Clark, McAlister Named to Leadership Posts on Ocean City School Board

By Donald Wittkowski Joseph S. Clark Jr. was reappointed president of the Ocean City Board of Education during the annual reorganization meeting Wednesday night, but he will have a new vice president sitting next to him this year. Veteran educator Jacqueline A. McAlister was named vice president after her predecessor, Thomas R. Oves Jr., stepped aside to let her take a leadership post with the board. Oves had served as vice president for the past three years. McAlister, while extending her thanks to Oves, said she planned to call on his experience from time to time to help guide her in her new position. “I think it’s a sign of a healthy board to rotate positions,” McAlister said of the leadership change. McAlister, a former English teacher in Egg Harbor Township, works full time as director of adult education for the Cape May County Technical Schools. She also serves as president of the Cape May County School Boards Association. The board president and vice president are annually appointed by their fellow members for one-year terms. Clark and McAlister both received unanimous support. This will be the fourth straight year that Clark has led the panel. He works full time as Ocean City's purchasing manager. Board members Gregory Whelan, left, and Dale F. Braun Jr., center, were sworn in by Business Administrator Timothy Kelley. In another board move Wednesday, Gregory Whelan and Dale F. Braun Jr. were sworn in for three-year terms following their election in November. J. Tiffany Prettyman also won election in November, but she missed the reorganization meeting because of illness, Business Administrator Timothy Kelley said. Whelan, director of business operations for pharmaceutical giant Pfizer Inc., said his top priority for the upcoming year will be to continue to focus on student safety and mental health issues. He serves on a board ad hoc committee that was formed following the suicides of two Ocean City High School students in the past two years. “I will be working toward making sure our school district is open for everyone and safe for everyone,” Whelan said. Whelan won his first full three-year term in the November election. In 2016, he had filled a one-year vacancy that was created when former school board member Peter Madden was elected to City Council. Braun, a retired banking executive, is a newcomer to the board. He is moving over to the Board of Education after previously serving with the city’s Planning Board. He said his main goal is to help the school district maintain its high-quality reputation. “I just want to make sure the school district stays as good as it has been. It is one of the reasons my family and I moved here,” said Braun, who has lived in Ocean City for seven years. Prettyman is a teacher at Mainland Regional High School in Linwood. In 2016, she filled the final year of the unexpired term of former board member Ray Clark, who had resigned. Her election win in November was for a full three-year term. The school board includes nine Ocean City members who are elected to staggered three-year terms and three representatives from Upper Township appointed to one-year terms. Upper Township is a sending district to the Ocean City school system. Members of the girls' soccer team were among the players who were honored by the school board for their achievements during the fall sports program. In other business Wednesday, the school board honored the students who participated in the high school’s fall athletic program. Four of Ocean City’s sports teams captured Cape-Atlantic League conference championships, but the crowning achievement was the state title won by the girls’ field hockey team. “What an outstanding season they’ve had,” Schools Superintendent Kathleen Taylor said of all the teams. In addition to the team championships, 21 Ocean City players were named first team Cape-Atlantic League selections, believed to be the most among all schools in the conference, Ocean City Interim Athletic Director Jack Pfizenmayer said. Pfizenmayer and some of the team coaches who spoke at the board meeting credited the new artificial turf surface at the high school stadium with helping to boost the sports program. “It really did make a difference,” Pfizenmayer said, while thanking Mayor Jay Gillian and City Council for approving the turf project last year.