School Board Candidate Colin J. Thomas

Name: Colin J. Thomas
Age: 41
Occupation: School principal
Family: Wife, three children

A longtime educator, New Rochelle resident Colin J. Thomas is eager to apply his extensive teaching and administrative experience to a spot on the school board.

Thomas, 41, currently serves as principal of Bronx Regional High School. He is a graduate of Hunter College and holds advanced degrees from The City College of New York and Teachers College, Columbia University.

“I’ve been teaching since the age of 16, when I began as a student teacher at P.S. 89 in the Bronx,” he said via a telephone interview. Married and a parent to three children ages 16, 14 and 9, Thomas is passionate about the positive results a good education can reap.

“If you educate students properly, you can change their lives and the lives of their families by extension,” he said. The New Rochelle school system faces many challenges, of which Thomas is well aware.

“Addressing the needs of minority students will be a major issue going forward,” he said. “If there is going to be an achievement gap, an educator can think inside and outside the box to try and come up with workable solutions. Nothing can be taken for granted.”

Thomas waxed positive on the overall quality of New Rochelle schools. It is a topic that hits close to home for him.

“I am pleased with the way my 11th grader has developed as a result of his education in our schools,” he said. “As an educator myself, I want to make sure that my fourth grader has an academic experience that is as good as, or better than, that of my ninth grader and my eldest. Moreover, I would like to see the kids in our school system have their educational choices driven by their dreams, not by necessity.”

EDITOR'S NOTE: There are six candidates for two five-year terms. The  candidates are Rachel Relkin, Naomi Brickel, Robert Cox, Peter O'Keeffe, Colin J. Thomas and Dr. Salvador A. Fernandez.