Election 2023: Cynthia McConnell For Washington Township School Board

LONG VALLEY, NJ — Election Day is nearing, and Long Valley voters will soon head to the polls to cast their votes for three seats on the local school board.

Patch sent questionnaires to all candidates, seeking their responses. Here is the response from candidate Cynthia McConnell.

Editor's Note: Patch emailed all candidates at the email addresses listed for their campaigns in the clerk's office. The responses will be revealed between now and the general election on Nov. 7. These comments will be published with just minor stylistic changes. Candidates who wish to participate but did not receive an invitation should email vianella.burns@patch.com.

Name: Cynthia McConnell

Age: 41

Town of residence: My husband and I both grew up in Chester and had a bunch of friends from Long Valley as kids. When we got married, we knew we wanted to settle down in Long Valley.

Family: My husband, Matt McConnell and I have two kids, Jessica and Brian McConnell, along with a dog and cats.

Education: I got my BS in Accounting Systems from Virginia Tech and my masters in IT Project Management from George Washington University.

Occupation: I'm an IT project manager and software designer. I take the details from our business partners and help them understand their needs so we can create websites to gather insurance applications easily from our customers (insurance agents and direct consumers). I then work with multiple teams of developers to break down the work and align everyone's efforts. I track the completion of the multiple teams and raise risks or dependencies as we identify them, and then find solutions to limit the risk or fully remove it.

Why are you seeking to run for school board?

I'm running for K-8 BoE in Washington Township because I want to make sure the board is focused on the education of our kids and raising our town's test scores while keeping our budget balanced. I've been seeing some on the board and running against myself who are more interested in trying to require teachers to tell parents if they find out a child mentions being LGBTQ.

This is not what our teachers need to be focusing on, and if passed, this can result in litigation for our town that will cause major financial repercussions for our budgets. It could also impact our property values if our town is seen as less than welcoming to marginalized groups. I want to make sure all our kids feel comfortable and safe in our schools and can focus on learning at school.

What according to you is the biggest issue facing the school district currently? How do you plan to tackle it?

The biggest challenge I see in our district is the need to focus on raising our student test scores rather than the noise happening in our BOE meetings around LGBTQ students. We know our test scores are dropping and while test scores are dropping in most places, that doesn't allow us to be complacent about it.

To me, it was obvious based on the number of questions we received at the BOE candidate public forum, held on October 10th. More people were focused on how many genders we believed in vs how we believed we could help get our test scores up and provide for the needs of our teachers and students. I want our BOE and teachers to work with other BOEs and teachers to understand what is working for them and where we can make some adjustments to help our students succeed.

What special qualifications do you bring to help meet the challenge?

As a project manager, I am used to asking questions, digging into the details and trying to identify the specifics of any issues. I'm very good at rephrasing things to get a point across to my coworkers, which can help everyone have a better understanding of the problem. These personality traits will be immensely helpful when we are working to break down various policies and determine the best way forward for our district.

What else would you like to share about yourself or your campaign?

I hope that everyone in this town takes the time to watch the question-and-answer session that was recorded last night and posted online. I believe it gives everyone a good sense of the two separate tickets running for the BOE, and what their supporters stand for. I'm hoping this town is ready and will vote for the school board to get back to the basics of making sure our kids get a quality education and that we are supporting our teachers and the needs of our administration within our budgets.