POULSBO — The North Kitsap School Board will choose a member Jan. 25 to succeed Bill Webb, who resigned late last year from the District 5 position.

Hoping to return to the board: Cindy Webster-Martinson, a Kingston resident who served on the board from 2013-17 and is believed to be the first Native American elected to public office (outside of Tribal government) in Kitsap. Also under consideration: Stacy Mills, a Hansville resident and manager of the Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe’s Family Assistance Program.

The school board will meet at 4:30 p.m. in executive session, followed by a policy review and study session at 5 p.m. and the public meeting at 6 p.m. The board will announce its selection and the appointee will be sworn in. The board member will serve the remainder of Webb’s term, which expires in 2019.

The board meets in the district office board room, 18360 Caldart Ave. NE, Poulsbo.

Webster-Martinson had moved out of director District 4 and could not run for reelection. When the position in District 5, where she now lives, became available, she applied for appointment.

“I have enjoyed my four years of board service,” she wrote in her application for appointment. “I have invested a lot of time and effort in professional development. I feel that I have worked cooperatively with and contributed positively to the Board and would like to provide my experience to move the work of the board through these challenging and transitional times.”

Asked what she sees as the role of board member in the operation of the school district, Webster-Martinson wrote, “School boards are a link between public schools and the communities they serve … The central role and responsibility of school boards is continuous improvement in student achievement through various means: hiring and evaluating the superintendent, allocating resources, approving the budget and other financial needs, providing for school facilities, setting instructional policy, determining policies for student services and discipline, and approval of staffing and personnel recommendations.”

Mills, a Hansville resident, is a board member of Kingston Cares, a non-profit human services organization; and serves on a state Department of Social and Health Services advisory committee. She graduated from North Kitsap High School in 1999 and now has children at Kingston Middle School and Kingston High School.

In her application for appointment, Mills wrote that she has worked closely with the Native American liaisons in Kingston schools “to ensure that students receiving services from my programs, as well as their families, are getting their kids to school and also getting any additional help they may need from the district or the Tribe.”

In addition, she has worked with the district to provide lunches to students in the Summer Experience program at Wolfle Elementary School since 2012, when she started the program.

“I feel that I have a pulse on the direct education of the community’s children and the needs of not only our students, but our families,” she wrote. “Our students can only be successful if their full needs are being met both in and out of school. It is very important to me that the school district as a whole keep this in mind whenever making decisions that undoubtedly affect the entire community and communities within our district.”

Mills wrote that she wants to “be a bigger part” of improvements in the district. “Making improvements to the district does not always mean making popular decisions,” she wrote, “and I often relate back to a quote that I saw on my North Kitsap High School counselor’s wall: ‘What’s right is not always popular and what’s popular is not always right.’ This strategy has continuously guided me in making other decisions and improvements in other agencies and communities, as well as my own personal life.”

Webster-Martinson and Mills were interviewed by the school board on Jan. 11. The interviews begin at 02:00 on the video.

School Board Meeting 01/11/2018 from North Kitsap School District on Vimeo.