The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education welcomed four new members – from Districts 1, 2, 5 and 6 – who were sworn in at the Dec. 9 board meeting. 

Each new board member brings a unique and important perspective to the board. Although they each bring distinct personal and professional experiences to their new role, they all share one common belief – that all students deserve an exceptional education and that CMS is here to deliver on that promise. 

The newly elected members joined the nine-member elected Board of Education. The board has three at-large members and six district representatives who all serve four-year terms. The district representatives faced elections last November, and at-large members will be up for reelection in 2027.

 

Dr. Charlitta Hatch, District 1

Dr. Charlitta Hatch will tell you that she was “raised by CMS” and is a third-generation graduate. She spent her K-12 years with CMS, ultimately graduating from Julius L. Chambers High School, where she met her husband in 10th grade. Her siblings all attended CMS, and her parents both graduated from CMS. She was the first in her family to attend college.  

“With a strong generational connection to this school district, it is an honor and privilege to serve on this board,” said Dr. Hatch. 

After growing up in Charlotte and attending CMS, Dr. Hatch graduated from Hampton University with a bachelor’s degree in business management, and from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte with a master’s and doctorate degree in urban education. 

Dr. Hatch’s first job before college was as a front-desk representative at the McCrorey Family YMCA. “Even though I only made $6 per hour, I credit my leadership foundation with my experience there. I had so much responsibility and was always surprised that they trusted me with the keys to open the building at 5:30 a.m. (yes we had real keys) and to deposit the money at the bank.” She often reflects on that experience when she thinks about raising the bar for our students and knowing that they will meet and exceed the standard.

She now serves as the city of Charlotte’s deputy chief information office and chief data and analytics officer, where she leads enterprise strategy, artificial intelligence, innovation and data governance.

Dr. Hatch really values the diversity each board member brings. As a new board member, she hopes to take her unique lens in helping the board continue on its AI trajectory in a way that unburdens teachers from administrative tasks, so they can spend more time with students. As a three-time book author, she intends to support and advance the board’s focus on literacy. She is also committed to better understanding why families are choosing (or not choosing) CMS for their child’s education. “Every child deserves to see themselves in their curriculum, in their teachers, in their environment.” 

She believes that engaging families is critical. She has started a radio show called “Community Classroom” to help parents understand information and provide them with tools that can help them support their children.  

Beyond helping her district families understand the nuances of school data and terms, Dr. Hatch wants to collaborate closely with her fellow board members on “demystifying” what the board does and how their work focuses on establishing goals and expectations for serving the whole child. 

“As a parent, I want to know my third grade son has access to great academics, but I also want to know that his mental health is protected and that his school friends are kind,” she said. She feels the board’s goals set the stage for producing good people and citizens. 

“For me, it’s not just about standing on the shoulders of those who came before me,” Dr. Hatch said. “It’s about now serving on the board and letting others stand on mine.”  

 

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Shamaiye Haynes, District 2

Shamaiye Haynes understood the value of learning from a very young age. Her mother was her first teacher and taught her that language is a powerful tool. 

“My mother taught me how to think, how to question and how to understand my responsibility to myself and to others. School did not replace that foundation. It reinforced it,” said Haynes.

“I learned how systems work, how power moves and how knowledge can either be used to confine or to liberate,” said Haynes. “Education was never just about achievement for me, but rather about agency.” 

Haynes was born in Cincinnati and returned there after living in California and Alabama. In 2012, she moved to Charlotte.

Her first job was as a nurse’s aid in a nursing home, and she quickly understood that caring for people at the end of their lives is sacred work. She learned empathy, responsibility and what it really means to show up for someone else. 

Those lessons laid the foundation for her community activism path. She became a dedicated community organizer and nonprofit leader. A proud mother of a CMS graduate and a current CMS student, she understands firsthand the challenges and possibilities within our public education system.

People asked her many times what made her decide to run for the board. “A decade had passed, and many things I wanted to see were tried but not completed,” said Haynes. “So I asked myself, ‘If not me, who?’ It became clear that I needed to run.”

Following the path of her mentor, retired board member Thelma Byers-Bailey, Haynes has a deep commitment to cultivating equity, opportunity and belonging in Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. 

Haynes learned about education policy and community building by studying and working closely with families, students and teachers over many years and feels this board is positioned to create student-focused change. “I worked with several board members in the community over the years and know many from the campaign trail,” said Haynes. “We all have a powerful community spirit and a high level of creativity.” 

She also feels passionately that families join forces with the board to advance student outcomes. “I want to uplift parental voices so that we can create more engagement and accountability for how we all work together to support our students.” She is also invested in the community school model and in strengthening restorative justice practices through policy.

