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Insufficient record — roster only

How we research: the LiberalMind standard — every candidate gets the same deep pass — service and voting record, campaign positions, local news, questionnaires and voter guides, endorsements, public statements, filings — and both columns of the ledger print: the dirt and the credits, each at the same standard of proof. What held up is stated as fact; what did not is labeled unproven or left out. Race roster: Baltimore County 2026 Election Guide (Dear America compilation), cross-checked against the League of Women Voters 2026 general voters' guide and the Baltimore Banner's candidate coverage — grade: compilation, with the underlying facts confirmed in the guides named below.

The race

Seven elected seats on the Baltimore County Board of Education are on the November 3 ballot — one per councilmanic district, four-year terms, nonpartisan — alongside four governor-appointed members and a student member. Four seats are contested (Districts 1, 3, 6, 7); three incumbents — Jane E. Lichter (District 2), Brenda Hatcher-Savoy (District 4) and Julie C. Henn (District 5) — face no opposition, and we make no call where there is no contest. The board hired a new superintendent this year (Dr. William Heiser, appointed June 24, 2026, by an 8–1 vote) and oversees a budget that is nearly half the county's total spending — the stakes of these seats are fiduciary as much as educational. The live issues in the contested races, per the candidates' own forum and questionnaire answers: screen time and a coming state AI-in-classrooms law, transparency of district data and communication, academic achievement, and fiscal stewardship.

The candidates

District 1 — Candice Logan-Washington. Credits: the deepest education file in any of these races. A Doctor of Education in urban educational leadership and social policy from Morgan State University; a graduate of District 1 schools, a former District 1 teacher, the parent of two District 1 graduates, and, in her own account, nearly two decades working with students, teachers, families and school leaders, with a background in special education. Her platform: invest in and support teachers, strengthen special education and early intervention, expand college and career pathways, and — on the AI question the Banner put to the field — treat AI as a tool students learn to use "responsibly, ethically, safely, in ways that strengthen learning rather than replace thought," without letting it replace reading, hands-on learning and human interaction. Dirt: none found — no adverse record surfaced in news archives or the guides.

District 1 — Lisa A. Mack. Credits: prior service on this board — she held a Baltimore County school board seat before resigning in 2022. Dirt: that resignation, attributed in coverage to health issues, is the documented end of her prior tenure — a fact voters weigh for themselves; we found no fuller public account of her board record, and her current campaign file is thin: no questionnaire answers or platform statements were retrievable from the guides worked. The Baltimore County Progressive Democrats Club's sample ballot lists District 1 as "Logan-Washington or Mack" — a non-endorsement between the two.

District 3 — Maggie Litz Domanowski (incumbent). Credits: elected in 2022; a lifelong county resident and the parent of three BCPS students, with a bachelor's degree from Towson University; she took the GoodParty.org pledge. Her stated priorities across the LWV and Baltimore Sun guides: raise academic achievement, ensure fiscal transparency — the school budget "represents nearly half of the county's total budget, and it must be managed carefully and transparently" — strengthen school safety, and demand "responsible budgeting, open reporting, and accountability for every dollar spent." She points to the board's superintendent search as the term's central work and backs the new superintendent's program. Dirt: none found. The honest limit of the file: her answers are disciplined and consistent; they are also general — the record shows stewardship language more than named fights.

District 3 — Kelli Slattery McClelland. Credits: a licensed educator (elementary and special education) with a master's in applied sociology from UMBC; after a personal tragedy in a truck crash, she worked for a nonprofit doing legislative advocacy on truck safety, meeting with members of both chambers of Congress — real policy-advocacy experience. Her platform leads with trust: current BCPS data reporting and public communication "make it difficult to build the community trust necessary" to raise achievement, and her first-100-days pledge is to map the communication gaps with the community and write policy to close them. She carries the Baltimore County Progressive Democrats Club's endorsement. Dirt: none found. The limit: her file is strong on process and advocacy, thinner on the budget and operations questions that dominate a board term.

District 6 — Christina Pumphrey (incumbent). Credits: the sitting District 6 member (term 2023–2026) and the Progressive Democrats Club's endorsed candidate. Her answer to the Schools Beyond Screens questionnaire is the most procedurally literate in the field: she largely agrees with the group's screen-time priorities, declines to sign a pledge "committing to specific actions and details before the work has been fully examined," and walks through how the board's Policy Review Committee actually builds a screen policy — detailed review first, stakeholder input before adoption — while noting the work "has already begun." That is a governing record speaking, not a campaign script. Dirt: none found.

District 6 — Darren M. Badillo. The challenger filed and is on the ballot; beyond that, the documented record is empty. He returned no response to the Schools Beyond Screens questionnaire and did not participate in the candidates' forum covered by the Banner/GovTech. No campaign platform, biography or endorsement was retrievable from any source worked.

District 7 — Rod McMillion (incumbent). Credits: the sitting District 7 member (term 2023–2026). On the Banner's AI question he gave a working answer: students "need to be exposed to AI," library media specialists — recently loaded with two extra teaching duties — must be supported because they teach responsible AI use, and "there should be consequences when students use it irresponsibly," including cheating. He has been a vocal defender of library media specialist positions. Dirt: none found. The limit: he skipped the virtual candidates' forum — an incumbent asking for another term owes voters the room.

District 7 — Stacy L. McNish. The challenger carries the Progressive Democrats Club's endorsement. Beyond that, the retrievable file is thin: she did not participate in the candidates' forum, and no questionnaire answers, platform or biography surfaced in the guides and coverage worked.

Pros and cons

Record gaps

The deep pass on this race worked: the League of Women Voters 2026 general voters' guide (Baltimore County) and its District 3 questionnaire; the Baltimore Sun voter guide answers republished by the candidates; the Baltimore Banner's school-board voter guide and its AI-policy and forum coverage; the Baltimore's Child / LNN school board voter guide (full questionnaire answers); the Schools Beyond Screens board-of-education questionnaire; the GovTech/TNS forum report; GoodParty.org's candidate and officeholder listings; and the Baltimore County Progressive Democrats Club sample ballot. Named gaps: Darren Badillo published nothing in any of them; Stacy McNish's file is an endorsement line and a ballot name; Lisa Mack's prior board tenure is documented only at its start and its 2022 end. Those gaps are printed, not filled.

OUR CALL

District 1: ENDORSE Candice Logan-Washington — a District 1 teacher with an education-leadership doctorate and two decades in schools is the strongest open-seat file on this ballot. District 3: ENDORSE Maggie Litz Domanowski for re-election — a clean stewardship record, a fiscal-transparency platform with the budget's scale stated plainly, and a superintendent search carried through. District 6: ENDORSE Christina Pumphrey for re-election — she answered the hard questionnaire like a member doing the work, because she is one. District 7: ENDORSE Rod McMillion for re-election, on his documented engagement with the AI and library-staffing questions; his challenger's record did not materialize. Districts 2, 4 and 5 are unopposed; we make no call where there is no choice. In District 6, Darren Badillo's finish is insufficient record in the strict sense — no platform, no answers, no appearances — and it is printed as exactly that.

This article is part of our complete Election 2026 coverage — every race, researched the same way. Read the full breakdown on our website.

Vote early. Research your candidates. Choose the best moderates, whatever their party — no extremism from either side. And encourage your friends and family to do the same.

Sources

Election result — November 4, 2026

Result pending. No verified call (Associated Press or official) as of November 4, 2026. This page will be updated when the race is called or certified. The original article above is unchanged.

AI-assisted article — but the sources are human, and the facts are very real.

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