our life learning. A goal of mine is to instill the love of learning in my children. Education is the one thing that seems to have a high potential to improve the future of my children's lives. I do not just mean this monetarily. I want to help build a future where my children's generation flourishes and my children are proud to work with their peers to improve the world we created for them. If elected, I hope to help my peers on the board of eduction create a safe place to learn for many generations to come.”Michael Lemke

Guiding Principals

It is important to understand the lens through which something is viewed. With this in mind, I try to see our school district through three distinct lenses.



Student Achievement

Students work hard everyday. Every student encounters times when the educational experience is simple and other times when it is challenging. I want to send my children to a school that supports them during challenging times and nudge them when times are simple.

Open
Culture

My wife, Meghan, and I choose to live in Skokie because of its celebration of diversity. Education is not just the pursuit of academic acumen, it is important to be introduced to the cultures of the world. Creating a safe environment to share is critical to a positive learning environment and developing the whole child.

Fiscal Excellence

Fiscal policies should benefit the school in the long term while supporting the current needs of the district. It is imporant to me that School Distict continues to provide high quality educational programs in a fiscally responsible manner.

About

Michael Lemke was born in California and later moved to Denver, Colorado with his mother, father, and younger brother Justin. They lived there for one year until his family moved again to Illinois. In a period of 6 years, Michael attended six different schools before High School. He graduated from Geneva High School in 2001. In 2005, Michael received his B.S. in both Mathematics and Philosophy from Northern Michigan University. While in college, Michael enjoyed many extra curricular activities. He founded the Philosophy, Poetry and Chess Clubs. He also, presented original works of philosophy, mathematics and computer science at various colloquiums, notably Argonne National Laboratory and the Michigan Academy of Arts, Science and Letters. He currently works for the educational technology company Area9 Lyceum, where he is the Vice President of Learning Architecture leading a team of learning engineers developing educational experiences used around the world.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many years have you been on the school board?

I am in the process of completing my first full term which means I have been on the school board for four years.

Why are you running for a seat on the school board?

I truly relish the experience of learning which is fortunate because we spend every moment of our life learning. A goal of mine is to instill the love of learning in my children. Education is the one thing that seems to have a high potential to improve the future of my children's lives. I do not just mean this monetarily. I want to help build a future where my children's generation flourishes and my children are proud to work with their peers to improve the world we created for them. If elected, I plan to continue helping my peers on the board of eduction create a safe place to learn for many generations to come.

How long have you lived in the district?

My wife and three children have lived in Skokie for nine years. Well, except for Harrison, he was born 5 years ago.

Do you have kids in any of the district schools?

Yep, all of them. Harrison is a proud preschooler at Meyer. Bailey attends Middleton and is in fourth grade. Sophia technically is in seventh grade at McCracken but she feels more like an adult every day.

How have you personally been involved in the district up to now?

Besides serving on the school board, I was a parent leader on the SD 73.5 MTSS committee. It was a great pleasure for me to work with Amber Brydon and my fellow parents to improve the already impressive MTSS program. You can see the video that we produced as a team. However, the thing that I am the proudest of is teaching beside our great educators in the district. Your child might have been in one of the classes where we launched rockets, programmed humans like robots, studied cryptography, raced across the room with different units of measure, found mathematical objects in nature, or learned that the stories of our lives can be analyzed quantitatively.


What do you do?

I lead a group of learning engineers that are located all over the world. We build adaptive learning experiences that are used by a wide variety of people in various industries. Trust me, it is even more fun than it sounds. We support learners from all walks of life. Just to name a few, the products that we create improve the lives of students across all grade levels, business leaders learning leadership skills, doctors refreshing their medical knowledge, or corporations looking to onboard new employees quickly.

Professional Timeline

  • Vice President of Learning Architecture

    Leading a team of learning engineers developing educational experiences used around the world.

  • Senior Director of Product Management

    Worked with senior leadership to develop a technological roadmap that allowed for a migration of millions of students to a next generation learning platform.

  • Lead Digital Product Analysts

    Lead the development of world class adaptive learning products bridging the gap between technological requirements and student needs.

  • Technology Manager

    While at Uncommon, I managed the development of a multi-million dollar eCommerce site that was the backbone of the business.

  • Senior Digital Producer

    During my tenure as Senior Digital Producer, I managed the creation of the online ancillaries for Pearson's math programs across 29 different K-12 math titles. These learning tools ranged from interactive books on the iPad, an interactive whiteboard games product and thousands of visual learning animations targeted at elementary students.

  • Marketing Specialist, NSF Math Programs

    As a Marketing Specialist, I focused on communication by facilitating the creation of promotional pieces such as samplers, flyers, brochures, websites and videos. By partnering with the authors and content devlopers, I trained curriculum specialists on our technology products and supported schools across the nation.

  • Producer in the Digital Learning Group

    As a Producer in DLG, I was responsible for the McDougal Littell Assessment System which is used to keep track of how students are progressing academically across the nation. My role was to work with editorial to develop, maintain and post content to the learning platform. In addition to MLAS, I was a member of the Resources2Go team which pioneered the delivery of educational materials on a flashdrive. I still remember the day Bill Gates requested one!

  • Mathematics Marketing Associate

    While a Marketing Associate I worked with the Product Manager to create a prioritized schedule of when marketing material will be needed. The team depended on me to maintain accurate product information such as, product titles, prices, and other specs in multiple databases. During my time on the team, I conducted various product training sessions on McDougal Littell Math, Destination Math, and competition along with 39 self-running demos of McDougal Littell's and competitors’ technology used to educate the sales force.

  • Faculty Services Representative

    The Faculty Services Repersentative's job is to support professors across the nation. I specialized in mathematics where I was able to train professors on our textbooks, explain the uses of different titles and answer any questions the instructors might have.