Olivia ‘Rūn’ FitzPatrick is running as a write-in candidate to serve on the RSU 13 School Board, representing Thomaston. She is seeking the seat that current board member Mark Lewis is vacating.

Regional School Unit 13 comprises the public K-12 schools of  Cushing, Owls Head, Rockland, South Thomaston and Thomaston.

FitzPatrick is recent transplant to the Midcoast, after moving to Thomaston last summer with her husband. She had finished graduate studies in food studies out of state, and settled in Thomaston.

FitzPatrick wrote the following:

My name is Olivia FitzPatrick and I am passionate about giving the youth of our community the best chance we can. On June 11, please write me in as your choice to represent Thomaston on the RSU13 School Board.

No stranger to rural living, I grew up in a small town in southern Idaho before enlisting in the U.S. Navy as an Air Traffic Controller. 

Growing up in a farm town taught me the value and power of rural community. I understand that community is not a thing that just happens, it takes hard work and chipping in by everyone who can, when they can because all of us will need it eventually. That’s why showing up in community has been a priority for me from the start. 

Put plainly, I am from away, but I have no desire to step in and push out our community voices that have already put so much work into making our community a great place to grow up. Instead, I hope for the opportunity to step up and lean in, to pull together and help many hands make the work lighter.

Since moving here Ive been involved with the planning and implementation of the Emergency Warming Center initiative. I’ve helped pull together regular community events like the Family Board Game night in Rockland every month. Not to mention my day-to-day hands-on work with youth themselves at the youth center.

I know the last few years have brought a lot of big changes to the Midcoast and some folks feel that their voices are being lost in the crush. I know that’s certainly true of many of the youth that I work with every day at the Landing Place Youth Center in Rockland. I work as part of the amazing team that keeps the low barrier drop-in center open and we run programs for youth three days a week with some of the highest attendance rates of after school programs in the area.

The challenges of the last few years have been hard for us all and young people are no exception. Conversations with youth themselves are what have inspired me to step up and offer to serve my community in this capacity. The biggest challenge I see our youth navigating is adjusting to life post-covid, when the tumultuousness of that period affected them so deeply.

The district, administrators and educators have made enormous efforts to engage with this challenge within a framework that wasn’t designed with such a deep cultural shock in mind. That is why I am stepping up: to listen and learn about the work being done, to step up and contribute where my efforts would be most useful, and to make sure that every effort is being taken to ensure that the most vulnerable of our youth are not slipping through the cracks.