A Wayne Community College employee is the newest member of the Wayne County Board of Education.
After a question-and-answer session with each of two candidates during a special-called meeting Thursday, the board took less than 10 minutes to appoint Craig Foucht of LaGrange to the District 5 seat vacated by Dr. Joe Democko.
Democko resigned last month to devote more time to his family and to help his mother navigate a serious illness.
Foucht and Goldsboro police officer and Seven Springs resident Phillip French were the only two applicants for the seat.
Foucht, who is the executive director of the Wayne Business and Industry Center at Wayne Community College, emphasized his experience with both education and workforce development and as a member of the WCC faculty as the reason he is best-suited for the board spot, adding that partnerships between the district and the college will allow the creation of more educational opportunities for Wayne County’s students.
Among the challenges the district faces, he said, are getting adequate funding to meet the needs of the students and to deal with the district’s aging infrastructure.
He said he does not see the challenge as with state funding dollars, but with locally generated funds that must be stretched to cover everything from health care to other county services and facilities as well as the schools.
“I think the biggest challenge is that we live in a rural community that has a low tax levy,” he said.
Foucht said finding the funds to take care of the district’s needs will be complicated, but that his vision for the district’s future involves innovation and new ways of managing resources and opportunities.
“I don’t necessarily know that funding is the full answer,” Foucht said.
Foucht also mentioned teacher salaries, noting that he has friends who are teachers who have left the county to go to schools in surrounding counties that pay more.
He did not address the possibility of increasing teacher compensation in the district directly and added that many in the field of education do not choose jobs because of salary.
“It is not always about the money when people move,” he said. “Changing lives is the thing for education.”
Foucht also addressed learning loss — specifically the deficiencies brought into the light as a result of the pandemic.
He said that the closures and remote learning required by COVID-19 have allowed the district to identify areas where student learning is not where it should be.
“It has given us the opportunity to address those disparities,” he said.
Foucht said as a board member he would work to improve the image of the schools in the community. He said he is not an advocate for eliminating charter schools, but added that Wayne County Public Schools should do a better job of communicating the district’s achievements to the public.
Accomplishing that starts with making sure the district is “run well.”
“We need to be the best option in Wayne County,” Foucht said.
Creating a relationship with the community and improving communication with parents and residents will be a big part of “marketing” the educational opportunities available at Wayne County schools, he added.
Foucht praised the board’s handling of repairing the district’s financial problems as well as its efforts to advocate for and to complete facilities projects, including the new Meadow Lane and now Fremont schools.
But moving forward, Foucht said the district and the schools need to pay attention to lessons learned from the last two years — including finding the best ways to find the strengths of students and helping create educational paths that target those skills and interests.
“(In my ideal world) we look at the things we did during this pandemic and we find out what worked well, we visit things that we have done for a long time that might not work so well and we recreate education,” he said.
French said that his experience in the work world as well as his efforts a community volunteer made him a good choice for the vacant seat.
He also said that his perspective as someone who is not associated with the education community would be a positive addition.
He emphasized that board members should speak for their districts and be the voice for the residents they represent.
There was little discussion about the candidates after the six question interviews.
The board voted 5-1 for Foucht, with member Len Henderson as the lone vote for French.
