LITTLE ROCK — Six people applied by Tuesday’s deadline to fill the Little Rock School Board’s Zone 6 position that was left vacant by the Nov. 1 death of member Michael Peterson.
The six applicants for the seat include Laveta Wills-Hale, who ran against Peterson for the board seat in the Sept. 18 school election.
Other applicants to represent the zone that encompasses south-central Little Rock are Andrew “Drew” C. Pritt, Michael Booker, Tommy Branch Jr., Robert Williams and Keneasha Scott.
The Little Rock School Board’s six members are scheduled to meet at 5:30 p.m. Monday to interview the applicants one at a time, for up to 30 minutes each, and possibly make a selection at the end of the meeting.
The person selected for the unpaid position will serve until the September 2013 school election, at which time the person can choose to run for election to fulfill the remaining two years of the three-year term.
Wills-Hale is coordinator for the Arkansas Out of School Network that promotes the development of after-school and summer programs for youths.
A past president of the Western Hills Neighborhood Association, Wills-Hale is a member of the Advisory Committees of the Arkansas Grade Level Reading Campaign and the Arkansas Opportunity to Learn Campaign.
She is a native of Malvern and has a bachelor’s degree from Henderson State University and a master’s degree in management and leadership from Webster University.
Pritt, who previously ran for the Little Rock School Board from Zone 2, works in the emergency room at Baptist Medical Center and said he is a Democratic Party “political operative/campaign consultant.”
He graduated from Heritage High School and attended the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, where he studied political science.
Booker is a lawyer and a former member of the Arkansas Legislature. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Arkansas State University and a law degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
He also has served as an officer in his neighborhood association and worked as an adjunct instructor at Philander Smith College and the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.
Booker’s son is a graduate of Little Rock Parkview and his daughter is a student at Central High.
Branch is a trainer for the state Department of Human Services’ Youth Services Division.
He earlier this year ran for the Arkansas Legislature but lost in a primary runoff.
Branch is a graduate of the school district’s J.A. Fair High School. He has an associate degree from Pulaski Technical College, plus a degree in organizational management from Philander Smith College and a degree in public health administration from Camden University.
Williams, a pastor, is the father of a student at J.A. Fair and a student at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff.
In his letter to the board Williams said he is the president of the Parent Teacher Student Association at Fair and vice president of his neighborhood association as well as a volunteer in several parks and youth organizations.
Scott lives in Zone 7 but applied despite the board’s requirement that the applicant live in Zone 6. She wrote that it shouldn’t matter where a person lives if they care about all the students in the district.
She said she has two children, one in Little Rock schools and one who attends a school in the Pulaski County Special School District because of Scott’s concerns about the Little Rock district. She said she now sees progress in the district and looks forward to her son returning to Little Rock schools.
Scott has a degree in criminal justice from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. She is working on a master’s degree in occupational safety and health from Columbia Southern University at Orange Beach, Fla.
She is a safety specialist at Safety and Environmental Associates Inc.
Arkansas, Pages 11 on 11/21/2012