ASHLAND — Zack Truax, the current president of the Board of Education at Ashland City Schools, is a “big proponent” of term limits.
But there is no legal limit on the number of terms a local school board member can serve in Ohio, so he decided to make one for himself.
“I don’t want to be a hypocrite. If I ran again that would put me on the board for like, close to ten years. I think that’s probably too much,” he said.
So near the end of a heated school board meeting on Nov. 21, Truax announced that he would not be running for re-election when his term ends in Dec. 2023, and he would be giving up his role as president in January.
“In my final months of my elected term, I will approach this job with the same enthusiasm and optimism as I’ve always had for Ashland City Schools, its employees, and most importantly, its students,” he said at the meeting.
Truax’s stint on the school board began in Nov. 2018 when he was unanimously chosen to replace outgoing board member Will Gravitt. At the time, the board chose him because of his passion for educating all students, and not just those that are college-bound, according to previous reporting by Ashland Source.
During his time, Truax and the board would have to navigate a contentious union contract negotiation, a pandemic that upended in-person education, and a recent battle over Ashland’s public library.
Out of all the challenges he faced, the pandemic was the toughest, Truax said.
“Because the decisions you make, it’s one thing to make decisions affecting someone’s education. It’s a totally other feeling you have when you’re making decisions that affect their health,” he said.
But the district’s response to the pandemic was also his proudest moment from his time on the board, he added.
“The way that I saw the administration, the teachers, non-certified staff, how they kind of rallied together at that time — obviously not everyone always believed in the direction we were headed, but I always felt like they trusted that we were trying to do the right thing for students at all times,” he said.
Truax said he “almost feels guilty” when people thank him for the work the board does. Whatever success the board had during Truax’s time is “100 percent” because of the district’s staff, he said.
“There’s no way we would have accomplished anything, or half of what we did without all the great people working there,” he said.
