Lanlan Xu
Running for school board in Howard County
Email: lanlanxu4boe@gmail.com
Website: www.lanlanxu.org
Facebook: facebook.com/profile.php?id=61578613470215
How old will you be on Election Day (Nov. 3)?
49
Are you currently employed? If so, where, and what is your job title?
I currently work at KNG Health Consulting, LLC, where I serve as the vice president of health policy.
What is the highest level of education that you completed, and where did you get that degree?
I have two doctorate degrees. One in public policy from Indiana University and one in German literature from Georgetown University.
Why are you running for the school board?
I am running because I want to help every student discover their path and reach their full potential. Howard County's schools are facing real challenges right now that hinder student success: workforce shortages, tight budgets, aging facilities in need of major repairs and replacement and persistent gaps in outcomes for students who have historically been underserved. They affect real children, real teachers and real families every day. To tackle these challenges, I want to bring my 'STEP UP' approach—Support, Transparency, Empowerment, Preparation, Unity and Progress. It is designed to help address those challenges. To ensure that students, educations and schools have the resources they need, my three priority areas are: Sustainable funding: prioritize student-facing positions and address deferred maintenance while advocating for greater transparency and stronger coordination with county and state leaders on long-term resource allocation. High-Quality dducation for all: use data to close opportunity gaps, expand college and career-connected learning and align resources with students’ specific needs. A workforce worth investing in: make Howard County Public School System a place where people want to build careers through competitive salaries, clear advancement pathway and creative recruitment strategies.
What makes you a good candidate for the board?
My career in national policy has trained me to develop evidence-based policy and manage large-scale budgets with transparency and measurable outcomes. My service on the Operating Budget Review Committee and other Howard County Public School System committees provides me with a technical, "day-one" understanding of our district's financial and policy landscape. Simultaneously, my leadership on the State’s Hate Crime Response and Prevention Commission, the Governor's Commission on Asian Pacific American Affairs and the Local Children’s Board has prepared me to foster unity across our diverse community. I am ready to turn community vision into actionable policy, ensuring Howard County Public School System remains a world-class system that prepares every student for 21st-century success. As a Howard County parent and a longtime community advocate, I have the hands-on experience to understand the daily needs of our families. Having lived on three continents as a student, parent and policymaker, I bring a global perspective to prepare students for success in today’s increasingly interconnected world. With my background as a policy expert and an executive with leadership experience at both the national and local levels, I am ready to lead. I will bring evidence-based decision making to the board to prioritize student well-being, academic excellence and long-term fiscal success.
What is the most important issue facing your school board and what would you do about it if elected?
One of the biggest challenges facing Howard County Public School System right now is ensuring every student has the academic and social-emotional support they need to reach their full potential. Students today are facing growing academic pressures, mental health challenges, behavioral needs and learning gaps, while schools are also dealing with staffing shortages, rising operational costs, aging facilities and increasing demands on educators and support staff. The board’s responsibility is to make thoughtful long-term decisions that keep students at the center while ensuring the school system remains strong and sustainable for the future. That means prioritizing student-facing resources, supporting and retaining educators, strengthening mental health and special education services and improving long-term planning for both operating and capital needs. It also means making decisions transparently and communicating clearly with families, staff and the broader community about priorities, trade-offs and outcomes. I believe Howard County Public School System must continue investing not only in academic excellence, but also in safe, supportive and inclusive learning environments where every student feels connected and able to succeed. The Board of Education should focus on proactive planning rather than reacting to challenges year to year. Strong schools require long-term investment, collaboration, transparency and community trust.
Please name a public leader you admire and explain why.
I admire Patsy Mink, the first woman of color elected to Congress and a lifelong champion of educational opportunity. A Japanese American woman who faced discrimination throughout her education and early career, she turned those barriers into a determination to open doors for others. What I admire most is how she translated her values into lasting public policy. She introduced the first comprehensive Early Childhood Education Act, authored the Women’s Educational Equity Act and played a pivotal role in Title IX, transforming educational opportunities for generations of women and girls. Her leadership reminds me that public service is about creating opportunities for others. As an immigrant, a mother and someone deeply committed to public education, I find her example especially meaningful. She showed how persistence, courage and effective policymaking can create change that lasts for generations.
The Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, passed by the General Assembly in 2021, is a 10-year plan that includes increased funding to support early childhood education, higher teacher starting pay, college/career-readiness standards for high school graduates, and expanded services to multilingual and impoverished families, among other goals. Since the Blueprint's implementation, test scores have increased modestly in many parts of the state, but some school officials complain about the costs and administrative burdens placed on them by the Blueprint. Please tell us your views on the Blueprint and how it is affecting your school district.
