Nick Didow and Valerie Foushee are running for re-election against newcomers Joel Dunn, Chon Shoaf and Lisa Stuckey. All five are vying for three seats in today's election.
Didow listed several components to increasing achievement including recruiting, developing, supporting and retaining outstanding staff, and combatting overcrowding by building new schools.
Didow said developing strong partnerships with local governments and UNC also were important.
Dunn said his main concerns are maintaining Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools' overall quality and raising the educational standard for minority students. He said having top-notch facilities and retaining staff would help address these matters.
Foushee stressed that the school board's primary goal is to assist students.
"Student achievement is what drives everything the board does," Foushee said, adding that students' backgrounds should not determine their academic success.
Shoaf said he was concerned that black students scored 20 to 50 percent lower on high school academic achievement tests than white students in Chapel Hill-Carrboro high schools.
"The biggest issue for me is the minority student achievement gap," Shoaf said. "I would say `Rather than let's reduce class size, let's take that extra teacher or two teachers that it takes to reduce class size and let's devote that toward minority students.'"
Stuckey said she "wants to make sure that all children are successful, and that includes closing minority student achievement gaps, making sure students are challenged and making sure students in the middle are not left out."