Health & Fitness
Just the Facts, Ma'am
At a post-meeting-with-the-mayor gathering at Shopper's, I mentioned that @WalthamGuy posted that 11% of Waltham voters voted in the last election for School Committee. That's a travesty. We tried to find the number of voters in Waltham who have children in the school system, and, after asking Mr. Google and scribbling on cocktail napkins, we came up with a number of around 50% [I hope that it is clear that our math may have been wrong. According to Wikipedia, in 2008, there were 35,000 registered voters in Waltham out of a population of around 60,000. 15% of the population is under 18 (9000). That means that 69% of people over 18 are registered to vote. There were, according to US Census data from 2000, 12,000 families and 23,000 'households', of which 20% (4600) had children under 18, including single-parent households. So, 24,000 two-parent families plus 4600 'households' is 28,000, which was close enough to half for us. Here's thehttp://http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waltham,_Massachusetts#Demographics link ] Why such a low turnout for something as important as School Committee?
Another smart and concerned parent had asked about a 'job description' for a School Committee member. This is where I was especially enlightened, since I had no idea that the School Committee responsibilities, as well as the requirement for a School Council, are Massachusetts DOE law:
http://http//www.doe.mass.edu/lawsregs/advisory/cm1115gov.html
There is also a Massachusetts Association of School Committees, which could provide benchmarks and a way to find what other school districts are doing:
http://http//www.masc.org
There are three Waltham School Committee positions on this year's ballot. The Patch previously posted the list of candidates:
http://http//waltham.patch.com/groups/politics-and-elections/p/ballot-set-for-waltham-city-election
I looked for information or a Candidate's page for the incumbents, Lisa Limonciello and Susan Burstein and couldn't find one. Ms. Limonciello is on twitter @lisalimonciello and Ms. Burstein is on LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/pub/susan-burstein/13/265/554
There are four non-incumbents running for the three seats. Kaytie Dowcette's page is here: https://www.facebook.com/KaytieDowcettWaltham. John Frassica can be found here: http://www.johnfrassica.com
Michele Kosboth maintains a blog on blogspot: http://kosbothforschoolcommittee.blogspot.com
Susan Monfette's page is here: http://www.susanmonfette.com
Have at it, Waltham!