PORT TOWNSEND — A week ago, the Port Townsend School District had no takers for an appointed position on the School Board.
Today, the School Board has two and expects to choose one of them after interviewing them at 2 p.m. in Room S-11, 1610 Blaine St.
Keith White and Janine Ramsey, both of Port Townsend, have applied to replace Anne Burkart, the board’s District 5 representative, for the remainder of her term, which expires Dec. 30, 2015.
The School Board will interview White at 2 p.m. and Ramsey at 2:45 p.m.
After the interviews, the board is expected to review candidate qualifications in a closed session then reopen the meeting to choose one of the two.
Both are retired educators, although White terms himself as having been “primarily an administrator.”
White retired as associate director of undergraduate admissions at the University of Wisconsin in 2004.
During his tenure with the office, which began in 1977, he served as liaison with the state Legislature and the governor’s office for the university’s admissions department and served one year as interim director.
After he and his wife, Catherine, moved to Port Townsend, he served until 2009 as the West Coast regional director for admissions for Marquette University, which is based in Milwaukee, Wisc.
“I was doing what I liked best, which was working with high school students,” White said Sunday.
He has a master’s degree in educational policy studies from the University of Wisconsin in Madison.
He volunteers with the North Olympic Salmon Coalition, the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, the Port Townsend Marine Science Center, the Jefferson County Historical Society, Peninsula Friends of Animals, Jefferson County Humane Society and the Wooden Boat Festival.
Ramsey worked as an educator and counselor for 25 years, she said on her application.
She has dual master’s degrees, one in special education from the University of San Francisco and another in counseling psychology from Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Ore.
“As a former educator, I have an interest in having Port Townsend Schools meet and exceed state standards,” Ramsey said on her application.
“I believe my background as an educator in grades K-12 and as a high school counselor qualifies me on many levels to act in a positive manner to help improve our local district and to provide new ideas and input on the road to excellence,” she said.
Ramsey volunteers with the Wooden Boat Festival, serves on several Cape George committees and served as a mentor for a Port Townsend senior on his senior project.
She organized the first Walk a Mile in Her Shoes event as an employee of Dove House Advocacy Services in 2010 and now organizes it each year as a volunteer.
“I think that I have a lot to add to a School Board because of my knowledge of education,” Ramsey said.
Ramsey said she founded a peer mediation program at the Milwaukie, Ore., high school at which she worked as a counselor.
“I have a good knowledge of how to mediate things that might be contentious,” she said.
The school district had extended the deadline for applications for the seat after the first deadline passed Sept. 30 with no takers.
Burkart had announced in September her intention to step down Oct. 31, citing her husband’s health and a desire to move closer to family.
District 5 — which includes Kala Point, Woodland Hills and part of the southern end of Port Townsend — has a high percentage of retirees, both Burkart and Superintendent David Engle noted after no applications for the seat were received.
“There are a lot of people without kids in that district, so they really don’t have any skin in the game,” Engle said at the time.
Ramsey applied for the position Oct. 6. White applied Oct. 9.
White said he applied after seeing a story in the Peninsula Daily News that no one had volunteered to fill the position on the School Board.
“I feel very strongly that people who are retired have every bit of responsibility for making sure public education remains high quality,” he said.
________
Managing Editor/News Leah Leach can be reached at 360-417-3531 or at leah.leach@peninsuladailynews.com.
Jefferson County Editor Charlie Bermant contributed to this story.