She is not intimidated by the size of the district’s student population or number of schools. She has heard many board members talk about whether you have 15 schools or 150 schools in a district. “The work is the work, and you got to get it done.” 

Haynes is driven to do this work. “Education is the center of a child’s growth and understanding,” she said. “It is the most important aspect of a person’s life. Let’s get the work done.”

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Cynthia Stone, District 5

Cynthia Stone always wanted to be a teacher and remembers her days walking to Pinewood Elementary School. “That walk taught me independence,” said Stone, who then would dive into a good book. “When I went through rocky times as a child, education got me through. It meant a lot. It was everything.” 

Born and raised in Charlotte, Stone offers a unique, decades-long perspective on Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. Her experience spans from the beginning of desegregation in 1970, when she was bused to West Charlotte High, to when she was a single parent to a CMS-educated daughter and, after remarrying, a parent to her stepdaughter, who attended South Charlotte Middle and Providence High schools. Ultimately, Stone realized her dream of being a teacher in CMS – the district that inspired her to teach. 

She graduated from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro with a bachelor’s degree in elementary education in 1976 and from Lander University in Greenwood, S.C., with a master’s degree in education. Her first job was as a student teacher in Siler City in Chatham County. She took a break from education to experience a business career and returned to education in 2004. Stone taught at Chantilly and Park Road Montessori schools. She retired as a teacher in 2023. 

“I was not ready to stop. I didn’t know what I wanted to do, but I knew I wanted to do something,” Stone said. She was asked by a friend if she’d ever consider running for the board. After reading the book “101 Essays That Will Change the Way You Think” by Brianna Wiest, she said, “Yes.”   

“I woke up, realized I won and immediately felt this was a big deal,” said Stone. “It is gratifying, and I’m pretty stoked.”

She is excited to serve on this board where “we respect the experience we all bring and will band together to figure out what needs to be done.”  

To understand what needs to be done, she wants to “learn from our families and students and encourage them to offer feedback on policies of any kind.”

Her top goals on the board are to support policies and decisions that reinforce the importance of mental health and physical safety. In alignment with the board’s goals, Stone also will remain focused on student achievement across the board to eliminate gaps. 

Stone shared the importance of children making mistakes. “I used to tell my students if you make a mistake, I want to know about it so I can help you. Mistakes are learning opportunities.” 

Stone also wants to recognize the value of our teachers. “Until you have been a teacher, it is hard to truly understand the time and effort that teachers put in every single day. They have a different reality from many.”

That reality is key to the community. “Education is the single most important way to eradicate poverty,” said Stone. “It’s the way to fix everything that is broken.”

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Anna London, District 6

Anna London has always been passionate about education. It played a defining role in her life and helped fuel her decision to run for a seat on the Board of Education. As a child, she saw family members struggle with mental health and addiction issues, but she found refuge at her elementary school. 

“Education was the thing that saved me as a child,” London said. “My teachers were my saving grace every single day. I know what it’s like to walk into school carrying invisible burdens, but being expected to learn and perform and behave. I can remember very specific things that my teachers said to me that really encouraged me, but also held me accountable to continue to achieve and to show up.”

London grew up in Concord and north Charlotte, and graduated from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte with a bachelor’s degree in psychology. While earning a master’s degree in counseling, she taught pre-K for more than three years in CMS – “the most fun job that I ever had” – then worked in crisis intervention and behavioral health alongside CMS. She transitioned to workforce development more than 11 years ago and is president and CEO at Charlotte Works. 

“I love that Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools and the previous board have really been focused on the whole child as part of the strategic plan, and I think we have an incredibly important achievement in math and reading, early literacy – all of that is really important. But [supporting the whole child] and a student’s mental health and well-being to me is just as important.”

London said her experience has taught her that the community really needs not just students who graduate high school, but students who are prepared to thrive after graduation. She said it’s a critical time for public education, and it’s important to have bold, courageous, local elected officials who are willing to fight for what students need, as well as for the educators and staff in the school system. She has spent a lot of time, even during her campaign, getting to know her fellow board members and said she knows what’s important to every one of them.

For London, she will be working to restore trust and credibility with parents and residents across the district, and to be available to hear educators’ perspectives because “they’re the heartbeat; they’re the ones that show up every day.” She believes the board’s student outcomes-focused governance will continue to close achievement gaps and wants advocacy at all levels to ensure the district has fully funded schools and higher teacher pay.

“I think that it is really important (for board members) to be independent thinkers, but to collaborate and to be a cohesive body,” London said. “We may not always agree, but that’s OK. We all come from different backgrounds, bring unique perspectives to this experience, and that’s how it should be. But at the end of the day, I respect every single one of them.”