Wylea Chase, a former director of operations for the Black and Brown Coalition for Educational Equity and Excellence, said Tuesday she is planning to run for an at-large seat on the Montgomery County school board.
Although Chase has not yet filed her candidacy with the county and state election boards, she would be the second person to file for an open at-large school board seat.
According to Chase’s LinkedIn profile, she was the director of operations and community engagement for the Black and Brown Coalition, an advocacy group for students of color who attend the county’s public schools, from September 2022 until June 2025. Before that, from 2019 to 2022, she served as the director of partnerships and corporate engagement for Leadership Montgomery, an organization “that supports public, private, and nonprofit leaders in Montgomery County,” according to its website.
Her announcement to Bethesda Today follows the Sept. 22 filing for the at-large seat by Brett Di Resta, a political consultant and adjunct professor. Candidates must file paperwork with county and state election boards to officially appear on the ballot. The last day to file is Feb. 24, 2026.
Four seats on the nonpartisan board are up for grabs in the 2026 gubernatorial primary election, including the District 3 seat held by President Julie Yang, Grace Rivera-Oven’s District 1 seat, Brenda Wolff’s District 5 seat and an at-large seat held by Karla Silvestre.
The eight-member board oversees Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS). Members are elected to four-year terms. Board member positions are part-time and members receive $25,000 annually.
Silvestre and Yang have announced they are seeking seats on the Montgomery County Council instead of running for re-election. Yang is running for the District 1 seat held by Andrew Friedson (D), who is running for county executive to replace Marc Elrich (D), who cannot run again due to term limits. Silvestre is running for one of the council’s at-large seats. Two at-large councilmembers, Democrats Evan Glass and Will Jawando, are also running for county executive.
Rivera-Oven, the board vice president, is the only board member who has announced she will run for re-election. Wolff told Bethesda Today in August that she has not decided whether she is running for re-election to a third term and has yet to make an announcement.
Chase, who is Black, told Bethesda Today that she was initially hesitant to run, even after several people began asking her to do so in August 2024.
“What led to the decision was — is – representation,” Chase said. “Representation really does matter, and I believe that I could help the [school board], help MCPS make the necessary difference for our kids. I really believe that I can, maybe I’m naive. So I decided to do it.”
Wolff is currently the only Black member on the school board.
Chase said she wanted to improve equity in schools, center the voices of teachers and students and help MCPS move past just gathering feedback about various issues “to being actionable.”
“We don’t go beyond [feedback] right now, quite frankly. We have a lot of committees, we have a lot of advisory groups, and there’s a lot of talking back and forth and really awesome ideas that are shared, but then it’s like, they go into this black hole and it feels like a box checker,” Chase said. “I’m not saying that the community are the ultimate decision makers, but we would really love to see the things that we spent our time and talent on, volunteering our time, be somewhere in the final decisions.”
Chase said that while others may identify her by her work for the Black and Brown Coalition and as a member of the Montgomery County African American Advisory Group, she is also “the lady who cares about all of our kids in the county.”
Chase said she would advocate for all students, as well as the most marginalized communities within MCPS.
