By Laura Waters
Go Lawrence Cardinals! The Lawrence High School varsity football team is on a roll (as of my deadline), and Oct. 12 was a big day for football fans as we pummeled Princeton High for our fifth win of the year in our annual Homecoming game. Later that evening, LHS students celebrated at the Homecoming dance, which sold out this year.
In other sports-related news, save the date of Sunday, Dec. 8 when the Harlem Wizards, a comedy-infused professional basketball team, will take on Lawrence Township Public Schools’ staff members. This is a fundraiser sponsored by our wonderful education foundation, LTEF, and will take place at 2 p.m. in the LHS gymnasium.
And don’t forget to come to our annual Community Conversation on Thursday, Nov. 14, at 7 p.m. in the LHS Commons, 2525 Princeton Pike. At this workshop, we solicit feedback on both short-term and long-term priorities and concerns. LTPS is currently in the fourth year of a five-year strategic plan and this meeting will be particularly important as we start to formulate our goals for a new cycle.
LTPS recently welcomed two new administrators to the Lawrence family: Anthony Mormile, supervisor of guidance, and Anthony Buczynski, Lawrence Middle School assistant principal.
Three of our elementary schools — Ben Franklin, Eldridge Park and Slackwood — have a new program called “Breakfast Buddies.” Our students there collected hundreds of boxes of cereal, breakfast bars and fresh fruit to donate to the children of HomeFront of Mercer County, which helps impoverished families in the area.
As you’ll recall, last year the school board decided to move school board elections to the date of the general election, which this year is Tuesday, Nov. 5. Per state law, school budgets are subject to voter approval only if we fail to stay within the 2 percent tax cap increase; as we’re under cap, there will be no budget vote.
School board elections remain non-partisan; the candidates on your ballot this year are Pepper Evans, Mike Horan and me. Our newly-configured board will swear in new members right after Jan. 1 and proceed with standard reorganization protocol. Please join us, or come to any one of our regularly scheduled public meetings — typically the second Wednesday of each month at 7 p.m. in the LHS library — and let us hear from you!
Laura Waters, Ph.D., is president of the Lawrence Township Board of Education. Her email is laurawaters6@gmail.com.
