Candidate Questionnaire
Montgomery County Tea Party
Full Name as listed
Ryan Tsamouris
Website
Degrees / certifications
Bachelor of Science and Master of Engineering, Texas A&M University.
Occupation
Information Technology Architect, energy sector (20 years in IT).
Marital status
Married. My wife Denise and I have been together 20 years.
Children
Yes — three, all currently attending Conroe ISD schools.
Incumbent status
Challenger to an incumbent
Party
Other
County
Montgomery
Office
Conroe ISD School Board
Full Bio
Ryan Tsamouris was raised on the red dirt roads of East Texas, where he learned the value of hard work, personal responsibility, and community service. As an FFA and 4-H member he raised animals for the county fair, an experience he credits for teaching him responsibility, budgeting, and the discipline of showing up every morning whether he felt like it or not.
He holds a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Engineering from Texas A&M University and has spent 20 years in information technology, currently as an IT Architect in the energy sector specializing in systems architecture and cybersecurity. That background shapes how he approaches oversight of district contracts, technology spending, and the protection of student data.
Ryan and his wife Denise have lived in Montgomery County for 19 years and are raising three children, all of whom attend Conroe ISD schools. Denise taught in CISD for 12 years and was twice named Teacher of the Year at her campus. Watching an accomplished teacher decide to leave the classroom is what first drew Ryan to district governance, and it remains the reason he believes teacher retention is a board problem before it is a budget problem.
He has served in local elected office for over a decade and is currently President of both his Municipal Utility District Board and his Homeowners Association Board. In those roles he has been directly responsible for budgets, audits, bond obligations, infrastructure, and tax rates, and has consistently voted to lower tax rates.
Within Conroe ISD, Ryan served as Parent Chair of the 72-member School Health Advisory Council, where he has worked on student mental health, suicide prevention, physical safety, and teacher retention. He has served on the Community Collaborative Cohort and other district committees, and he volunteers in his children's classrooms through the Watch DOGS program. He has also worked with the Texans for Public Education research group on state-level public education advocacy.
Since 2023 he has published articles at WeHaveQuorum.com, a running commentary on proper governance and board experience, and he built a public tool at cisd.boardmonitor.app that lets any resident track board agendas, meeting summaries, and policy changes. Both exist for the same reason: residents cannot hold a board accountable for decisions they never see. Sharing knowledge is Ryan's passion, and he uses his technical expertise to bring transparency wherever he can.
Ryan is running for the Conroe ISD School Board to restore proper governance that includes oversight, transparency, fiscal discipline, and a board focused on student outcomes rather than controversy.
Candidate Bio (Short)
Ryan Tsamouris is an IT Architect, a ten-year local elected official, and the father of three Conroe ISD students. He served as Parent Chair of the school district's 72-member School Health Advisory Council and is currently President of both his Municipal Utility District and Homeowners Association boards. His wife Denise taught in CISD for 12 years. He is running to restore oversight, transparency, and fiscal discipline to a board that has lost focus on student outcomes.
What are three reasons why you think you are the best candidate running for this Board position?
First, governance experience. I have ten years as a sitting board president of two local government entities, where I have been personally responsible for budgets, audits, bond obligations, infrastructure, and tax rates. I have voted to lower tax rates consistently, lowering our MUD tax rate by nearly 30% in the last 6 years. This is not a theoretical experience for me.
Second, district knowledge. I have attended CISD board meetings consistently for years, served two years on the School Health Advisory Council and currently chair it, and have written detailed public analysis of district governance since 2023. I also built a public tool at cisd.boardmonitor.app that tracks board agendas, meeting summaries, and policy changes so any resident can follow what the board does. Very few candidates arrive knowing the district this well.
Third, professional skill set that the board currently lacks. Conroe ISD is a large organization with a nine-figure operating budget, a two-billion-dollar bond program, enterprise technology systems, and student data that must be protected. I spend my professional life on systems architecture, risk management, and cybersecurity. That is directly applicable to oversight of contracts, technology spending, and data protection.
What are the three biggest challenges facing the board and how would you address these challenges if you are elected to the Board?
