Former board members make bids to come back
BY KATHY BARATTA
Staff Writer

Four Manalapan residents are running for three three-year terms on the Manalapan-Englishtown Regional School District Board of Education in the April 17 school election. One Manalapan resident is running unopposed to complete an unexpired term.

The board has nine members; eight from Manalapan and one from Englishtown. All of the seats on the ballot next week are for Manalapan representatives. Polls will be open from 3-9 p.m. April 17.

Running for the three-year terms are current board members Anthony Manisero, a court administrator, and Joanne Orr, a teacher in Tinton Falls, and former board members James Mumolie, an attorney, and Martin Spindel, a retired teacher.

Board member Lucille Benedetti is not seeking re-election.

Dr. Valerie Maglione, a dentist and past PTA president at the Pine Brook School, was appointed to the board in November to fill a vacant seat. She is running unopposed to complete the final year of that term.

Maglione was not available for comment for this story.

Orr, 52, is the married mother of two grown children. She has been a teacher for 30 years. Orr said she is running for her second term on the board for the same reasons she ran for her first.

She said she believes her 30 years as an educator lends the board a needed expertise given her knowledge and understanding of core curriculum standards and also in helping her to relate to the problems within a school district.

"I would really like to be here to finish the projects I was already involved in starting," she said, referring to the planned September opening of the John I. Dawes Early Learning Center next to the Clark Mills School and the hiring of a new superintendent.

"Putting someone else on the board negates the work already done," she said.

Superintendent of Schools Maureen Lally previously announced her retirement effective at the end of the current school year.

Manisero, 54, is the married father of three children. He is seeking a third term on the board. He presently serves as the board's president.

In addition to helping to oversee the completion of construction and the opening of the John I. Dawes Early Learning Center and the selection of a new superintendent, Manisero said he wants to return to the board in order to continue working on "restructuring the school budget," as well as to develop a shared services agreement with Manalapan in order to help keep taxpayers from paying for duplicate municipal and school services.

He said he has been involved in pursuing the shared services agreement and wants to see that project through to completion.

Manisero said regardless of who residents elect to sit on the board, he wants to encourage voter turnout that will also be needed to approve the $71.8 million budget the board has adopted for the 2007-08 school year.

"People who are concerned about education need to come out and vote to show their support," he said.

Mumolie, 53, is an attorney and the married father of three children. He previously served three terms on the board. He said he is running again because "the children of this district need an advocate."

Mumolie said he would work to make education a priority at the state level.

"I would force the state to forgo the photo ops for actual programs that work," he said.

Spindel, 67, is a retired teacher. He has two grown children who were educated in the district. He said he is running for the board again because he believes "it is important that the community continues to be active in guiding what is happening in our schools due to the increased pressure of educating our children with limited funds."

"I am running because I feel in these times when money is shorter, that someone like me can make sure that cuts aren't made in ways that affect children's education," he said.

Spindel referred to the federal No Child Left Behind Act which he said places "the emphasis on mathematics and reading programs while the arts, music, social studies and sciences suffer."

According to Spindel, because school districts' success rates will be judged based on those numbers, he worries that in order to continue to qualify for federal money that is doled out based on the No Child Left Behind standards, administrators will try to make more cuts in the non-math and non-reading areas "in order to keep up."

Spindel said he believes his background in education will prove to be an asset when it comes to choosing the new superintendent.

The Manalapan-Englishtown district serves children from both municipalities. The elementary schools are the Clark Mills, Taylor Mills, Lafayette Mills, Milford Brook, Pine Brook and Wemrock Brook schools. The district's middle school is the Manalapan Englishtown Middle School. All of the schools are in Manalapan.

The district's headquarters are in the former Main Street School on Main Street, Englishtown.