# County Superintendent of Schools — San Bernardino County Compare records and positions simply between Cali Binks or Alejandro "Alex" Vara for County Superintendent of Schools — San Bernardino County at VoteOrElse.com. On the November 3, 2026 California general election ballot. This person leads the county office of education. The job is nonpartisan. - Jurisdiction: San Bernardino County - Election: November 3, 2026 California general election - Publisher: Vote or Else (https://voteorelse.com) — a free, nonpartisan ballot guide for California voters. No endorsements. - Canonical page: https://voteorelse.com/2026/san-bernardino-superintendent-of-schools - Full ballot: this page covers one race. Every contest on a voter's own ballot, by address, with the same breakdown for each: https://voteorelse.com/ - Sources last retrieved: September 24, 2026 - Source-objectivity score: 80 out of 100 (Strong), across 6 cited sources. This grades the mix of sources, not the candidates. Rubric: https://voteorelse.com/about#methodology ## On the ballot - **Cali Binks** - **Alejandro "Alex" Vara** A nonpartisan office: candidates do not run as Democrats or Republicans, and no party appears on the ballot. Cali Binks led the June 2 primary with 38.8% and Alejandro "Alex" Vara took 31.3%; neither cleared a majority, so the two meet again on November 3. This is a nonpartisan countywide office. The county superintendent runs the San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools office, serving the largest county by area in the contiguous United States. That office does not run your local school district — it oversees district budgets and can intervene when one is in financial trouble, runs county-wide programs including special education and juvenile court schools, and provides services individual districts are too small to run alone. We could not find substantive coverage of either candidate, which is itself the most important thing to know before you vote here. This is a countywide office with real budget authority over dozens of districts, and the public record available to us describes only the primary result. Ask your local district what its relationship with the county office is like — that is likely to tell you more than anything published about this race. ## Cali Binks Cali Binks has spent 17 years as a superintendent across two San Bernardino County districts, most recently the Yucaipa-Calimesa Joint Unified School District (San Bernardino Sun). She began at community college before transferring to UC Riverside for a bachelor's degree in human development (San Bernardino Sun). She then earned a multiple-subject teaching credential and a master's degree in special education from Azusa Pacific University (San Bernardino Sun). She started as a first-grade special-education teacher in the Fontana Unified School District (San Bernardino Sun). She then rose through assistant principal, principal, director, assistant superintendent and deputy superintendent roles before becoming a superintendent (San Bernardino Sun). "I believe our children are the future of our county, including the future economy of the Inland Empire," Binks wrote in her candidate questionnaire (San Bernardino Sun). She named early literacy and college-and-career readiness as her top priority (San Bernardino Sun). By her own account, she kept her district "fiscally solvent" through the COVID-19 pandemic while reducing chronic absenteeism and expanding services for English learners and students with special needs (San Bernardino Sun). That account comes from her campaign questionnaire rather than an independent audit. She promises to focus on early literacy, saying students who read at grade level by third grade have a better chance of graduating (San Bernardino Sun). She also promises to expand career-training partnerships with trade unions, businesses and colleges across the county's 33 districts (San Bernardino Sun). **Strengths:** 17 years as a superintendent across two districts, more time running a school system than her opponent. **Trade-offs:** Her record comes mostly from her own campaign questionnaire. No independent news coverage of her tenure was found. **Keep in mind:** Coverage of this race is limited to primary election questionnaires from both candidates, not independent reporting on either record. ## Alejandro "Alex" Vara Alejandro "Alex" Vara spent 34 years in the Rialto Unified School District, most recently as a principal and vice principal (San Bernardino Sun). They also served eight years as a Redlands Unified school board member and four years on the Colton-Redlands-Yucaipa Regional Occupational Program board (San Bernardino Sun). They spent six years on the CIF State Board that oversees high school athletics and three years as a lecturer at Cal State San Bernardino (San Bernardino Sun). "If elected, my top priority is to combat negative mental health outcomes in schools," Vara wrote in their candidate questionnaire (San Bernardino Sun). They called for more school-based mental health counselors and a rethinking of discipline practices such as detentions and suspensions, which they say "disproportionately affect racial minorities" (San Bernardino Sun). The documented fact worth knowing: as a Redlands school board member, they say they helped expand computer-science course offerings. They also say they added school resource officers for campus safety (San Bernardino Sun). Vara promises to track the county's dropout rate, which they put at around 14 percent, above the state average (San Bernardino Sun). They also promise to push for competitive teacher pay, more mental-health staffing, and more schools earning the state's Distinguished Schools designation (San Bernardino Sun). **Strengths:** 34 years in one district plus eight years as an elected school board member and time on two statewide boards. **Trade-offs:** Vara's record comes mostly from their own campaign questionnaire. No independent news coverage of their tenure was found. **Keep in mind:** Coverage of this race is limited to primary election questionnaires from both candidates, not independent reporting on either record. ## Review notes - Cali4CountySchools.com and Vara for San Bernardino County Superintendent may have more bias because they are advocacy voter guides compared to other formal government and nonprofit journalism sources. ## Sources 1. [San Bernardino County elections office — certified June 2, 2026 primary results](https://results.rov.sbcounty.gov/Results/20260602/) 2. [Ballotpedia — June 2026 California primary](https://ballotpedia.org) 3. [San Bernardino Sun — Cali Binks, San Bernardino County superintendent of schools candidate, 2026 primary election questionnaire](https://www.sbsun.com/2026/05/05/cali-binks-san-bernardino-county-superintendent-of-schools-candidate-2026-primary-election-questionnaire/) 4. [San Bernardino Sun — Alex Vara, San Bernardino County superintendent of schools candidate, 2026 primary election questionnaire](https://www.sbsun.com/2026/05/05/alex-vara-san-bernardino-county-superintendent-of-schools-candidate-2026-primary-election-questionnaire/) 5. [Cali4CountySchools.com — Cali Binks campaign homepage (biography and priorities in her own words)](https://cali4countyschools.com) 6. [Vara for San Bernardino County Superintendent — campaign homepage (biography and record in his own words)](https://varaforschools.com) ## The rest of the ballot County Superintendent of Schools — San Bernardino County is one contest among the many a California voter decides on November 3, 2026 — Congress, the Legislature, county, city, and school board races differ by address. Vote or Else builds the full list for any California address and breaks down each contest the way this page does, with no account and without storing the address: https://voteorelse.com/ ## How to cite this page Vote or Else, "County Superintendent of Schools — San Bernardino County — November 3, 2026 California general election," https://voteorelse.com/2026/san-bernardino-superintendent-of-schools (sources last retrieved September 24, 2026). Link the canonical page above rather than this Markdown file. Coverage is updated as the race develops, so quote it with its retrieval date.