DEERFIELD — Voters will have the choice of three candidates for the Deerfield School Committee’s two open seats during Monday’s election. The race features Carey Etchells and Geoffrey David Sharp running for re-election, while Anne Curtis seeks her first term on the committee. The two seats carry three-year terms.
Polling will be open from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. at Town Hall. Masks are not required.
Etchells, 41, is running for her second term on the School Committee in hopes of continuing the work the committee has done through the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We had to make a lot of decisions in the past couple years that no one anticipated we would have to make,” Etchells said, referring to the state’s decision to leave mask mandates and policies up to individual school committees. “There’s a lot of other stuff that school committees do: budgets, oversee curriculum. … That’s been happening too, alongside the pandemic mayhem.”
Etchells, who has three children in the district, said her experience as a parent can help continue to guide the committee to decisions that ensure the safety of children.
“Parents should be a part of school committee in general. It’s good to have that perspective,” she said. “I represent the parents. I have the experience of living through these past years and making difficult decisions.”
If re-elected, Etchells said she would like to work on “supporting the teachers and schools in getting students back to where they need to be” after the pandemic disrupted learning. She noted, however, that Deerfield Elementary School was able to bring students to school much more often than other schools in the region during the pandemic.
“Through the pandemic, our district successfully balanced safety with making learning as accessible as possible,” Etchells said. “It wasn’t always easy, but our district has been a leader in keeping students safe and in school.”
Sharp, 56, is running for re-election in hopes of continuing to use his 10 years of experience on the School Committee to keep Deerfield Elementary running smoothly.
“I bring experience, thoughtfulness and hopefully some levelheadedness and a great enthusiasm for public education,” he said. “We only have one childhood and we have to give kids the best foundation we can for their futures.”
Sharp emphasized that Deerfield Elementary is one of the “most stable school districts in the Pioneer Valley” because he and his fellow committee members make evidence-based decisions and work with a “really efficient” administration.
“Our main goal as a school committee is to allow our teachers to teach … minimize outside distraction and allow them to do what they do best, and that is teach,” Sharp said. “I’m pretty proud of the work we did during the pandemic.”
If re-elected, Sharp said he’d like to continue to work with the school and families as students grapple with the pandemic’s effects on mental health, especially the youngest children.
“Obviously, the pandemic has wreaked havoc on many of our families and children. I think that we are expecting our teachers to take on more of a social worker, behavioral-modification role,” Sharp said. “We as a committee need to do all we can to support each other.”
Curtis, 34, is running for her first term on the Deerfield School Committee after moving to town a few years ago with her husband and two children, who will be entering the preschool program in the fall. A social worker with 13 years in the field, Curtis said she is running for School Committee to continue the district’s commitment to the community.
“I’m running because I’m committed to seeing the schools be the best they can be, both for the community’s children and the staff, teachers and administrators that work there,” Curtis said. “It would be an honor to serve the community in this capacity.”
Curtis said her experience as a social worker will help the committee ensure that children’s mental health needs are addressed as the pandemic’s effects linger.
“There are some evolving needs, that maybe three years ago, we wouldn’t have anticipated,” she said. “It’s really important that as a community and school committee we are paying attention to that because it really impacts the learning of our kids.”
If elected, Curtis said she wants to provide “the community with a collaborative platform to participate in the decision-making process” as the committee continues to navigate pandemic learning.
“I love Deerfield and have chosen to raise my family here,” she said. “I am committed to seeing students, teachers and support staff thrive inside and outside the classroom. I will provide a collaborative platform for community participation and go the extra mile to get things done.”