Sandra Buendia is campaigning for a seat on the Salt Lake City School District board on a platform of transparency and student-focused spending. Her bid comes after a long career in education — 27 years of it in the district — ended with her firing in 2024 and a state commission suspending her professional license for two years. Buendia has described the discipline as overly harsh.
Buendia is challenging incumbent board member Annie Romano for the seat representing parts of the Ballpark, Liberty Wells and 9th and 9th neighborhoods, according to The Salt Lake Tribune. Before her firing, Buendia served as executive director of the district's educational equity and student support department, the newspaper reports. The district filed a complaint against her with the Utah Professional Practices Advisory Commission, known as UPPAC, in 2024, and the commission determined she had provided false testimony under oath and failed to correct the record after discovering her testimony was incorrect, according to the Utah State Board of Education, as described by the same Tribune report.
Buendia disputes that characterization. On her campaign website, she says that during the hearing she could not remember some things and unknowingly provided inaccurate information. She has said she views the two-year suspension of her license as overly harsh, framing it instead as a formative experience that now informs her candidacy — she has said her time in the district and her experience with the disciplinary commission motivated her run for office.
What Typically Triggers a License Suspension
A license suspension in Utah typically signals serious misconduct violating state educator standards, according to the Utah State Board of Education, and can stem from repeated or egregious behavior including failure to report abuse, excessive force, specified criminal convictions or falsifying education documents. State rule R277-215 identifies knowingly and deliberately falsifying or misrepresenting information on an education-related document as covered conduct, and the rule indicates a suspension of up to one year is presumed appropriate in certain repeat-conduct situations, per Utah State Board of Education rule R277-215.
Statewide disciplinary data updated in December 2024 shows just how varied these cases can be: violence against students or non-students was the most common category, with 168 cases, while boundary violations with students were second-most common at 122 cases, according to ABC4. Nearly 40 licenses were suspended for one to five years in that boundary-violation category alone, the station reported. Outcomes across Utah's system range from revocation and voluntary permanent surrender to suspension, reprimands, or letters of warning, admonishment or education.
A Broader Fight Over UPPAC's Fairness
Buendia's case lands amid a wider reckoning over how UPPAC operates. Utah State Board of Education member Joseph Kerry has said the commission needs reform, telling reporters bluntly that “UPPAC is in need of reform.” The state board voted in February 2026 to launch an audit of UPPAC's processes expected to take about 10 months to complete, the Tribune reported. Kerry's report found that UPPAC staff play multiple roles across the lifecycle of a case and that the commission lacks a formal conflict-of-interest policy, and it noted UPPAC doesn't formally notify educators when a complaint is filed against them, nor does it have a formally defined threshold for opening a case.
More recently, the state board voted 8-7 to ask the Legislature to change the so-called double-investigations law governing teacher-misconduct complaints, according to The City Journals. The board is also looking to overhaul other UPPAC operational standards tied to that policy. Separately, a state licensing bill known as SB312 drew scrutiny this year over whether educators with suspended or revoked licenses could again work or volunteer in public schools under certain circumstances; reports conflicted on the timing of the governor's action, with Deseret News reporting as of March 24 that Gov. Spencer Cox had yet to sign or veto the measure, while the Tribune's April report described the change as already in effect.
Another Precinct's Discipline Dispute
Buendia isn't the only district candidate with a recent brush with UPPAC. Former West High School principal Jared Wright, who is running to represent Precinct 3, received a formal reprimand from state officials on Oct. 1 after the district filed its own complaint accusing him of falsifying transcripts and unprofessional conduct with the school board. A reprimand generally signals a serious violation not severe enough to warrant suspending or revoking a license, and can stem from repeated or egregious misconduct including unprofessional communications, testing-protocol violations, mismanagement of public funds or failure to make legally required reports, per the Tribune's reporting.
Wright has said the reprimand was baseless, tracing it to a claim that he called a colleague an expletive nine years earlier and to a disputed grade change, and he said he was considering whether appealing justified the legal fees. He has also said he believes he was pushed out of the district after refusing to stop seeking answers about a 2023 student stabbing, an allegation the district has denied.
The Race for Precinct 5
Romano, who was appointed to the board in 2025 after a bribery scandal prompted a former member to resign, grew up in Salt Lake City and says five generations of her family have attended district schools. She now works as a senior education coordinator with University of Utah Health and has children attending schools in the district. Romano envisions a more efficient district with stronger academic programs and says she'll advocate for fiscal responsibility that protects student-facing positions, weighing demographic data, enrollment trends, finances and community input on any future school-closure decisions.
The candidates met at an October forum hosted by the Liberty Wells Community Council, which identified the participants as incumbent Annie Stevens Romano and challenger Sandra Buendia, according to the Liberty Wells Community Council. The council noted that both candidates voted against the district’s recent Career and Technical Education center project. The district warned in June 2026 that declining enrollment makes further school closures likely. Buendia has said she would not support closing a school until reasonable alternatives are evaluated and the decision is shown to serve students’ best interests, weighing evidence, educational quality, community needs and long-term financial sustainability.
The 2024 School Closures
In 2024, the district board voted to permanently close Bennion, Hawthorne, Mary W. Jackson and Riley elementary schools, according to The Salt Lake Tribune.
Buendia frames her campaign around directing resources toward students and classrooms, evaluating programs by effectiveness, and ensuring district spending supports student success. She has said she believes every student deserves an excellent education and that every family deserves a district that listens, responds and delivers results, describing her vision as one that puts students first and rebuilds trust with the community.
Election Day is Nov. 3, 2026. Mail ballots must be dropped off at a ballot dropbox by 8 p.m. that day, or returned by mail and received by the county clerk by the same deadline.
