New member of school boards group

A Baldwin man with a long-established track record in education has been elected to the board of directors of the New York State School Boards Association.

B.A. Schoen, a member of the Nassau BOCES board and a past president of the Baldwin School Board, was elected to his new position by school boards across Nassau County.

Schoen now represents Area 11, which is the designation for Nassau County.

“It’s really an honor,” said Schoen, 68. “This one is a big honor, because every school district in the county has a vote. There are a lot of people you don’t know personally. Somehow I was picked out of four people. It comes with a little responsibility.”

The School Boards Association provides information, training and advice on matters affecting school boards, and works to promote excellence in public school education, according to its website.

Schoen noted that he is replacing Susan Bergtraum as Area 11 director. She has been chosen as president of the association.

Schoen will keep his seat on the Nassau BOCES board. In addition, he is on the executive board of REFIT (Reform Educational Financing Inequities Today), and was that agency’s president for three terms. REFIT is a consortium of school districts that have joined to lobby government for equality in funding.

According to the School Board Association’s website, Schoen also is a member of the Sound Basic Education Task Force and Safeguarding Sound Basic Education Task Force, and the Long Island Educational Coalition. He represents Nassau BOCES on the Long Island Association. 

Locally, Schoen is a member of the Baldwin Foundation for Education, the Nassau BOCES Educational Foundation, Sons of the American Legion, the Amityville Highland Pipe Band and the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. 

Schoen is retired from British Petroleum. He has a bachelor of science in mass communications from Minnesota State University-Moorhead. 

Asked to comment on his newest job, Schoen said, “My wife reminds me that you get paid for jobs.”

But, turning serious, he said, “It means that in a sense that I’m on course. I’m chasing the right windows. And that I have a lot of opportunity. That’s what gets me up in the morning.

“I think we all think we have our talents. I was raised to use those talents to do positive things. Public education is my bailiwick. I have a little more fuel in the tank.”

As a member of board of directors, he said he hoped to work to promote the School Board Association’s goals. “Sometimes it’s hard for the public to understand that their school board members need professional development, like any other profession,” he said, citing doctors, lawyers and teachers, who must continually develop skills and knowledge.

“The school board association is a primary provider of that. I want to encourage school board members to take advantage of that,” he said. “I want to make the association a strong advocate in public education.”

In addition, he said, the association has “goals for the legislative process, and they are basically: stop with the unfunded mandates.”

In particular, he cited the Individuals with Disabilities Act. He noted that when it was enacted about a half-century ago, districts were assured they would pay only 15 percent of the costs. Now, he said, the costs are regularly over 70 percent.

The solution, he said, is for “the state to pay its fair share and for the federal government to pay its fair share.”

Schoen said he would head to Washington, D.C., in a few days to join in the annual lobbying process before Congress. He said he would meet with U.S. Reps. Kathleen Rice, Peter King and other officials, “and their staffs, which is as important as meeting with the members.

“That’s one of the ways I’ve gotten to know people from other districts,” he said, explaining his election to his new post. “Now, I’m going as a member of the board of directors.”

Then he quipped, “It also means I get to stay in the headquarters hotel.”