Jim Dickinson – shown here with his children – will serve with board Vice President Amy Austin.
The Palmyra Board of Education begins 2026 with new leadership.
Jim Dickinson will serve as board president and Amy Austin as vice president.
Longtime board president Sean Toner indicated at the board’s December meeting that he would likely not be president in the coming year, according to Lisa Muir-Jablonski, the district’s media manager and administrative assistant to school Superintendent Florencia Norton.
Toner has served as president since 2020. He reflected on all the forward progress that has happened in the district through COVID, the current Strategic Plan 2021-’26 that ends in June, a referendum and subsequent campus construction that remains ongoing.
“This is a shift in the leadership of our long-seated board,” Muir-Jablonski explained. “(We are) now working with our new and motivated superintendent, who is approaching her 200th day in the ‘job that she loves.'”
The board’s reorganization meeting on Jan. 7 began with the swearing in of returning board members Kate Allen Yoakum, Erika Celley and Cara Broadbelt. They ran uncontested for the three seats in the November election and took the oath from Jared Toscano, the board’s business administrator and board secretary.
The board agenda included proposed meeting dates for 2026, with a shift in the long-standing meeting date for monthly sessions; they will now be held on the third rather than the second Wednesday.
The next board meeting will be held at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 21, at Charles Street School. There will be presentations to four student of the month honorees and six Governor’s Educator of the Year honorees.
