Dennis Ryder

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Dennis Ryder

Prior offices

Nashua Board of Education At-large

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Personal

Profession

Engineer

Dennis Ryder is a former at-large member of the Nashua Board of Education in New Hampshire. He was first elected to the board in 2005 but lost his re-election bid on November 5, 2013.

Biography

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Dennis Ryder is a resident of Nashua. Ryder is a retired mechanical engineer. During his career, he served as the chief executive officer of three companies.

Elections

2013

See also: Nashua School District elections (2013)

Incumbents David Murotake and Sandra Ziehm and former board members George Farrington and Dotty Oden defeated incumbents Dennis Ryder and Thomas Vaughan for four at-large seats on the Nashua Board of Education on November 5, 2013.

Results

Nashua School District, At-Large General Election, 4-year term, 2013
Party		Candidate	Vote %	Votes
	Nonpartisan	George Farrington	20.2%	4,181
	Nonpartisan	Sandra Ziehm Incumbent	19.9%	4,137
	Nonpartisan	Dotty Oden	18.6%	3,867
	Nonpartisan	David Murotake Incumbent	15.9%	3,303
	Nonpartisan	Thomas Vaughan Incumbent	14.8%	3,069
	Nonpartisan	Dennis Ryder Incumbent	10.5%	2,183
Total Votes				20,740
Source: Office of the New Hampshire Secretary of State, "Results for Selected Contests in School District No. 194 - Nashua," accessed December 22, 2013

Funding

Ryder reported no contributions or expenditures to the Nashua City Clerk.

Endorsements

Ryder did not receive any official endorsements for his campaign.

2009

Nashua School District, At-Large General Election, 4-year term, 2009
Party		Candidate	Vote %	Votes
	Nonpartisan	Sandra Ziehm Incumbent	28%	4,376
	Nonpartisan	Thomas Vaughan Incumbent	24.5%	3,835
	Nonpartisan	Dennis Ryder Incumbent	23.9%	3,730
	Nonpartisan	David Murotake	23.6%	3,693
Total Votes				15,634
Source: Nashua, New Hampshire, "General Municipal Election," accessed August 1, 2013

Campaign themes

2013

In an interview with the Nashua Patch blog, Ryder answered several questions outlining his campaign themes.

“	Why are you running for election/re-election? I've gotten part way there in achieving the goals we've set up, but we have to do things in a different way if we're going to succeed. We're spending more and more money, and our test scores are going down and down. We don't have very much of a record, a way of judging how the school is doing, but the one standard we do have is NECAP and our schools are steadily declining, particularly in high schools. What are the top priorities, in your perspective, for Nashua’s Schools right now? Our primary objective is the Common Core, which sounds like a good approach, but it's untested. I hope we can make it work. We are working along those lines currently. What is the top priority for the school district moving forward? It should be prioritized in the integration of technology into education. Our children seem to have a natural aptitude for computers, we need to engage technology more fully in the education process. Why should voters select you to represent them on the School Board? Because of my age and my great experience – I've lived in four countries, been in at least 11 different jobs, I'm experienced in many different disciplines – engineering, running companies, started my own business – I bring all those tools learned over 83 years, to the school board and the people of Nashua. One thing that has been frustrating is that I joined the school board to make things better and, at this point, there hasn't been improvement. In fact, just the opposite – we're worse last year than the year before. Improvement is a slow process. It takes a long while to filter through the pipeline. Improvements might be starting in third or fourth grade, and we just might have to wait for those students to come to the top grades before we see the results. Governments right now across the country, moving into some sort of evaluation system, they can literally see results of different programs. It's happening everywhere, and happening in New Hampshire. It's been mandated by the state Board of Education, and so we have no choice in adopting it. There's a great deal of controversy over it, but in my opinion, it's a step in the right direction. We should have a way of evaluating effectiveness of teachers and programs, otherwise we're putting money in just hoping things will get better.	”
—Dennis Ryder interview, (2013)

Recent news

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Dennis Ryder News Feed

See also

• Nashua School District, New Hampshire
• Nashua School District elections (2013)

External links

Suggest a link

• Nashua School District