Dexter elects two new school board members after recall vote

By Kasey Turman, Bangor Daily News Staff

DEXTER — Two people were elected to the Dexter-area school board on Aug. 5, nearly two months after voters recalled the school board members who previously held the positions.

Carol Sherburne and Dale Jackson were elected to the Maine School Administrative District 46 school board in a special election in Dexter on Aug. 5. Sherburne and Jackson were elected with 144 and 134 votes, respectively. Antoinette Ploude, the third candidate on the ballot, received 35 votes.

The election came after voters supported removing Alisha Ames and Judy Saunders from the SAD 46 school board in a June recall vote. The vote was brought by a group of Dexter residents who accused Ames of having a conflict of interest as she co-owns a homeschooling co-op, and Saunders of violating the school district’s nepotism policy.

Sherburne, 73, was a middle school teacher in Dexter for nearly 30 years before she dove into volunteering around the community. Since retiring, she has volunteered at the Heart of Maine Resource Center, a non-profit organization that distributes food and other resources across the Dexter area.

Her experience in the school and community will help her to try to bridge the gaps between the community, parents and school board members to make changes to the school system that residents want, she said.

“You’re elected to listen to people in your community and reach a consensus,” Sherburne said.

The board, teachers and parents need to be more transparent when trying to find common ground to improve SAD 46, Sherburne said. She said she hopes the transparency that she wants to see from the board and the common ground she wants to find with the community should push the town to “move forward” from the animosity that surrounded the recall vote.

“We need to find ways to work together to accomplish what we want, which is certainly to offer the best education we can to the students in our community,” Sherburne said.

Jackson, 54, is another active volunteer in the Dexter community who splits his time between the Kiwanis Club and the Heart of Maine Resource Center. Jackson had multiple kids graduate from SAD 46 and one still in the school system.

Jackson said he wants to spend the beginning of his tenure figuring out how the board works and then work toward drafting a budget that extends afterschool programs for students but doesn’t increase taxes for residents.

The board should work toward giving students and community members what they ask for, including non-sports afterschool activities and a more balanced budget, something Jackson said has been a problem for multiple years.

“We’re not here to break the school rules. We’re not here to have all the drama. We’re here to try to have everybody work together without hurting anybody in the long run,” he said.