Erick Bourdeau For School Board

03/13/2024

We did it!!!!!!!!!!

03/12/2024

Take 2 min to learn about me and why im running for school board

03/07/2024

For those who have been watching school board meetings the past year or two, there has been a lot of talk about the facilities and grounds. One thing that continue to be repeated is that the high school is now 20 years old, and we need to start planning for long term upkeep and repairs. This is where my professional background can help assist the board in these decisions. Ive been a Police Officer for New Durham, I worked at Southern New Hampshire University doing Athletic Operations where my primary goal was maintaining and improving of our athletic facilities, I worked at John Stark Regional High School in the Building and Grounds department as the maintenance supervisor, and have now been doing property maintenance/management the past couple years. I think I could be an asset to this school board as we have a lot of retired educators and involved parents. What we don’t have is people with a building and grounds background, and that showed this year.

This year the school board decided to not let the boys and girls soccer teams practice on the soccer field. Yes, the soccer teams didn’t practice on the field that was created for their sport. The boards main reason for this was that they wanted to make sure that the field looked good for playoff time and that it was the first thing people saw driving into the school. If someone was on that board who has been around the school since it opened in 2004, or specialized in building and grounds, they would know that the boys and girls teams have always had the option to use the front field the day before games. This allowed them to get use to the home field conditions, the speed of the grass, the position of the sun, the size of the field, all the things that give the home team the slight advantage. Instead this was the first year that this advantage was taken away from the soccer teams, and all to just make sure the field looked good for people driving in. Even though in the past 20 years of practicing the field had minimal to no damage every year.

This wasn’t the boards fault, I don’t expect them to know every single thing that goes on or how things have gone in the past. But they took information from someone who was brand new to the school and didn’t know. If we don’t know the facts, as board members we should have ways to make sure we can get them. The administration has only been there for a few years, most board members have only been there for a few years, on the other hand ive been around and/or involved with Prospect Mountain since the day they opened their doors. This is why voting for me, you will have someone on the board that knows how things have been at PMHS before, someone who knows what has and what hasn’t worked, someone with a building and grounds background that can actually offer supporting facts instead of guessing or assuming.

Please Vote March 12 at PMHS

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Erick Bourdeau

03/05/2024

Hello all, my name is Erick Bourdeau, or some of you may know me as Moose. I am running for a seat on the Alton School Board. For those that don’t know, this position is not only for the school board of Alton Central School but also combines with Barnstead to form the JMA School Board for Prospect Mountain High School. Just wanted to take a quick minute to introduce myself for those who don’t know me.

I moved to Alton in 7th grade from Milton NH. Nute was again talking about shutting down their sports programs so my family made the decision to move to Alton. I attended Alton Central School and Graduated from Prospect Mountain High School in 2009. I was lucky to be apart of the greatest athletics class to ever come through Prospect Mountain. We went to 6 final fours across soccer, basketball and baseball, we were able to raise 3 banners, and I was a team captain in all three sports. What meant more to me though is the connections I made with the people at Prospect Mountain. From teachers, to admin, to janitors, bus drivers, and kitchen staff, this is what made my time at Prospect Mountain enjoyable and I think this is what is currently missing from PMHS. It doesn’t matter what programs are offered, or what the budget is if the right people are not in the right place to create a conductive school environment. As I believe that’s what is needed for students to thrive.

We have seen this over the past couple years, where we have large number of teachers and staff leaving PMHS. They leave for a variety of reasons but from what I have heard, the culture at PMHS is suffering. This could only affect a small percentage of people leaving but if elected a school board member I promise to dig into this problem and look for a solution.

I’ve also been lucky enough to Coach Baseball/Soccer for the last 4 years here at PMHS. I was fortunate enough to have great times through sports and the lessons I have learned through sports have made me who I am today. I wanted to coach to make sure kids today had the same opportunities I had growing up. Another benefit of coaching is I get to hear from 30+ student athletes every day. I hear stories about what they like at school and what isn’t working in the school. I believe another current issue PMHS faces is they are slightly disconnected from their students. Decisions are being made without contacting the people those decisions directly affect. Again, if elected, I would try and give the students a larger voice and direct feedback from the students, as at the end of the day that’s who all of this is for. If anyone has any questions feel free to reach out to me and I’d gladly respond.

Please check out the rest of my page for more about me.

