Marisa Wood is a public school teacher, mother and grandmother, and has spent her last 20 years serving the Bakersfield community that she calls home.
Advocating for children is Marisa’s passion.
She teaches English at a public school where many of her students are underprivileged and for a large portion, English is a second language. But Marisa does more than just teach: she mentors, she counsels, and she helps these young people strive for a bright future.
Marisa understands the struggles that many families face in California’s 20th Congressional District.
She and her husband John didn’t have much as they tried to save for a home, all while raising their three children on an apple orchard where John worked. She knows that families need jobs that pay the bills, access to affordable health care, and an economy that prioritizes workers, growers, farmers, teachers and first responders – not just the super rich and well connected.
Marisa was born in Danville, California where she went to public high school. She moved south to attend California Polytechnic State University, where she met her husband John.
Together they moved to Bakersfield in the late 1980s to live on the apple farm where John worked. Marisa raised her children John Sidney, Casey and Jamie on that farm, and Marisa has taught public school and religious education in the community ever since. John continues to work in the agriculture industry.