One: loss of public trust. Over the past several years the district has been repeatedly pulled into controversy, leadership turnover, and public conflict, and too many decisions have been made through executive session or consent agenda with little public explanation. I would restore accountability by limiting executive session to what the law actually requires, requiring committee review and public input for major curriculum adoptions, and conducting a comprehensive review of board policy to remove political and ideological language from both directions so governance is neutral and durable.
Two: budget pressure against flat enrollment. Enrollment has flattened after years of projected growth, and the district budgeted against projections that did not materialize. I would require conservative enrollment forecasting with variance reported publicly, stop the practice of funding recurring costs with one-time money, and conduct a hard review of legal spend and major external contracts, which have grown alongside the district's recent controversies. I am committed to a parity or lower tax rate whenever it is achievable.
Three: staff recruitment and retention. Conroe ISD was once the destination district for North Houston, and we are now losing experienced administrators and teachers. Student discipline is a leading reason teachers leave, and it is fixable. I would set clear behavior expectations with consistent, fair enforcement, protect planning time, cut duplicative paperwork, and make sure educators have a real voice before decisions are made rather than after.
Would you actively pursue an annual third party financial audit of the ISD?
Conroe ISD already has one, and it is required by law. Texas Education Code requires every school district to have its fiscal accounts audited annually, at district expense, by an independent licensed CPA, in a format prescribed by the State Board of Education and subject to review by the State Auditor. The audit must include verification of the accuracy of the district's PEIMS data, and the report must be filed with TEA.
So the honest answer is that the annual third party financial audit is not something a trustee needs to pursue. It is something a trustee needs to actually read, question, and act on. In my experience on two boards, the failure is almost never that the audit does not exist; it is that the board accepts it as a formality without engaging the management letter or the findings.
What I would pursue beyond the required annual audit: an independent performance or operational audit of specific high-dollar areas where the financial audit does not reach. Legal services spending and major external contracts are where I would start. A financial audit tells you the money was recorded correctly. It does not tell you whether the money was well spent. Those are different questions and the board should be asking both.
What do you believe is parents' role in their children's education?
Parents are the primary decision-makers in their children's education.
In practice this means parents should have real access to curriculum, instructional materials, classroom content, and online platforms their children use, and they should not have to file a records request to get it. It means major curriculum adoptions should go through committee review with public input before a board vote, not after. The Bluebonnet adoption is the clearest recent example of the district getting this backwards: a significant curriculum change implemented without meaningful teacher or community input.
It also means the board should not treat parent participation as a nuisance to be managed. Public comment, book challenges, and grievances should run through processes that are clear, consistent, and actually responsive.
What's your opinion of programs such as Common Core curriculum? Critical Race Theory? Social Emotional Learning? International Baccalaureate?
Common Core: Texas prohibits it. House Bill 462 (83rd) added Texas Education Code Sections, which bar the State Board of Education from adopting Common Core standards and bar school districts from using Common Core to satisfy the requirement to teach the essential knowledge and skills. Texas teaches the TEKS. Attorney General opinion also confirmed districts must teach the TEKS. There is nothing for a trustee to oppose here; it is already settled law and CISD teaches TEKS.
Critical Race Theory: CRT is a graduate-level legal theory. It is not a course, a curriculum, or a TEKS standard in Texas K-12 education. Texas law already restricts how certain race-related concepts may be taught in public schools. I would not support instruction that teaches students they are inherently superior or inferior by race, and I would also not support policing normal history instruction under the CRT label.
Social Emotional Learning: As Parent Chair of the School Health Advisory Council, I have spent two years on student mental health, suicide prevention, and student safety, and I have seen the data on what our students are dealing with. Teaching children to manage frustration, resolve conflict, and ask for help when they are struggling is not ideology; it is what good teachers have always done. Where I agree with critics is that the label has been used as a delivery vehicle for content unrelated to those skills, and that programs are often purchased without evidence of effectiveness. My standard is the same as for any program: show me the outcome data, show me the cost, and let parents see the materials. If it does not work, cut it.
