CLAREMONT — Three candidates are looking to replace two outgoing Claremont School Board members in the March 11 election.
Incumbents Whitney Skillen and Bonnie Miles are not seeking another three-year term.
On the ballot instead are: Loren Howard, a Stevens High School graduate and filmmaker; William Madden, an engineer; and Emily Sandblade, a former Republican candidate for the New Hampshire House.
Howard, 25, was born and raised in Claremont, attending Bluff Elementary, Claremont Middle School and Stevens High School. He is the assistant technical director for Florentine Films in Walpole, N.H., and is making his first run for public office.
Howard has an 18-month-old son who will soon enter the school system and also his future is in Claremont, he said.
“Both of those things made me want to get involved in local politics,” he said.
Additionally, Howard said he would be the youngest member on the board and hopes his candidacy encourages more people of his generation to get involved in their local government.
He chose to run for the School Board as opposed to another board because he worked with some of the people on the board when he was in college and worked as a videographer with the local television station, CCTV.
“Taxpayer burden and costs are huge right now,” Howard said. “There are a lot of different opinions on how that needs to be approached and there is a limited scope of what we can do at the local level to fix the bigger picture.”
Howard said he’d like to advocate for more federal funding, but worries the current administration’s support for public education does not appear to be very strong.
“With that in mind, (…) we need to reevaluate how we structure our schools and educate our children with the money we receive from the community if the state and feds are not going to help us,” he said.
Madden, 66, an engineer with a law degree, came to Claremont during the COVID-19 pandemic from the suburbs of New York City. When his son joined him three years ago and began struggling at the high school, academically and socially, Madden said he got involved and learned all he could about school rules and programs of study at Stevens.
Madden said the school system is not as open to parental involvement as it claims to be. But he did find “upper echelon” support that helped his son’s academic improvement. He is now on track to graduate a year early with a Diploma of Distinction and has been accepted at four colleges, Madden said.
“I witnessed the best and worst of the education system,” Madden said.
Madden said he has heard about Claremont’s poverty, an unfair funding system, drugs and alcohol and education not being valued.
“I acknowledge those points but don’t accept them,” he said. “I abhor the mindset that we can’t compete with Hanover or Sunapee.”
Madden, who has been a substitute teacher at the high school, also disagrees with those who say Claremont students are not motivated to succeed academically.
“What I see is we have not linked education with success and happiness in the minds of students,” Madden said. “I don’t accept excuses and blame-shifting.”
If elected, Madden said he will stress the importance of setting goals in order to keep the board moving forward and to create “new opportunities.”
“My short-term goal is to affect positive change in the school system,” Madden said. “I might be a disruptive influence on the board but I am optimistic.”
Sandblade, 71, served one-term in N.H. House from Goffstown 10 years ago. She is an engineer working part-time, a retired physicist and former college instructor in computer science and physics.
She is running for School Board for two reasons, she said in an email, the first of which is to raise educational standards in Claremont schools.
“Right now, students are scoring at 38% competency level on standardized tests,” Sandblade said. “The School Board needs to heavily focus on getting the Claremont School District out of the bottom quarter of New Hampshire schools.”
Additionally, Sandblade thinks taxpayers and stakeholders in the school system needed better representation.
“It takes a school to bankrupt a village,” Sandblade said. “Next year, education will cost about $28,000/student. Are Claremont families receiving good value for the sharply increased taxes on their homes?”
In her November campaign for the New Hampshire House from District 6, representing Claremont and Croydon, Sandblade said she would work to expand educational choice for parents while reducing the tax burden. She would also push for expanding Educational Freedom Accounts, which give tuition vouchers to parents who wish to send their children to schools outside the public school system
On Tuesday, March 4, there will be a candidates’ forum in the Goodrich room of the Sugar River Valley Technical Center from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Ballot voting will take place on Tuesday, March 11 from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. Wards 1 and 2 will vote at the Claremont Middle School, while Ward 3 will vote at Disnard Elementary.
Patrick O’Grady can be reached at pogclmt@gmail.com.
