Candidate: Matt Susin

     Matt Susin is a proud husband and father of five children who has dedicated the last fifteen years to Brevard Public Schools as a teacher, citizen, and School Board Member. Matt's unique multifaceted experience comes from being an award-winning teacher and coach, successful businessman in the community, and a result driven school board member. 

     For close to a decade Matt taught hands on and high energy lessons in his American History and American Government classes. Former students still today talk about reenacting the Battle of Belleau Wood by digging three 100 foot trenches, filling then with water and sulfur, and 300 students with hand built tanks and paintball guns battled with cheers from many retired military veterans. Students also vividly remember when Mr. Susin heated up the room and reenacted the early industrialization sweat shops forcing the students to make a product under similar conditions as our early factory workers. His lessons and tactics in class caught the eyes of his peers and he was honored with Beginning teacher of the year for the state of Florida, National Teacher of the Year for the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Walmart Teacher of the Year, and Social Studies Teacher of the Year for Brevard Public Schools. As a coach Matt thrived through motivation and team building for multiple sports and was honored as Cape Coast Coach of the Year for taking a wrestling team to an undefeated season. His true passion was public service where actions included flying water filtration systems into Haiti and many others. His service club was given the National Jefferson Award for Public Service where his students were honored by then Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. 

     After a successful teaching career that spanned almost a decade Matt moved into the private insurance sector. Even though he was no longer a teacher he still gave back to Brevard Public Schools and was selected to serve on the Half cent Sales Tax Citizens Oversight Committee to audit and monitor over 50 million dollars a year in capital constructions projects. For the first time Matt was looking from the outside in and decided to make a difference once more he ran for school board on a platform of delivering trades jobs programs and reducing debt. The son of a construction contractor, Matt knew firsthand how to navigate and relate to many of the trades and was successful in introducing many new programs to include welding, manufacturing, construction, and aviation. He then delivered the largest youth jobs program in the country and was honored Nationally by Vocational Rehab at their national convention. He claims that his most important achievement was to support the first policy in the state that requires EKG heart screening for all athletes. In its first-year partnership with Who We Play For BPS screened over 8,000 athletes and caught 18 students who had surgery and thrive today rather than possibly be a statistic. 

     Maintaining a strong financial budget Matt has paid down over 100 million in debt, cut 27 million from the operating budget, and aligned programs to support the teachers and students in the classroom. After 13 years of public service with Brevard Schools Matt has not slowed down but rather gained strength and speed. His plans moving forward are to compete the talent pipeline for our trades and workforce, and bring Trust, Transparency and Accountability to the budget operations at the school district through a series of restrictive fiscal policies. He has earned a reputation as a man of the people for his votes from the dais and actions in his community. Results not rhetoric define Matt as he successfully takes on challenges not based on what is easy, but what is right. Leaving a legacy that will long outlive him.