On Monday Night at the Wissahickon School Board meeting, the Board of School Directors accepted School Board Director, Tiffany Hodgson’s resignation.

Hodgson posted a recap of the statement that she read at the meeting on her Facebook page yesterday:

You can read the prepared statement that Tiffany Hodgson read to the Wissahickon School Board below:

It is with mixed emotions that I have submitted my resignation from the Wissahickon School Board effective tomorrow Aug 21, 2018. It has been an honor and my privilege to represent you, the constituents of Wissahickon School District. However, my family will be moving out of district in the next months. It is not an honorable course of action for me to remain in the seat making decisions impacting you, knowing that I will soon be leaving the district.

In my tenure as a school board member, I have aimed to listen to you, the constituents, and bring those concerns to the Board and the Administration. I never lost sight of the fact that I represent you irrespective of whether you voted for me, and I work for you. I am grateful for the opportunity to have served you and I hope you feel that I did so equitably and with fidelity as I swore I would do.

During my tenure, I never avoided talking with a constituent because of their politics. As a result, I have maintained relationships and speak regularly with folks on the far right, and the far left. We always kept it civil and we always kept our eyes on the prize – doing what is best for the children and taxpayers.

As a school board member, I have aimed to raise awareness of special education issues and tonight, gender identity. I have asked many questions and persisted in getting answers. Some answers were forthcoming, some were not.

I have voted with my colleagues on some issues, and stood alone on some issues.

I have offered big ideas – namely starting school later to improve the health and well-being of our children and examining our school lunch offerings more closely. I regret that I will not be able to continue work on these projects. I have proposed a full safety and communications plan involving students, faculty, outside groups, such as Sandy Hook Promise, to promote a safety culture and work in tandem with systematic threat assessment teams.

I am glad to see that the Administration has decided to adopt some aspects of the plan.

Thank you to the members of the community who have reached out with kind words. Those words told me that I was doing something right. I think it is now very apparent that you can, and should, demand more from your local elected officials and those who are tasked with the awesome responsibility of molding your children’s brains.

I wish to thank my husband who encouraged me to apply my enthusiasm and passion for education toward this endeavor. I want to thank my children, for knocking on doors with me, being patient during long board meetings — sometimes making themselves dinner and tucking themselves into bed so I could do this important work.

For the person who takes my place and those who come afterward: you have a difficult job and there will be no shortage of people who are eager to tell you that you are doing it wrong. I leave you with a quote from Teddy Roosevelt, for whom my 3rd born child is nicknamed. It is from his Citizenship in a Republic speech, 1910 and it’s one of my favorites. It’s good advice in politics, life and parenting. I’ve shortened it and adapted it for gender parity.

“It is not the critic who counts; not the one who points out how the strong one stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the one who is actually in the arena…who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes up short again, and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming…who at best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if she fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

It has been my privilege to serve with you all.

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The Wissahickon School District website contains the notice of vacancy and process by which seat I have vacated, will be filled. I am happy to talk with anyone wishing to know what my experience on the Board was like.

Enjoy your last week of summer Wissahickon. Thank you again for the honor of serving you.

The Wissahickon Board of School Directors is accepting resumes to fill the School Board Director vacancy.