2017 BOE Elections

8 candidates - 3 spots - here's their website info:

Elizabeth Baker (Current)
https://www.boe2017.com/

Robin Baker
https://www.boe2017.com/

Shannon Cuttle
https://www.facebook.com/ShannonCuttleforBOE/

Felisha George
https://georgeandjulien4boe.com/

Avery Julien
https://georgeandjulien4boe.com/

Anthony Mazzocchi
https://www.mazzocchiboe2017.com/

Sheila Shidnia
Couldn't find a web presence but here's her statement on the Village Green:
https://villagegreennj.com/election/s-orange-maplewood-boe-candidate-statement-sheila-shidnia/

Donna Smith (Current)
http://www.donnasmith2017.com/

Would to hear your feedback on who you're voting for and why.


Usually I'm on top of this, but this year I'm beyond swamped and haven't been paying attention. If someone would create a spreadsheet of where each candidate stands on various issues, I would be so grateful.


Anyone who had something to do with the Ramos mess will probably not get my vote.  I will look at the issues from there.


I would primarily blame Christie for any issues with Ramos. The super cap makes the pool of available candidates either retreads with baggage or young people without sufficient experience. You got the former, Millburn is having issues dealing with the latter.



ska said:

I would primarily blame Christie for any issues with Ramos. The super cap makes the pool of available candidates either retreads with baggage or young people without sufficient experience. You got the former, Millburn is having issues dealing with the latter.

Agreed.  The arbitrary cap has been a disaster and had a negative impact on many school districts. 

People need to stop trying to control what someone else can make based on what they make -- especially for a position that oversees thousands of students, hundreds of teachers, and has to deal with parents.  

the risk reward in making the jump from teacher to principal to super has become minimal compared to the extra time and duties.  

Research based on looking at websites and discussing with a few friends could all be done spending under an hour.  Not having time is not an excuse and if you can't devote an hour to something that makes up more than half our property tax bill should just not vote (and not complain if they do not like the results).


I agree that the cap has hurt us, although I don't think that NJ districts would be able to compete with the suburban New York districts that NJ supers are going to even without the cap.

Brian Osborne's first year base pay in New Rochelle was $265,000, plus the possibility of various bonuses.  That amount was significantly more than Brian Osborne was getting in SOMA even prior to the cap.  

The problem is the cap combined with the fact that suburban New York State districts spend 30% more than NJ districts do (on everything) and can thus pay their admins more than we can.  (NY's total spending is only 15% higher than NJ's, but the suburban-suburban disparity is wider even when you compare peer suburban districts.)

As New Jersey's fiscal crisis deepens and New York State rakes in money from Wall Street, I expect that the problem of staff migration to NYS will continue.


Possibly but not necessarily. The prior super of Millburn was making $219,500 before the cap. He openly left because the cap would have resulted in a large decrease in his salary. But the salary in the district he went to was only $215K.


FYI... New Rochelle (10600 students) spends $260 million a year.  That's more than Millburn and SOMA spend combined (11,900 students)

New Rochelle gets $42 million in state aid.  Although that might include some items that NJ pays for discreetly (like pensions) Millburn and the SOMSD, combined, get about $7 million in opex aid.

Suburban NJ districts could not compete against NYS districts even without the salary cap.

http://newrochelle.dailyvoice.com/schools/new-rochelle-superintendent-recommends-260-million-schools-budget/706816/


I agree with you that the cap has been harmful, but the salary gaps are also about raw spending, not just the cap.

ska said:

Possibly but not necessarily. The prior super of Millburn was making $219,500 before the cap. He openly left because the cap would have resulted in a large decrease in his salary. But the salary in the district he went to was only $215K.




JBennett said:

FYI... New Rochelle (10600 students) spends $260 million a year.  That's more than Millburn and SOMA spend combined (11,900 students)

New Rochelle gets $42 million in state aid.  Although that might include some items that NJ pays for discreetly (like pensions) Millburn and the SOMSD, combined, get about $7 million in opex aid.

Suburban NJ districts could not compete against NYS districts even without the salary cap.

http://newrochelle.dailyvoice.com/schools/new-rochelle-superintendent-recommends-260-million-schools-budget/706816/

Yet somehow NJ manages to rank #2 on its public school performance and NY a very mediocre 26.

https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with-the-best-schools/5335/ 


I would blame Ramos's performance (not his salary) on Ramos and the people that supervised Ramos, specifically the Board of Ed. His performance was sub par at best and he left in the middle of his contract with many initiatives unfinished.  The BOE is accountable for how  well the Superintendent does his/her job. 

ska said:

I would primarily blame Christie for any issues with Ramos. The super cap makes the pool of available candidates either retreads with baggage or young people without sufficient experience. You got the former, Millburn is having issues dealing with the latter.