International Baccalaureate: Texas has been paying schools to offer IB since 1995. The Advanced Placement Incentive Program in the Education Code puts real money behind it, such as equipment grants for schools that offer IB courses, $100 per student who scores well on an IB exam, training subsidies for IB teachers, and authority for the commissioner to cover exam fees for kids whose families can't afford them. The Legislature also made a point of protecting IB exams when it banned Common Core. IB is a demanding college-prep option that families choose on their own, and I'm not interested in taking away academic options the state itself encourages.
Did you vote FOR the 2023 $2 Billion CISD School Bond? Why or why not?
Yes. I live in the Grand Oaks area. Grand Oaks High School was built for about 3,000 students and has been running well past 3,800, with portables stacked on portables. The bond funded the junior high, the ninth-grade campus, and Kacy Arnold Elementary, which is the only real relief that area is going to get. I also wanted elementary kids to finally get gyms instead of doing PE in a cafeteria. And as a former FFA and 4-H kid who raised animals for the fair, I supported the ag barn.
A yes vote is not a blank check, and that is where the board has fallen short since. My commitment is oversight: track every project against its original scope, cost, and timeline, report variances publicly instead of burying them, and hold administration accountable when one drifts. Voters approved specific projects at a specific price. They should get exactly that.
Do you believe the school board should be able to remove sexually explicit material from libraries and classrooms?
Yes. The board of trustees has clear legal authority over instructional materials and library collections in the district, and material that meets the legal definition of harmful to minors does not belong on a campus.
My focus is on making that authority work through a process that is consistent and defensible rather than reactive. Right now the book challenge process is slow, inconsistent, and fought title by title, which serves no one. Not the parents raising concerns, not the librarians, and not the students. I want a process that is policy-driven, applies the same standard every time, resolves challenges on a defined timeline, and is transparent about how decisions were made. Systemic fixes, not one-title-at-a-time fights.
Will you work to remove harmful materials as defined in Texas penal code 43.24 from all school property? Additionally, do you support removing the "educational exemption" from this law?
Yes. Material meeting the Penal Code 43.24 definition of harmful material has no place on school property, and I would support district policy and processes that keep it off campuses.
On the second question, that exemption is already gone. Senate Bill 412 repealed it, effective September 1, 2025. Educators and librarians no longer have a professional-purpose defense. The only one left is for judicial and law enforcement officers doing their jobs. What matters now is implementation. Because educators no longer have the educational exemption defense, Conroe ISD has an obligation to give its teachers and librarians clear guidance on what the law requires and a reliable process for reviewing material, so that the district is protecting students and not leaving individual employees exposed to criminal liability over an ambiguous title. That is a governance responsibility the board owns.
The CISD geographical didn't meet the forecasts by the previous Superintendents projections, likely causing a deficit in the budget. How do you plan to fix it?
One correction on the premise: those projections were not the Superintendent's. They came from Population and Survey Analysts (PASA), an outside demographic firm the district contracted, and for years PASA actually under-projected the district. Conroe ISD repeatedly enrolled more students than even PASA's high-growth scenario. What changed is birth rates. The district's current demographer, Zonda, now projects roughly 73,000 students by 2030-31 followed by a decline, against PASA's earlier estimate near 98,000 by 2032-33, and Zonda attributes it to fewer births than expected even with thousands of new lots still coming. That is a demographic shift, not a personnel failure, and I would rather be accurate about it than score a point.
The budget problem is real regardless, and here is how I would manage it. Build enrollment forecasts conservatively, check them against the October snapshot, and show the board the variance plainly instead of burying it in a packet. Stop funding recurring costs with one-time money or fund balance. Review legal spending and major outside contracts, which have grown right alongside the district's controversies and are among the most avoidable costs we have. And address the part we actually control: families who lose confidence in a district leave it, and every departure is permanent revenue loss. Rebuilding academic quality and public trust is not a soft goal, it is the actual fix.
The State of Texas has passed laws banning the social transitioning of children in schools. Will you enforce this law as a member of the board and protect students from woke gender ideology?
Yes. Senate Bill 12 is state law, took effect September 1, 2025, and Conroe ISD is subject to it. A trustee's oath is to follow the law, and I will. That obligation does not depend on whether a given trustee likes a given statute, which is the standard I would apply to every law equally.
Do you support allowing all students to use bathrooms, showers and locker rooms, as well as participate in sports, based on the gender with which they identify, not the sex they are assigned to at birth? Please explain.
