School Board Controversy, Moms 4 MAPS, and the Candidates Seeking Our Votes
The Latest from Marquette, MI by Brian Cabell
NORMALLY, SCHOOL BOARD elections don’t capture the spotlight or generate much controversy, but this year is different. We just witnessed a failed recall campaign against two current Board members, and now, next month, eight candidates are vying for three open positions on the Board. We’re paying attention.
The old versus the new? Experience versus the upstarts? Liberal versus conservative? None of those descriptions, despite what we might have heard, is entirely accurate. But the MAPS School Board has been in the headlines for the last few years, and 2024 has been a tumultuous and polarizing election campaign year.
So…let’s sort things out.
KRISTEN CAMBENSY, the current chairperson on the Board, has been serving since 2015. She’s seeking another six-year term. “I want to continue the leadership and experience that our Board needs,” she says. “I’ve helped guide the district through some contentious times in recent years with COVID, masking, the nickname controversy, and turnover…It hasn’t been easy, but we got through it…”
She’s won praise from many in the district for her evenhanded treatment of the contentious issues—she actually voted to keep the Redmen name, but urged acceptance of the new name after the vote…”You look at the district,” she says, “and we have a lot of good things going on in terms of budget, enrollment, and student achievement.”
GLENN SARKA is the other incumbent running for re-election. He’s been serving on the Board since 2019…“The culture wars kept coming down on the school board, and we had to make some difficult decisions,” he explains. “And I think we made the right decisions.” He voted—with the the majority of the Board—to drop the Redmen name.
“COVID was difficult for us,” he continues, “because we kept looking for health professionals to provide guidance on masking, and they kept pushing it back to us.” It’s not surprising that there was reluctance on the issue when you remember that there were calls for Dr. Anthony Fauci to be tried and executed for his role in the COVID crisis. As for Sarka, he says he’d rather take part in the difficult issues than…say…deciding what type of pizza the district should order.
CASSIDY THOMAS is the youngest candidate for the MAPS school board. She’s 28, a physician’s assistant in respiratory medicine. She attended school here from grades 1-12, then graduated from Michigan State, left for Denver for a while, and has now returned. She appreciates the education she got in Marquette, and now wants to give back.
“I think the current board has done an excellent job,” she says. “They’ve faced a lot of adversity. It’s not an easy job, but I’d love to join them.” The biggest challenges she sees ahead? Staying within budget and improving the infrastructure.
NATHAN JOYAL is an adjunct NMU faculty member with degrees in engineering and computer science. He’s also certified as a paralegal and legal investigator. The father of seven children…“I think it’s important for our community to remain united behind the Sentinels name, regardless of whether it was any particular person’s first choice,” he says. “Allowing ourselves to be sucked back into a potentially years-long cultural dispute about our sports team name would not be productive.”
He has praise for the Board’s actions during the pandemic. “I think the Board was very transparent and open in their discussions and decisions when dealing with COVID,” he says.
JIM RANKIN, who’s retired from the Department of Corrections, finds himself in an unusual position: He’s running for both the MAPS school board and the City Commission. No problem, he says. “I can either sit back and complain how things are done or I can step up and try to change things,” he explains. “Parents and students are telling me that physical conditions at some of the schools are terrible. They need to be fixed and then we need preventive maintenance.”
He also weighs in on the nickname change. “A lot of people were upset with that,” he says. “They don’t agree with the way it was done. It left a bad taste in their mouth.” He’s not opposed to revisiting the issue if the Board brought it up again.
ASHLEY MATTSON, SARAH MILLS-GERVAIS, and JENN TOUSIGNANT…These are the “MOMS 4 MAPS” who have created the biggest headlines in the campaign. Three mothers, political neophytes, who were unhappy with the school board and decided to join forces for a united campaign.
“We have good schools here,” says Mills-Gervais. “I went to school all my life here. We just want to keep moving in a positive direction. But we need to get new people in, we need to get a new perspective.”
They weren’t happy with the Board’s actions during the COVID crisis, nor with the nickname change. “I’ll consider myself a Redette for the rest of my life,” says Mattson, “but it’s over and done with. If I was on the Board when the decision was made, I probably would have voted to keep the Redmen name.”
“It’s a non-starter,” Tousignant says of the nickname issue. “That’s what we all agree on. None of us are getting on the Board to change the name back. We can’t waste the tax dollars, we can’t waste the time. It’s a dead issue.”
Still, they say, the controversial decision to drop the Redmen name damaged the community. “There’s a lot of unhappy students,” says Mills-Gervais. “I think school spirit is down. I just think it was done poorly, and they didn’t listen to the community.”
Politics, whether we like it or not, has entered the campaign. “This is supposed to be a nonpartisan election,” says Tousignant, “but it has not been nonpartisan on one side. You're not supposed to be following party lines.”…The three moms have also faced charges of being anti-intellectual. Ridiculous, they say. “We do not want to ban books!” says Mattson with exasperation, and the others nod their heads. “That was a rumor that started and it spiraled out of control!”
ELECTIONS IN 2024. Unpredictable, rumor-filled, and polarizing even in the ostensibly “nonpartisan” races. Virtually all of the candidates agree that the MAPS schools are well-run and their children are getting good educations. But the question for voters in this high-profile election is this: Do you think the MAPS school board has done a good job, despite the challenges, over the last few, difficult years…or do you think it has failed the community and needs to be replaced by new, fresh voices?
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
“Politics, it seems to me, for years, or all too long, has been concerned with right or left instead of right or wrong.”
—Richard Armour