FWIW, I think that these state-wide rankings are generally pretty meaningless, as they just average out metrics that tend to vary widely within any state.  You couldn't, for example, conclude that New Rochelle has better schools than Camden NJ because NJ is #2 and NY is #6.  Anyone who attempts to assess a given town, county etc. based on school performance (the measuring of which is whole other can of worms that would need to be unpacked) would need to drill down to much more localized analysis.

ska said:



JBennett said:

FYI... New Rochelle (10600 students) spends $260 million a year.  That's more than Millburn and SOMA spend combined (11,900 students)

New Rochelle gets $42 million in state aid.  Although that might include some items that NJ pays for discreetly (like pensions) Millburn and the SOMSD, combined, get about $7 million in opex aid.

Suburban NJ districts could not compete against NYS districts even without the salary cap.

http://newrochelle.dailyvoice.com/schools/new-rochelle-superintendent-recommends-260-million-schools-budget/706816/

Yet somehow NJ manages to rank #2 on its public school performance and NY a very mediocre 26.

https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with-the-best-schools/5335/ 




JBennett said:

I agree that the cap has hurt us, although I don't think that NJ districts would be able to compete with the suburban New York districts that NJ supers are going to even without the cap.

Brian Osborne's first year base pay in New Rochelle was $265,000, plus the possibility of various bonuses.  That amount was significantly more than Brian Osborne was getting in SOMA even prior to the cap.  

The problem is the cap combined with the fact that suburban New York State districts spend 30% more than NJ districts do (on everything) and can thus pay their admins more than we can.  (NY's total spending is only 15% higher than NJ's, but the suburban-suburban disparity is wider even when you compare peer suburban districts.)

As New Jersey's fiscal crisis deepens and New York State rakes in money from Wall Street, I expect that the problem of staff migration to NYS will continue.

Although when Brian was asked, he would have stayed here had the salary been at the $225,000- $235,000 level.  He loved the area and did not want to move his family.  

The logic behind the cap was lacking and there is no question it makes it tougher to attract the best talent.  And quite frankly I think the two towns would pay top dollar to get the best.  In a budget well over 100 million dollars and in the overall school tax we pay we should be looking for the best. 

Our property values are tied to the school system and the midtown direct (and NJ Transit sucks).  Investing in our supers and teachers is the same as investing in our town and our homes. 



I don't think the salary cap has any defenders. I was just pointing out that suburban NYS districts spend a lot more than suburban NJ districts do and can outbid us.

I hope that this thread can return to the 2017 SOMA BOE race.


I would ask Elizabeth Baker and Donna Smith what ideas they introduced during their terms on the B.o.E.  What vote did they take of which they are most proud?

Of the platforms presented, Anthony Mazzocchi's seems most relevant to the position of B.o.E. member.


@jamie

This thread did not come up in a search for me when I searched for "boe" in the title in 2017.  (Didn't work for "BOE" in all caps either).


Thanks for the info - we'll look into it.


Search issue is fixed.

Here's the CCR Debate:


Did anyone ask the candidates about the Ramos debacle? Especially Elizabeth Baker & Donna Smith.

jamie said:

Search issue is fixed.

Here's the CCR Debate:




I hope you all watched the whole BOE debate posted above. It sure helped me decide.


hmm, still a little undecided after watching that video.

Here's a couple other debates:

from Hilton Neighborhood Association:


From LWV 10/10/17:


I've started to review, and I summarized the candidates responses to these 3 things in a spreadsheet for myself (@jamie - I can send my excel spreadsheet summary in PDF format to you if you want to post. But it's small print).  

  1. Priorities based on their Village Green response and/or web page 
  2. Special Education Parent Advisory Committee's (SEPAC's) two questions, which are posted here
    1. https://villagegreennj.com/election/board-ed-candidates-respond-special-ed-parent-advisory-committee-questions/
  3. CCR debate answers summary (from the first hour and 13 minutes). 


Here's my voting thinking so far (I'm not yet down to 3 as you can see from my "unsure" category):


-- WILL BE voting for --

Elizabeth Baker: I can see why she's the current BOE President. She's well versed in the laws and policies across a wide range of topics. Understands the complexities of many issues facing the district. And I tend to agree with her analyses of the issues, and her priorities.


