New Palestine’s Amanda Wooton ran for the New Palestine Community Schools school board district 1 seat and won.
HANCOCK COUNTY — Current New Palestine Community School board member Brian McKinney walked over to Amanda H. Wooton and congratulated her on winning a seat on the district’s school board Tuesday night at the county’s annex building.
Wooton who was flanked by her husband and three children sat at the Annex building for most of the night waiting for results that trickled slowly in.
The race she was in was the lone contested one for the New Palestine Community School board seat (District 1) and ended up being a runaway victory for Wooton. She was one of three people who ran for the seat to replace outgoing school board member Matt Ackerman, who decided not to run for another term.
The three candidates vying for the District 1 open seat were Andrew J. Dropsey, Brian Hart and Wooton.
Wooton ended up earning 4,070 votes; Hart captured 2,707 and Dropsey got 1,599.
“I couldn’t be more encouraged thanks to all the people who said they were excited that I was running and ended up voting for me,” Wooton said. “Knowing that I have all that support I think is a great way to start my new term.”
Wooton said she has such an immense amount of respect for both the men she ran against and knows for certain they would each have done a great job if elected, but she is happy voters picked her for the position.
“It was just a good race and I respect both of my candidates, and I know I have big shoes to fill with Matt leaving the board and I take that very seriously,” Wooton said.
Wooton noted she will take a “listening and learning” posture at first to make sure she understands the workings of the board before jumping in too deep.
“I’ll be teachable and ask questions from the start,” Wooton said. “But, I am looking forward to doing the best job that I can.”
Heading into the race Wooton said she and her family, including the three children, moved to the area over a decade ago and fell in love with New Palestine and the school system.
“All of our kids have gone to New Palestine schools, from kindergarten on, and we really like this school district,” Wooton said at the time. “The evolution to be part of the school board was gradual, with clubs and sports, and I still volunteer to this day.”
Dropsey noted he wanted to be on the school board because he cares deeply about education and the community.
“Having two kids being a part of the system, with one having gone through all the way from kindergarten through 12th grade and one that is kind of half through, I came into contact firsthand seeing how great our schools are and all the wonderful things,” Dropsey said prior to the election. “I’d just kind of like to play my part to help the schools to grow and get even stronger.”
Hart noted before the election he’s been a longtime supporter of the community and the school system and has always been actively involved in supporting the youth leagues and even coached when his kids played sports. Over the past year and a half, Hart has been attending school board meetings and said he feels like being a part of the board would be the next logical progression for him in his efforts to support the community.
While Hart noted he had no concerns about the direction the district is heading, he often noticed the board always votes 5-0 in favor of every measure, and while he said there was nothing wrong with that if it’s the best decision. Still, he’d like to make sure major decisions are properly vetted and looked into thoroughly before votes are cast.
There were two other seats up for election on the New Palestine School Board, seat District 2 (non-partisan), but board member Laura Haeberle ran unopposed, and in District 4 (non-partisan) where Daniel W. Walker also ran unopposed.
