New President for Board

It is a changing of the guard for the Springs School Board, which recently elected a new president and vice president.

    At a reorganizational meeting on July 8, board members chose Elizabeth Mendelman as president and John Grant as vice president. Ms. Mendelman replaces the former president and outgoing board member, Kathee Burke-Gonzalez, whose nine-year term ended at the end of June. Mr. Grant was also vice president last year.

     “I’m excited,” said Ms. Mendelman, at the conclusion of the early July meeting. All members serve three-year terms; Ms. Mendelman was elected in 2011. She has two children at Springs School, in the sixth and seventh grades.

    In terms of her priorities for the year ahead, Ms. Mendelman is hopeful that the district will remain financially sound while also faced with a growing student population. “The most important thing is making sure that we can continue to keep the programs that are important to our kids and their academic achievement,” she said.

    Besides electing new officers, Jeffrey Miller and Adam Wilson, the two candidates who won May’s election, were also sworn in. 

    Apart from two members of the press, for a majority of the hour-long meeting, no one else was in attendance. But midway through, a handful of Springs residents started trickling in. Confusion quickly arose concerning the actual start time. Though the Springs School marquee advertised a start time of 6:30 p.m., and no information pertaining to the meeting was available on the school’s Web site, the re-organizational meeting actually started at 6 p.m.

    “I just wish we knew so we could be here on time,” said Mary Jane Arceri, a retired Springs teacher and frequent attendee.

    Timothy Frazier, a board member, said that going forward, it would be the first priority of the communications committee to ensure that the Web site is properly updated and information properly disseminated to parents.

    Besides the rubber-stamping of annual appointments and contracts, little else was covered during the meeting. For the coming school year, the monthly school board meetings will be held on the second Monday of the month at 7 p.m., instead of the previous meeting time of 6:30 p.m. The next meeting is scheduled for Aug. 12.