No. On athletics, Texas already requires K-12 athletic participation to be based on biological sex as stated on a student's birth certificate at or near the time of birth. On facilities, Senate Bill 8 addresses multi-occupancy restrooms, locker rooms, and showers in buildings owned or operated by political subdivisions. Conroe ISD does not have discretion to adopt a contrary policy, and I would not propose one.
The part of this that is genuinely within a trustee's control is making sure the district applies the law consistently, does not put teachers and coaches in the position of improvising policy on the fly, and does not turn individual students into the subject of public board meetings. Enforcement should be quiet, lawful, and uniform.
Do you believe there are two genders? If not, how many are there?
A school board trustee has no authority to define gender, and no vote I cast will settle that question for anyone. What a trustee actually controls is whether the district follows state law, whether classrooms stay focused on academics, and whether every student in the building is safe and able to learn. Under current Texas law, instruction and programming on gender identity are prohibited in K-12, and I will enforce that. Beyond enforcing the law, I do not think a school board should be relitigating this in public meetings while our reading and math outcomes need attention.
What is your position on implementing a gender fluidity policy to remove all gender subject matter books & materials from CISD?
If the question is whether I support Conroe ISD adopting a policy that promotes gender fluidity: no. State law prohibits instruction, guidance, activities, or programming regarding gender identity in K-12, and I will follow that law.
If the question is whether I would support a blanket removal of every book or material that touches on gender or sex from district libraries: also no. Blanket removals by category do not survive legal challenge, sweep in health, biology, and history materials the district is required to teach, and hand the district an expensive lawsuit. The approach that actually holds up is a consistent, policy-driven review process applied to specific material against the legal standard for harmful material. That protects students and it protects the district. I would rather win this permanently through good process than lose it in court through a broad policy that a judge strikes down.
Do you believe a teacher should be required to use a student's preferred pronoun?
No, and under current Texas law the question runs the other direction. Senate Bill 12 prohibits school employees from assisting a student with social transitioning, and the statute defines social transitioning to include the adoption of a different name or different pronouns. A CISD employee is not merely permitted to decline; the district is restricted by statute.
I will follow the law as written. I will also say plainly that I do not think teachers should be disciplined by the district for how they navigate an individual interaction with a child in good faith, and that the district owes its staff clear written guidance rather than leaving them to guess at a statute that is currently being litigated.
Should the SBOE have total & final authority on what teaching materials are used in the classroom? Please explain fully.
No, and I will explain fully because I expect this is a point of disagreement.
The State Board of Education sets the TEKS and reviews and approves instructional materials at the state level, and that is appropriate. But Texas law deliberately leaves local adoption authority with elected local trustees, and I think that structure is right. If total and final authority sat with fifteen members in Austin, then the parents of Conroe ISD would have no meaningful recourse over what their children are taught, because the people who answer to them directly would have nothing to decide.
I would point to Bluebonnet curriculum as the practical illustration. It is a state-developed product that Conroe ISD adopted without meaningful teacher or community input, and this district recorded its first two campus F ratings in its history in the same period. Whatever one concludes about causation, the process failure is the point: local parents and educators had no seat at the table. Moving more authority upward would guarantee that outcome every time.
Local control means the people who live here, pay the taxes here, and send their children here get a vote. I am not willing to hand that to a state board, regardless of who currently sits on it. That principle has to hold in both directions or it is not a principle.
How much access do you believe parents should have to their children's curriculum? classroom? teacher? online?
Full access, and it should be easy rather than adversarial. For curriculum and instructional materials, parents should be able to see what their child is being taught without filing a records request. For classrooms, parents should be welcome in schools, and I volunteer in my own children's classrooms through the Watch DOGS program, so I mean this literally. For teachers, parents should get timely responses, and the district should set clear expectations for communication.
For online apps, this is my professional field, and it is the area where districts are weakest. Parents should know exactly what applications and platforms their children are required to use, what data those vendors collect, where that data goes, and who has access to it. I would add that districts often fail this test not out of ideology but out of disorganization. The information exists in six places and no one owns it. Fixing that is a systems problem, and it is one I know I have experience with to solve.
