Corner Brook -
Katie Healey wants someone to take over her demanding, challenging and rewarding job.
Healey is a volunteer trustee on the board of the Western School District. She was a trustee on the board of School District 3 before that and started volunteering with the Western Integrated School Board about 15 years ago.
Since then Healey has helped make decisions to open schools, close schools and shape policy for the entities she's been part of.
"I like being able to look at the big picture," Healey said. "I started as a board member because I felt the youngest of my four children didn't have the choice in programming that my other three children had had. When you get to the board you realize you don't look at the personal level, you look at the big picture. What you're working toward is the best for every child in every school in every part of the district, and the district is huge."
After the school board election in November, Healey won't be part of the process, so she's speaking out to recruit new members on behalf of the Newfoundland and Labrador School Boards Association.
She encourages anyone who's interested in education to offer themselves to be part of the board.
Nominations for this year's elections close Thursday at 5 p.m. Nominations forms can be obtained by calling 637-4642 and they may be dropped off at the board office on Wellington Street or faxed to 634-8349.
The board is composed of one member from Zone 1 in Labrador South, one member for Zone 2 in Vinland-White Bay Central, one member from Zone 3 in Straits-St. Barbe, two members from Zone 4 in Gros Morne-Deer Lake-White Bay South, five members in Zone 5 in Bay of Islands-Humber, three members in Zone 6 in Appalachia, and two members from Zone 7 on the southwest coast.
Healey said the hardest part of the position is closing schools. She said it's a hard pill to swallow, but it occasionally has to be done for the benefit of the children involved.
"You can't give a child in a K-12 school of 30-40 children the breadth of education they could get in a much bigger facility," she said. "I was thinking particularly of the ones on the Northern Peninsula, like Raleigh, coming together into Harriot Curtis Collegiate (in St. Anthony). The kids need the social interaction as well as the educational facilities and the programs."
The amalgamation of Corner Brook Regional High School was contentious in the last two years of the 10-year process, said Healey. What kept her going through the opposition was the knowledge the programs would be better in a larger school.
"You have to weigh the balance," she said. "You'll always have someone that isn't happy. You can't please everyone all of the time.
"But I think things have worked out really well."