-- UNSURE if I'm voting for --

My concerns ranged from inexperience (Sheila Shidnia), to one-note approaches (Shannon Cuttle: addressing climate and culture was the suggestion for many problems), to BOE experience from over a decade ago being a bit rusty (Robin Baker), to not being sure if I agree with some perspectives (Donna Smith - G&T seemed on the forefront of her priorities, and I think other issues are higher priorities).  


-- NOT voting for --

Felisha George or Avery Julien: While both have potential, and have held student activist roles previously, they are recent CHS graduates, and don't seem to have familiarity with policy. If they start attending BOE meetings and provide insights from students/community, perhaps they will be more prepared next time around. The clincher for me was that they indicate that Special Education is a priority for them... but then did not respond to the Special Education Parent Advisory Committee's (SEPAC's) questions at all. 

Anthony Mazzocchi: I respect his Arts focus, but my concerns from the last election re-emerged based on his responses to several questions. Some responses at the CCR debate did not work for me (I don't really see a wholesale change to a non-standardized system holistically fixing every problem), but the clincher was his answer to Question 2 from the SEPAC. The SEPAC question was "How do you see yourself working with the new Executive Director of Special Services and Youth Development and the Interim Superintendent to ensure compliance with and accountability for implementing special education policy and law?"  His answer did not directly address this question, and he didn't mention anything about compliance or accountability. As I see the district's lack of attention to compliance and accountability as part of its biggest problems, I can't vote for someone who seems to treat them as not important enough to address, or possibly thinks that compliance and accountability are part of some student or teacher 'standardization' that should be gotten rid of.


Also, a quick note about current BOE members: 

As far as I could tell, the voting records of Elizabeth Baker and Donna Smith did not have much difference from each other this past year. There also weren't major splits in many BOE votes, or votes on contentious topics, as far as I can remember. I wish I had a better sense of their thinking process and contributions in the BOE meeting discussions, but unfortunately I haven't had time to watch BOE meetings lately.

(ETA: My sense of the votes comes from reviewing the BOE meetings minutes, which are posted here: https://www.somsd.k12.nj.us/page/10 . The voting tallies tend to be near the end of the minutes. I *think*, but I'm not sure that the number of abstains from Elizabeth Baker may be due to the BOE President's vote sometimes only being needed as a tie-breaker?)



sprout said:

I've started to review, and I summarized the candidates responses to these 3 things in a spreadsheet for myself (@jamie - I can send my excel spreadsheet summary in PDF format to you if you want to post. But it's small print).  


Yes - please send it to me jamie@maplewoodonline.com


Thanks for posting, Jamie!

And to everyone else: 

1. Sorry about the tiny print. You likely need to zoom into those PDFs linked above in Jamie's post.

2. The the eight candidates names are down the left side (the first five candidates responses start on pg 1, the other three candidates responses start on pg 2) , and the questions go across the top. If printed, the pages would get put together in this order to make a rectangle:

[ 1 ] [ 3 ]

[ 2 ] [ 4 ] 


Also... I wanted to say thank you to villagegreennj.com for making the election section of their website open for free without a subscription: 

https://villagegreennj.com/election

 (and that I will be subscribing now.... really!)


This is very helpful. Thank you Sprout.

I don't think I can vote for Elizabeth Baker. She is the President of the BOE and the way they handled the supervision of Ramos was unacceptable.  Leadership on the BOE needs to be accountable.

As for Mazzocchi, I still have an issue with the way he left the district when he was head of the arts for the district.


jamie said:

Here's the PDF: http://www.maplewoodonline.com/BOE2017-CCR.pdf



What is your take on the BOE's supervision of Ramos? (Asking seriously, as I either missed something obvious, or wasn't reading between the lines well enough to see the crux of this issue)


Just wanted to note that Mike Donoghue also endorsed Donna Smith for BOE.

I point this out because I felt like he had a very good understanding of Donna's strengths:

"Donna Smith has quietly and effectively worked on behalf of students during her tenure on the board.  She is a policy expert who is content with effecting change through hard work and negotiation, not through grandstanding or focusing on blame while not offering solutions to problems.  She is committed to better serving all our students as evidenced by her strong support for the Access and Equity Policy, programming for gifted and talented students and the new Section 504 Policy."

jamie said:

Here's the PDF: http://www.maplewoodonline.com/BOE2017-CCR.pdf

https://villagegreennj.com/election/letter-elizabeth-baker-and-donna-smith-have-the-experience-passion-to-meet-district-challenges/


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