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Next move: Community calls for the resignation of Scarborough superintendent

SCARBOROUGH (NEWS CENTER Maine) — Community members in the town of Scarborough moved the next chess piece Monday in the tussle over high school principal David Creech.

Creech tendered his resignation last month but later attempted to rescind it.

In early March, the community responded, forcing the regular board of education meeting to be moved to accommodate Creech's hundreds of supporters. But the board refused Creech's request.

Scarborough parents and the community proved their support Friday for Creech, delivering more than 3,000 signatures they had collected to the town hall.

They are demanding changes from the top down.

"Each of the undersigned voters respectfully request the recall of the school board members who is an elected official who currently serves on the board of education due to incompetence," former Maine educator Tor Nilsen reads the petition aloud, leading this latest charge. "There’s no way they can ignore over 3,000 people making a statement."

Nilsen, surrounded by a dozen community members, took page after signature filled page of petitions inside town hall for certification.

Scarborough Town Manager Tom Hall said it could be 60 days or more before the town council can hold a public hearing on the petition.

Credit: NEWS CENTER Maine

"We appreciate all the interest obviously in this issue and we want to move it through the process," Hall said. "We want to make sure we’re following the rules correctly."

"We want Creech, we want Creech," Scarborough High students chanted one month ago, outside the high school, raising their voices to keep their principal.

"My family and I can’t – I don’t have the words that I can come up with to express how much we appreciate the support," Creech said.

But one month later, Creech has not been reinstated. Scarborough parents say they have exhausted every avenue to keep him.

Concerned parent David Cleary explained why the effort took place.

"He came into something five, six years ago when he started his tenure here and it was a mess, morale among the teachers was among the all-time lows," Cleary said, "and over the course of 18 months, he rebuilt the foundation of Scarborough schools. He has been a driving force to bring Scarborough schools back."

April Sither, the mother of four young children in Scarborough says the petition is the last resort. She has served on a committee with Superintendent Julie Kukenberger who told Creech he wasn’t a good fit for the district and that he needed to resign or he wouldn’t be recommended for a renewal of his contract.

Sither says she believes the superintendent and several members of the board of education have lost their compass.

"When the superintendent fired the principal, we saw all the parents and all the support. It just confirmed to me that she was making a lot of decisions that just were not in the best interest of all the kids in this district," Sither explained. "We are not going to rest until the superintendent and the three board members submit their resignation. And then reinstate Principal Creech."

Thor Nilsen says it’s important to be clear: neither he nor the community behind the petition is after anyone. This measure, he says, is truly their last option.

"There are people on that board who we respect dearly, people might look at this the wrong way and think that we are after people and we’re not," he said. "We’re just doing the only thing we have left."

Nilsen says it comes down to the democratic process. The groundswell of support for Creech, he says, cannot be ignored. Neither can the more than 3,000 signatures calling for the ouster of some of the top leaders within the Scarborough Board of Education be ignored.

After the signatures and petition were filed inside the town hall, Sither looked visibly relieved.

"I feel like we definitely gave the community an outlet for all of this frustration and getting these petitions officially filed feels really good."

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