I believe the Blueprint brings Howard County in the right direction by strengthening academics, supporting educators, expanding early childhood education, improving college and career readiness and directing additional resources to students with greater needs. However, we need to look closely at the challenges associated with implementing the Blueprint. Full implementation will require the state to fully fund the Blueprint. But the reality is, at the local level, our school system is required to carry out the Blueprint’s mandates with insufficient funds. That means Howard County Public School System must prioritize its investments in a way that does not crowd out essential programs, resources, and staff to meet the demands of the Blueprint. My approach would be protecting core classroom services, using a phased and data-driven budget plan and maximizing state Blueprint funding. For universal pre-K, I support a mixed-delivery model using both public and qualified private providers so we can expand access without overburdening existing schools. If reallocations are needed, they should come from operational efficiencies or phased implementation—not from core instruction or essential supports like special education or student mental health. Additionally, empowering educators is also a key aspect of Blueprint implementation, since they translate the Blueprint goals into the classrooms, and they need the tools and staffing to do that well. Ultimately, we should evaluate the Blueprint by its results: whether it improves student achievement, expands opportunity, supports and retains excellent educators and prepares students for life after graduation.
Chronic absenteeism has been a problem in many schools since the Covid-19 pandemic. How big of a problem is absenteeism in your school district, and what if anything can the Board of Education do about it?
Chronic absenteeism remains a persistent challenge in Howard County Public School System. The district's strategic plan sets a goal of reducing the rate to 11% by 2029, but as of 2025, 17% of all students remain chronically absent. This is unchanged from the prior year and already behind target. The disparities are particularly concerning: economically disadvantaged students are at 32%, while multilingual learners and students with disabilities are both at 27%. Meeting these goals requires a data-driven, evidence-based approach that identifies the root causes keeping students from school—transportation barriers, mental health challenges, housing instability or family circumstances—and responses with targeted, individualized interventions. No single solution works for every student. But we also need to give students a reason to want to be in school. That means making education meaningful and engaging by connecting learning to students' interests and future goals and expanding hands-on and career-connected opportunities. I would strengthen wraparound services, expand community partnerships and use community coordinators to bridge schools and families, while ensuring students feel known, supported and connected to their school community.
Are you satisfied with your school district's policy on AI use by students? If so, why? If not, what would you suggest to improve the AI policy?
I broadly support Howard County Public School System current AI use policies, which also includes guardrails to help students understand the consequences of using AI. AI use should be age-appropriate, with greater protections and guidance for younger students and increasing opportunities for responsible use as students mature. Used thoughtfully, AI can enhance learning, creativity and critical thinking rather than replace them. Clear safeguards are also needed to prevent misuse, including academic dishonesty, exposure of personal information and inappropriate or inaccurate content. AI literacy is increasingly important for college and the workforce, making it essential that students learn to use these tools responsibly. Educators need adequate training to apply AI policies consistently and effectively. We must also ensure that differences in access to devices, internet or AI tools do not widen opportunity gaps. Finally, because AI is evolving rapidly, Howard County Public School System should regularly review and update its policies with input from educators, students, families and experts.
Youth mental health has been a growing concern for years now. Do you think your school district has the resources and personnel in place to deal with this issue adequately? If not, what would you suggest to improve the situation?
Through my efforts as a health policy expert and Horizon Foundation board member, I have seen first hand that expanding school-based behavioral health services across Howard County Public School System remains a challenge. That work reinforced that our school system needs early intervention systems in place, that access to care shouldn't depend on which school a child attends and that prevention is always less costly than crisis response. Howard County Public School System has made meaningful progress, but demand for mental health support continues to outpace available resources, staffing and services. We need to close that gap through investing in counselors, psychologists, social workers and behavioral specialists; building school climates where every student feels safe, respected and included; and ensuring educators have the training and support they need. We also need stronger coordination between schools, families, healthcare providers and community organizations. Student well-being is a whole-community responsibility.
Do you think there are circumstances when books should be removed from school libraries? If so, what kind of books should be removed, and who should make those decisions?
Our school libraries rely on trained library media specialists, and I believe their professional expertise should remain central to decisions about selecting or removing books. Howard County Public School System should use clear, consistently applied educational criteria, including age-appropriateness, while providing parents and community members meaningful opportunities to raise concerns and request reevaluation. Parents should have a voice in the process, but decisions about access for all students should be based on established standards, professional expertise and educational value—not any single viewpoint or objection. Howard County Public School System should also monitor patterns in book challenges and make the review process transparent, including clearly published criteria for selection and reevaluation. The goal should be a balanced approach that respects parental concerns, protects intellectual freedom, preserves educational value and provides students access to materials that reflect the diversity of experiences in our schools.