Thank you
Erick Bourdeau

03/05/2024

BASIC SCHOOL PHILOSOPHY

School means something different for just about every person who attends, some are there for the academics, some for the sports, some are their for the socializing, and for others its just a safe and warm place to go during the day. Its for these reasons why teachers have a difficult job to do. With 20 or so kids per class its hard to personalize an education when just about everyone has a different reason for being there. I use to think back and try to figure out what I learned at school. For me, an honor roll student who played three sports, I never went to school for the education side. Sports are always what drove me, and I credit sports with a lot of the skills I’ve learned. My time in school though helped me develop the skills and strategy to get through the education portion of school. I learned how to prioritize, I learned how to socialize and how to ask other for help, I learned how to work together on projects, I learned that in order to play sports I needed to succeed in academics. This forced me to learn the skills required to do. I believe every student has a different reason for attending school, and I don’t believe academics is that sole purpose. This is why I’d like to see schools focus on all these other reasons people attend school. Academics is obviously the core to all of this, but I’d like to see some more focus on these other reasons for why kids attend school, and to accentuate for the student body.

With kids in school for half the year, 7 hours a day, then add on extracurricular activities and sports, plus a job to be able to afford things in this ever expensive world and age we live in, this generation has a lot going on. I don’t agree with hours of homework every night, I believe after school time should be for hanging out with their family, playing outside, playing video games, doing whatever it is they like to do that makes them a kid. I am a proponent for kids being in school for the minimum amount of time as required by NH to enable them to pursue those things that interest them and are passionate about.

03/05/2024

THE BOYS LANDSCAPING

I started The Boys Landscaping to help give student athletes a chance to work and play sports. I remember when I played sports in town, it was impossible for me to get a job. I would have sports on nights and weekends, the schedule would always be changing through the year, and there aren’t too many places in town for a 16 year old to work. I saw a lot of athletes posting in the community pages offering to do odd jobs or manual labor. I decided to start The Boys Landscaping to help connect these athletes with jobs. I am now able to offer guidance, supervision, tools, insurance, I can find them jobs whenever they are available. This is because I am dedicated to these athletes and love to see them succeed. With more kids every year dropping out of sports to go work, I think this offered a good alternative for kids to earn money while still playing sports.

03/05/2024

OPEN ENROLLMENT

Open enrollment has been a hot button topic for PMHS this past year so figured I would share my thoughts. I think just about anything that gets more kids in the door at PMHS is a good thing. More kids creates more competition, more competition makes kids push themselves just that much more to better themselves. Not to mention the possible tax benefits. I’m still intrigued with how schools will react and if they will pay the tuition for the students coming here or if they fight it. I haven’t heard many updates on this so it will be interesting to see how this first year went with 11 open enrollment students, and how many of these schools paid. It will also will be interesting going into year two, how many kids come to PMHS through open enrollment. At the end of the day I think our main goal should still be looking to see if towns like New Durham, Gilmanton, Pittsfield, Farmington, or Milton to combine with PMHS. Schools like Farmington and Nute have about 150 students and with PMHS currently around 400 that would put us slightly above where we were when the school opened in 2004 and we use to hover around 500 students every year. I think open enrollment will help with this goal, because even if open enrollment doesn’t succeed long term, hopefully it starts drawing kids from these schools where these schools will have to sit down and have that conversation with PMHS about possibly combining.

I think another possibility should be offering a low cost tuition. When looking at high school tuition across the state its pretty common to see the price tag of $15k per year. But we have heard the school board mention several times, with our declined enrollment our per student cost is much lower because we already have the room for 100 extra students. We already pay to heat the building and keep the lights on, so our per student cost is lower then that $15k price tag. Do I know what the number is for PMHS, no I don’t, but I would like to explore and look into it. Lets say for example we offered tuition for $5k as well as scholarships. We could draw in high quality students from the scholarship side and with the low cost tuition. We can take applicants every year and grant a few students a year, free tuition due to what they could bring to PMHS and the community. Families that want better schooling for their students could see this $5k tuition as a cheaper option rather than trying to find homes in this housing market and with these interest rates in the town of Alton. Again, I don’t know the details but I think all options should be explored, especially with the amount of time and money we are spending on open enrollment and trying to increase our attendance numbers.
A lot of hurdles and unknows currently surrounding open enrollment, but that’s at least my basic thoughts on the subject.

Please scroll the rest of my page to see other topics and to learn more about me.

Thank you
Erick

03/05/2024

SNOW DAYS

With very few snow days this year, this wasn’t really much of an issue. There were still times when the robo caller for the school didn’t work, or late notice was given to families about a delayed opening or cancelled school. I think we can be a little more proactive with snow days and delayed starts. Many schools still did it this year, where they issue a 2 hour delay the night before the storm. This gives a little more wiggle room for towns to access the roads in the morning and for families to plan accordingly and make necessary arrangements for child care. Just something small, but something that always seems to be a topic and a easy way to help families is by planning ahead.

02/28/2024