By Lea Kahn, Staff Writer
There will likely be many new faces on the school boards in the Princeton, Lawrence, West Windsor-Plainsboro and Montgomery public school districts, given the number of candidates who have filed to run for the school board.
They are hoping to fill the seats held by seven incumbent school board members in the four school districts who are not running for re-election in the Nov. 8 general election. Monday was the filing deadline to run for a three-year term on a school board.
In Princeton, incumbent school board members Molly Chrein, Tom Hagedorn and Andrea Spalla are not seeking re-election, clearing the path for three new board members to be chosen by voters from a field of five candidates.
Those candidates are Ravi Bala of Valley Road, Deborah Bronfield of Dodds Lane, William D. Hare of Jefferson Road, John Alexander Martin of Hun Road and Gregory M. Stankiewicz of Jefferson Road. They are seeking to fill the three open seats on the Princeton Public School District’s board of education.
At the West Windsor-Plainsboro Regional School District, incumbent school board members Louisa Ho of Snowbird Court, Scott Powell of Cambridge Way and Yu (Taylor) Zhong of Rutledge Court are seeking re-election. Ms. Ho and Mr. Powell are the West Windsor Township representatives and Mr. Zhong is the Plainsboro representative on the regional school board.
West Windsor voters can choose from among Ms. Ho and Mr. Powell, and Carol Herts of Blackhawk Court, Richard A. Kaye of Coneflower Lane, Deborah Marinsky of Fieldston Road and Mirna L. White of Thrasher Trail. Mr. Kaye is a former school board member who served from 2006 to 2014.
Plainsboro voters can select from among Mr. Zhong, and Shrenik Dagli of Macnamee Street, Todd S. Hochman of Daisy Court and Russel A. Melville of Lee Court. Mr. Hochman is a former school board member who served from 2009 to 2012.
In Montgomery Township, incumbent school board member Dharmesh H. Doshi of Hudnut Lane in Belle Mead is seeking re-election. School board members Sandra Donnay and Nicholas Hladick are not running again.
Voters will chose from among Mr. Doshi and Phyllis Bursh of Sunset Road in Skillman, Paul Johnson of Jamestown Road in Belle Mead and Shreesh Tiwari of Liam Place of Skillman for the three school board seats.
And in Lawrence Township, incumbent school board members Pepper Evans and Michele Bowes are seeking re-election, but board members Michael Horan and Laura Waters chose not to run again. Ms. Evans is running for a three-year term and Ms. Bowes is running for an unexpired one-year term.
In addition to Ms. Evans, who lives on Slack Avenue, voters will chose from among Glenn Collins of Bearfort Way, Jonathan Dauber of Springwood Drive, Colette M. Dickinson of Abby Drive, Michelle King of Chatsworth Court and Michael J. Wilson of Carver Place for the three-year terms.
Two of the candidates are former school board members and one is a former Lawrence school district administrator.
The two former board members are Mr. Collins and Mr. Wilson. Mr. Collins served part of a three-year term that would have expired in 2017, until he resigned for personal reasons in April. Mr. Wilson served on the school board from 2000 to 2005.
Mr. Dauber is the former principal of Lawrence High School. He worked in the school district from 2006 to 2015. He is the principal at West Windsor-Plainsboro High School North.
Ms. Bowes, who lives on Melvina Drive, is running unopposed for the unexpired one-year term. She was appointed to the school board in May to fill out the rest of Mr. Collins’ term.
Staff Writer Philip Sean Curran contributed to this article.
