Emily Dexter speaks at a School Committee meeting.

From Kelly Dolan of Porter Square, Oct. 31, 2015: As a longtime Cambridge resident and public school parent, I urge Cantabrigians to vote No. 1 for a new School Committee candidate, Emily Dexter.

She’s an experienced educator with high-level training from Harvard’s Graduate School of Education, and was an active Cambridge Public School parent for more than 15 years.

Our public schools are at a crossroads. Our city and the education field are changing rapidly, with many different paths forward. We need someone on our School Committee who understands educational issues from a professional perspective and has in-depth, firsthand knowledge of our schools and our communities. Emily Dexter has both.

Furthermore, through her participation in many parent and city advisory groups, Emily Dexter has shown that she can collaborate with diverse stakeholders and is committed to every student.

With our resources and a new superintendent coming aboard in June, we are poised for success. The final lever to that success is a School Committee that has someone with professional-level expertise about education, but who is also a Cambridge insider, ready to hit the ground running.

Please join me in voting No. 1 for Emily Dexter for Cambridge School Committee.