This post, like all posts on adpunctum.org, represents my opinions as an individual. It is not an official position of the Oyster River Cooperative School District or School Board.
TL/DR: We have five really good candidates running for School Board. There are no bad choices here, and I will be glad to serve with any. After careful consideration, I’m voting for Matt Bacon and Heather Smith.
Tom Newkirk and Al Howland have served on the Oyster River School Board for 10 years, since their first election March 13, 2012. Both have decided they are not seeking reelection this year. Thanks to Al and Tom for the gift of leadership and dedication they’ve given our school community as board members!
I’ve watched the School Board Candidate Forums hosted by the ORMS PTO and by the ORHS Debate Team. I’ve also read the candidate questionnaires from the Oyster River Teachers’ Guild and Oyster River Equity and Inclusion group (a community group – not part of the School District), and the coverage in Foster’s. My biggest take-away from these is that all 5 of these individuals would make good School Board members.
I know that by posting this, I’m going out on a limb a little – I will gladly serve with whomever wins the election, and I hope this post does not leave any ill will.
What I look for in a school board candidate:
- Respect and collegiality with other board members and administrators. This really should go unwritten, but too many town select boards and school boards don’t have this any more. A board that can’t work together has lots of negative consequences for the community.
- Clear sense of what the School Board’s role is – and what it is not.
- Listens to many perspectives before reaching a conclusion.
- Has complimentary skills and talents with other board members.
- In Tom we are losing graceful leadership, deep experience with education (especially literacy), and a clear supporter of creating opportunities for staff and students while balancing cost.
- In Al we are losing the person best able to distill complex topics to their salient points that respect all stakeholders in order to get to a decision.
- Pays attention to what the School Board does and how it operates.
- Can balance the interests of students, taxpayers/voters, and staff.
- Knows their limits and expertise.
On Tuesday, March 8, 2022, I’ll be voting for Matthew Bacon and Heather Smith. Here’s why:
Matt Bacon is genuinely the nicest guy I’ve ever met. I also see him as most likely to fill Al’s role as finding the important points in complicated situations to guide School Board decision-making. He’s got diverse experience as a paraeducator, in the national guard, PTO officer, town government… He asks good, thoughtful questions and does not jump to conclusions. Full disclosure: I first met Matt in 2009 or 2010 when our spouses were working together at Wentworth-Douglass, and our oldest kids are in the same grade.
Heather Smith clearly has a knack for analyzing complex topics and making them digestible. Case in point is her presentation on behalf of the Long Range Planning Committee at the March 2, 2022 school board meeting. She’s enthusiastic in a reasonable way. She has a good understanding of the role of the school board (and what it’s not). And I saw her out in the cold with a broken leg making outdoor PTO events work during the pandemic at Moharimet last year.
This really is a tough decision… There are lots of good things to say about all the candidates.
Giana Gelsey also invests tons of her own time in making both schools and the town better, chairing Moharimet’s PTO, serving on ORCSD’s Long Range Planning Committee, Madbury town board work, and she stuck her neck out to run for Madbury Select Board a couple years ago. She would bring a lot of passion and reasoned arguments for doing the right thing.
Debbie Harmon has a incredible track record of community service in Oyster River and may be the best known of the candidates. She was an important part of the campaign to build community support for the new Middle School building, and I can’t thank her enough for that. She’s tacked other hard things for the schools before too – the ORMS craft fair was a major PTO fundraiser (not to mention a great place to shop local), and I know how time consuming that is since my wife also chaired it one year. I think Debbie would also be an asset in improving district communications.
Marie Therese D’Agostino is the only one of the candidates I haven’t spoken with directly. Her answers in forums seemed reasonable. She’s got the most experience of any candidates in serving on a school board (Newmarket) and working as a school Business Administrator (several places, maybe most notably in Somersworth).
Here are links to other sources of information related to the 2022 School Board candidates:
Dean Rubine’s summary of the ORMS PTO candidate forum: https://orcsdcleanslate.blogspot.com/2022/02/we-met-candidates.html
Candidate bios from celebratedurhamnh.com: https://www.celebratedurhamnh.com/single-post/who-are-the-orcsd-school-board-candidates
Candidate bios on district web site (I think they are the same as the Celebrate Durham post): https://orcsd.org/news/what_s_new/2022_school_board_candidate_bios
Video from the PTO’s candidate forum: https://screencast-o-matic.com/watch/c3nuDvVbKOs
ORHS Debate Team forum: https://youtu.be/LCNTJSi8IAM