Jim Dillon and Timothy Doyle were appointed to the Lynnfield School Committee as interim members by the School Committee and Select Board Tuesday evening. Dillon and Doyle will serve on the committee until the end of April, after which new members will be elected during the town elections.
Both members were elected after all nine candidates were interviewed and then voted upon by the joint committee of three School Committee members and three Select Board members.
Doyle received four out of six votes to be elected and has served on the School Committee for 18 years, including two years as chair and seven years as vice chair.
“I’m not too sure there’s any other individual in the community that can match my experience on the school committee,” Doyle said at the meeting. “I think those qualifications speak for themselves and that I left the school department in good shape. I think we had a lot of achievements in my 18 years of service to the community. I feel like I can hit the ground running and address the needs and hopefully set up the next committee to have success.”
Dillon, a former school committee member and teacher, also received four out of six votes to be elected.
“Students should have the best possible learning experience in our schools that they can while we are operating within a budget,” Dillon said at the meeting. “Communication with the parents is really important for the School Committee. By the time a decision is made, all the parents should have gone through a process of understanding why it is being made.
The appointments resulted from the resignations submitted by former Chair Rich Sjoberg and Vice Chair Stacy Dahlstedt at the end of last year. The resignations came amid controversies surrounding the committee and Superintendent of Schools Kristen Vogel.
In recent School Committee meetings, parents have heavily criticized the committee in the last few months, citing a lack of responsiveness and disrespectful communication.
In November, the Lynnfield Teachers Association declared no confidence in the school district’s leadership. Vogel has been on indefinite medical leave since Dec. 4.
Out of the nine candidates that were running for the interim positions, seven were women. School Committee Chair Kate DePrizio urged the joint committee to consider that statistic while voting.
