Board of Ed. Candidate Profile: AnneMarie Martino

With the Babylon School District budget vote and school board election a week away Patch will be providing readers insight on the spending plan, budget issues, community opinion and insight on candidates seeking election to board.

AnneMarie Martin is the only relatively new challenger to the incumbents running this year for Babylon's Board of Education. She, along with Roger Katz and Dominic Bencivenga, will seek the public's vote on May 21.

Patch asked Martino, as well as every candidate, a short series of questions to provide readers with information about their backgrounds and views on the challenges facing the school district.

AnneMarie Martino
Age: 49
Occupation: Legal Assistant
Children: Three
Lived in Babylon: 23 years

Patch: Why are you running?

Suffice it to say, if I was content with the current directions and actions of the Board of Education, I would not be running.

Patch: What is the biggest challenge facing the district?

We are a small district coupled with unfunded mandates, little aid, very low commercial tax base, tax cap and increasing costs.

Patch: What would be your top goals, if elected, to achieve within the district over the next few years?

District-wide goals should be established by the Board of Education at the start of each school year, presented to the community and adopted by the Board of Education, with routine public updates on progress and completion. They should be the basis for the Superintendent’s annual review. Again, this is another opportunity parents, students and staff (‘stakeholders’) have to be made aware of a district’s overall direction. Goals should encompass all aspects of a district; including finances, curriculum, technology, policy and buildings & grounds. If you do not identify specific goals and assign responsibility for them it is all too easy to become distracted, duplicate efforts and/or fail to meet the needs of all students.

Patch: What is one thing you want to do differently in the district?

I want better and more timely communication, consistency and real transparency. Too often the parents, students and staff are subject to changes to policy/procedure/curriculum long after discussions and plans to implement said changes, this can or will negatively impact the required or anticipated results, as well as staff and student retention. When you communicate with stakeholders during a process that determines what changes are necessitated and the best courses of action for implementation you make it a common goal and increase the likelihood for success.