Jared Nicholson has announced his candidacy for re-election to the Lynn School Committee.
Following is his announcement:
I am excited to announce that I am running for reelection to a third term on the Lynn School Committee.
I ran for School Committee four years ago because of how important having great schools is to Lynn’s hopes for growth and because I want to send my future kids to great Lynn public schools. That passion still drives me. On top of that, the District faces challenges from shifting external circumstances. I believe I can continue to help the District navigate those challenges as a member of the Committee.
Beacon Hill is working on the biggest overhaul of education funding in decades. State education officials are guiding implementation of enormous reforms to English language learner education. The City of Lynn faces serious financial shortfalls. And state finance officials have expressed skepticism about the city’s ability to pay for the new schools that we so desperately need.
I believe that drawing on my experience on the Committee, my legal training and my business background, I can continue to be helpful to the Lynn Public Schools as we face these external pressures.
As we face these pressures, we continue to make progress on important issues.
Our new Superintendent, Dr. Patrick Tutwiler has hit the ground running.
Last year, for the first time in several years, the Lynn Public Schools was fully funded by the city in the eyes of the state.
We all know the value of meaningful activities after school. We have added three wrestling teams and a girl’s lacrosse team. Our “STEAM” (science, technology, engineering, the arts and mathematics) extracurriculars are more and more connected to what’s going on around the city.
We are building more pathways for students to college and jobs. For example, we have built a successful program for students around the district to learn job skills after school at Lynn Tech. Another example, Lynn Tech is adding an HVAC shop this fall.
Other highlights include social-emotional learning, school nutrition, positive behavior interventions, advanced course offerings, civics curriculum, financial literacy, teacher diversity and more.
I have listened to many parents, students, teachers, administrators and community members about problems they had and worked to help find solutions and connect them with resources.
It has been an honor to serve with my School Committee colleagues and work with the Lynn Public Schools team and our partners to improve public education in the City of Lynn. I look forward to many conversations about this work and ideas from other Lynners over the course of the campaign.
Lynn, and specifically the Lynn Public Schools, have both exciting momentum and ongoing challenges. I plan to continue to work on meeting those challenges to help our kids reach their potential so that we as a community can reach ours!