With a little over two weeks until the filing deadline, two Grand Rapids Public School board seats have no prospective candidates to fill them.
There are five full-term vacancies on the ballot this November and one partial two-year term. Three candidates—Robert Hovenkamp, Ismalis Nuñez, and Aarie Wade—have filed for the full four-year term elections. Erika VanDyke has filed for the lone partial two-year seat, the Kent County Clerk’s Office and the Grand Rapids Clerk’s Office confirmed Monday morning.
Two positions remain open. The deadline to file as a candidate is July 21.
Wade is the current board vice president. Her and VanDyke’s terms are set to expire in December. VanDyke was appointed to the board in February, after Trustee Arick Davis resigned in January. Twenty people applied for the position. Hovenkamp and Nuñez were two of the four finalists considered for the appointment for Davis’ vacancy.
The terms of Board President José Rodriguez, Trustee Kymberlie Buczek, Trustee Sara Melton, and Trustee Kimberley Williams will also expire at the end of 2026. The GRPS board has nine trustees in total.
Rodriguez has a GRPS board campaign website, but his name does not appear on the Kent County sample ballot available online as of July 2. He did not respond to a request for comment made last Thursday.
The candidates elected to the next GRPS board term will reckon with budget shortfalls. The district faces financial challenges, as federal COVID-19 monies end, and as district enrollments decline.
The state of Michigan provides districts $10,050 per pupil. According to MI School Data, GRPS had 13,692 students enrolled in the 2024-25 school year, a decline of nearly 3,000 students from 2015-16.
The district’s budget for the 2026-27 school year is $281 million, which projects using $13 million in fund balances to cover the deficits. The 2025-2026 school year’s amended budget was $288 million, although the budget had called for $259 million. The plan called for eliminating several administrative positions and freezing the salaries of district leadership. The district sent a letter to families in April, stating that GRPS was operating in a budget deficit of $17.7 million and that staff positions may need to be cut.
In 2024-25, GRPS’s expenses were $276 million.
The district has also had turnover at top administrative positions.
Deputy Superintendent Brandy Lovelady Mitchell was placed on administrative leave in April, following an internal investigation into her treatment of staff, MLive reported. Her brother Charlie Lovelady, the Alger Heights Middle School principal, was placed on leave in February after he was arrested for violating probation for a drunk driving conviction. Bridget Cheney, chief area instructional leader for the southeast quadrant, was placed on leave in March, with no details given by the district as to why.
In April, a measure not to renew Mitchell and Cheney’s contracts for the upcoming school year failed, four votes to five, against Superintendent Leadriane Roby’s recommendations.
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