The Supreme Court of the United States recently ruled that states may ban boys from participating in girls' sports. How will you protect female students as a member of the school board?
Texas law already requires K-12 athletic participation to match the sex on a student's birth certificate. Conroe ISD follows that, and I will support it.
Where a trustee actually makes a difference for girls is everything after eligibility: facilities for girls' programs that are funded and maintained, fair scheduling and travel, good coaches, and harassment complaints investigated quickly and taken seriously. Those are the votes that change what four years here actually look like for a girl, and they get a fraction of the attention the eligibility debate does.
Would you, individually, take public, overt steps to have pornography removed from CISD classrooms, libraries and campuses?
Yes, and I would do it through the mechanism that actually works: a board vote on a policy that applies a consistent legal standard, with a defined review timeline and public reporting of outcomes.
I want to be direct about one thing, because I think it matters to this audience more than a slogan would. A single trustee has no unilateral authority to pull a book off a shelf. What a trustee can do is build a majority for a durable policy. Individual public demands generate news coverage; policy changes generate results, and they survive the next election. I am interested in the outcome, not the theater.
The urgency here is also greater than most people realize, because SB 412 stripped the educational affirmative defense effective September 1, 2025. Conroe ISD employees now face potential criminal exposure with no professional-purpose defense. A district that does not give its staff a clear standard and a working review process is failing both students and employees at the same time.
Are you now or have you ever done business with CISD or a CISD official?
No.
What curricula and/or subjects do you think should be prioritized in setting up every Conroe ISD student for future success?
I will be direct: I am not a curriculum expert, and I do not claim to be. I work in IT. On instructional decisions I would lean on our teachers and curriculum staff, who do this for a living, and I would expect them to bring me evidence rather than opinions. What I do believe firmly is that reading comes first. A child who cannot read fluently by third grade is locked out of every subject that follows, and no program later makes up for it.
Beyond that, our CTE and career readiness programs are a genuine strength and serve the many students for whom a four-year degree is not the right path. And in the one area where I do have expertise, technology, I would push for practical digital and AI skills while being just as willing to pull technology out of classrooms where the evidence says a screen is hurting learning.
Would you be in favor of returning the pledge of allegiance to the American flag each morning in the public schools?
The Pledge has never left, and it is already required by law. Texas Education Code requires the board of trustees of every school district to have students recite the pledge to the United States flag and the pledge to the Texas flag once during each school day at each campus.
Do you believe the Bible should be returned to the public school library? How would you implement that?
I am not aware of any policy in Conroe ISD that removed the Bible from school libraries, and I would want to see the specific instance before answering as though one exists. If you search within the CISD Library Catalog, you will find copies of the Bible available and hundreds of titles that relate to the Bible, whether through children's books or academic literature. I support having the Bible available in our libraries. It is the most historically and literarily influential text in Western civilization, and Texas Education Code already lists religious literature, including the Hebrew Scriptures and the New Testament, and their impact on history and literature, among the subjects in the state curriculum. A library that excluded it would be making an indefensible academic choice.
Additional Links
https://www.wehavequorum.net — my published analysis of CISD governance since 2023
https://cisd.boardmonitor.app — public tool I built for tracking CISD board agendas, summaries, and policy changes
https://www.ryanforcisd.com — full platform and unedited responses to other voter guides
Anything in your background of an embarrassing nature? Arrests, convictions, bankruptcies?
Yes, and I talk about it openly because of the impact it had on me. In 2010, when I was 26, I was arrested for DWI. No one was injured. I took full responsibility for it; it was my decision and my mistake.
It was also the turning point of my life. Within three years of that night, Denise and I were engaged and married, we built our first home, we were expecting twins, and I had started my career in the energy industry. I stopped drifting and started building.
In the sixteen years since, I have held a consistent record of leadership and service: ten years as a director and now president on both my MUD and HOA boards, service on the Conroe ISD School Health Advisory Council, volunteering through Watch DOGS and school fundraisers, and work with the Education for Tomorrow Alliance. I have signed off on audits, approved budgets, and voted to lower tax rates in those roles. My volunteer efforts have been consistent and continue to expand.
I would rather you hear this from me than find it somewhere else.