Hopewell Township residents cast their ballots in the general election on Nov. 3, and seem to have returned one incumbent and elected two newcomers to the Hopewell Valley Regional Board of Education.
Five candidates vied for three, three-year terms representing Hopewell Township on the school board.
Based on results from Mercer County Clerk’s Office updated on Nov. 13, newcomer Andrea Driver has 4,936 votes to secure the top spot, incumbent school board Adam Sawicki, who currently serves as vice president, has 4,603 votes, and newcomer Anita Williams Galiano currently holds the third spot with 4,480 votes.
Additionally, newcomer Jacqueline Genovesi has earned 4,087 votes and newcomer Ross Gordon has received 3,444 votes.
The vote tallies were current as of press time on Nov. 17. The election results are unofficial and have not been certified by the Mercer County Clerk. The deadline to count all votes is Nov. 20. The deadline to certify the election results to the state is Nov. 23.
Driver resides in Hopewell Township with her husband, two daughters and her mother-in-law. She has lived in the Hopewell Valley for most of her life and Driver’s family has resided in the Valley for more than five generations.
Driver attended Hopewell Elementary School, Timberlane Middle School, and graduated from Hopewell Valley Central High School (HVCHS) in 1993. She currently holds certificates as an Educational Administrator and Supervisor. This September, Driver started her 24th year of teaching, with experiences in grades from kindergarten to eighth grade.
Sawicki and his wife have been residents of Hopewell Township since 1997. Their two younger children are juniors at HVCHS, their older son is a sophomore at Rutgers University and their older daughter is a senior at Cornell University.
He has represented Hopewell Township for the past nine years. During his time on the board, Sawicki has served as chairperson of the Finance & Facilities, Education, Personnel and Policy committees, and is in his second year of service as vice president.
Sawicki has been employed as a structural engineer by the Boeing Company in Ridley, Pennsylvania, for 30 years, was designated a Boeing Technical Fellow in 2006, and has served as a delegate of the FAA for aircraft certification since 2009.
Galiano is a 20-year resident of Brandon Farms and mother of two HVCHS alumni. She has built a 30-year career working for a Fortune 100 company, as well as working as an entrepreneur.
Galiano is a chief operations officer for OnPace+, a subsidiary of Alan Health & Science, Corp, an e-health (electronic management) and an m-health (mobile) company. Her experience between consumer healthcare operations and business management has been spent working within, as well as leading, teams.
She has co-led Six-Sigma projects assessing and redesigning product and service delivery systems.
Genovesi is from the Titusville section of Hopewell Township and has three children. She is vice president for the Center for STEAM Equity at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University.
Gordon lives in Titusville with his wife and two sons, a 4-year-old and a 4-month old. Gordon teaches seventh grade social studies in Willingboro, and has previous experience as a pre-kindergarten teacher.