School board to have new look for next term

After the April 5 consolidated election, East Peoria’s District 86 school board will have a significantly different makeup.

Of the four candidates running for the three open seats on the school board, only one is an incumbent, which guarantees that there will be at least two new members of the school board.

Sara Sparkman, Donald Bell, Chad Kramer and Dennis Vandiver are the four candidates that will be on the ballot on April 5 for the school board.

Background

Although each of the four District 86 school board candidates comes from a different background, they each have ties to the East Peoria community and want the best for the District 86 schools.

Sparkman, 45, is the lone incumbent running for the board. Sparkman is an 18-year resident of East Peoria and works as the community relations manager for the Tazewell County Health Department. She is seeking her second term on the school board.

Bell, 46, is running for the school board for the first time. The 11-year resident of East Peoria owns  the East Peoria Jewelry and Trade store and currently has two sons attending District 86 schools.

The third candidate running for the board is Chad Kramer, 39, a nine-year resident of East Peoria. Kramer works as an IT analyst for Caterpillar and has two daughters enrolled in District 86 schools.


Vandiver, 58, is a 34-year resident of East Peoria. He retired in December after a 38-year career as a machinist for Caterpillar.

Reasons for Running

Despite the different backgrounds that the school board candidates boast, almost all of the candidates cited building on the quality work that the current school board has done as a reason for running.

Sparkman, who studied elementary education in college,  said that she wanted to continue to build on the work that the school board has done over the past term.

“I’m rerunning because I know the teachers and administration and students all do a wonderful job and I want to continue to be a part of it and help if I can,” she said.

Kramer echoed that sentiment as his reason for running.

“(The school board has) faced some challenges and have come up with some very creative solutions to keep meeting the needs of teachers and students, and I just want to be part of that,” he said.

Bell, who has worked with the East Peoria City Council to have safety lights installed near Lincon School, said increasing school safety is one of his top priorities.

“My big thing is I want to see a lot more safety at our schools over here,” he said. “I just kind of saw a lot of people were concerned but didn’t feel like going to a school board meeting would help, so I’m going to be a voice for the citizens.”

VanDiver said that running for the school board offered him the chance to give back to the community.

“I feel, with three vacancies open on the board, that it’s an opportunity to do what is a civic obligation to run for the board,” he said. “It’s a golden opportunity to do something I’ve wanted to do in the past.”

Consolidation

With the state of Illinois facing a sizeable deficit, Gov. Pat Quinn has named school district consolidation as a way the state can gain some financial relief.

Since three school districts, including District 86, feed into East Peoria’s District 309, East Peoria and the surrounding communities look to be affected by state consolidation efforts.

While the District 86 school board has taken steps in recent meetings to look into the possibility of consolidation, the four  district 86 candidates have varying opinions on the issue.

“Absolutely not,” Vandiver said  when asked about the possibility of consolidation. “I think this is a local issue and consolidation should be left up to the people of the district.”

Kramer said that he supports  the district’s research into consolidation.

“It should be worth our efforts to work with some of the area districts to see if it is something that is  benefit to the students,” he said. “I’m eager to research that to see if the benefits are there or not.”

Sparkman said that she agreed with the school board’s submission to a consolidation study and added she wants the community to see the results before committing to consolidation.

“We as a school board want to have the information, give it to our community, make sure the community understand it, make sure the parents and staff understand all the different aspects,” she said. “I’m really interested in being part of that process and understanding a little bit more because its hard to accept things that are put on you as a mandate so the more information we can get out to the public ahead of time will be beneficial.”

Bell added that consolidation could be beneficial to East Peoria if they look to improve on the efforts of nearby communities that have already consolidated their districts.

“We could look at the neighboring school districts that have done with success. What we could do is look at what they’ve done and improve on that,” he said.