WCASD School Board Members

Members of the public wishing to contact any or all of these Board members are asked to do so through Board Secretary Pauline Bachtle at 484-266-1125.

Rogers W. Vaughn
Jeffrey Seagraves
Martha Carson-Gentry
Susan J. Carty
Terri Clark
James Davison
James Smith
Dr. Ricky L. Swalm
Gail Tomassini

Rogers W. Vaughn
President

Board President Rogers W. Vaughn holds a B.A. degree in journalism and business from the University of Pennsylvania. A retired employee of the duPont Company, he worked for the company for 38 years, last serving as business director of the Teflon and Corian businesses. He also served three years in the Counter-Intelligence Corps of the U.S. Army. He resides in East Goshen Township. In the past, he has also resided in East Bradford, West Goshen, Birmingham and Westtown Townships.

Mr. Vaughn has a daughter who graduated from East High School and a son who attended West Chester schools before finishing his high school education in Europe. He began his School Board service as a member of the West Goshen Township School Board for one year in 1964, prior to the formation of the West Chester Area School District. He was a member of the West Chester Area School Board from 1975 to 1983, serving two of those years as Vice President and four of them as President. Mr. Vaughn was re-elected to the Board in 2001 and was elected to another four-year term in November 2005. He has served as Board President from 2003 to the present. He is also the Board’s PSBA representative and employee relations contact.

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Jeffrey T. Seagraves
Vice President

Jeffrey Seagraves holds a B.A. in psychology from Swarthmore College and an M.S. in human resources from Villanova University. He is currently township manager for Thornbury Township in Delaware County. He was formerly director of auxiliary services for the Penn Delco School District in Delaware County and the facilities manager for the Glen Mills School. He is an 19-year resident of Thornbury Township.

Mr. Seagraves has a daughter and a son at Bayard Rustin High School and another son at Stetson Middle School. Another daughter is in the Intermediate Unit’s Early Intervention Program at Sarah Starkweather Elementary. He was re-elected to a third four-year term and currently serves as Vice President. He also chairs the Property and Finance Committee and is a member of the Personnel Committee. During his prior term, he served as Board President, as chair of the Personnel Committee, and as a member of the Property and Finance and Pupil Services/Community Relations Committees. Prior to coming on the Board, he served on a Redistricting Committee.

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Martha Carson-Gentry

Martha Carson-Gentry holds a bachelor’s degree in secondary education with a concentration in social studies from West Chester University and a master’s degree in secondary education from the University of Scranton. She taught social studies in the district for 22 years, retiring in 2004. During most of her tenure, she was a teacher at Henderson High School. She also coordinated the Partnerships in Education Program, designed for businesses, service clubs and institutions to share resources with the District. An Alliance for the Future was launched in 2000 between the school district and West Chester University to formally join in a partnership for the common good of both institutions. She has co-authored two books, Images of America: West Chester and Post Card History Series: Southern Chester County, both of which are available in area bookstores. An active member of the community, she has served on the Council of Trustees of West Chester University and the Boards of Directors of the Chamber of Commerce of Greater West Chester and the West Chester Rotary Club. She is a member of several professional organizations and has traveled extensively, visiting every continent except Antarctica.

A resident of the district for 43 years, Ms. Carson-Gentry has lived in her current home in West Chester for the past 35 years. Appointed to fill the unexpired term of June Cardosi, who resigned in June 2005, she was elected to a full four-year term in November 2005. She is currently a member of the Board’s Elementary and Secondary Education Committees.

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Susan J. Carty

Appointed by the Board to fill the vacancy created by the May 2007 resignation of Paul Brockett, Susan J. Carty has been elected to complete the remaining two years of that term. She is serving on the Board's Secondary Education and Property and Finance Committees, and is the Board's legislative liaison.

Mrs. Carty was a science teacher in the district’s Stetson Middle School from 1986 until her retirement in June 2004. In 2001, she traveled 40 days across the Pacific from Hawaii to Japan as the teacher in a pilot Teacher at Sea Program for the National Oceanic and Aeronautics Administration (NOAA). During that assignment, she broadcast live from the ship Ron Brown to her students at Stetson Middle School. During her teaching career, she also presented a number of workshops for the Association for Science Educators in England and for the National and Pennsylvania State Science Teachers Association. She received the Pfizer Education Initiative Teacher of the Year Award in 2001.

A resident of the school district since 1979, Mrs. Carty has two daughters who graduated from West Chester East High School. She currently serves on the East Goshen Planning Commission and the West Chester Regional Planning Commission, and is employed on a contract basis as an Educational Training Consultant. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Biological Psychology from Immaculata University and has completed 36 graduate credits from West Chester, Millersville and Widener Universities. She has completed numerous summer workshops and seminars, most recently attending a workshop on astrobiology at Woods Hole and on teaching with forensics at the Virginia Institute of Forensic Science and Medicine.

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Terri Clark

Terri Clark attended the University of Maryland and is employed as an administrative assistant to the Chester County Controller. A resident of the School District for 25 years, she currently lives in East Bradford Township. She has two daughters, one of whom is a graduate of Henderson High School.

Ms. Clark was elected to her third four-year term in November of 2007. She chaired the Board’s former Pupil Services & Community Relations Committee and served as Vice President of the Board in 2001. She currently chairs the Elementary Education Committee, is a member of the Secondary Education Committee, and is the Board's liaison to charter schools. Prior to coming on the Board, Ms. Clark was President of the Parent-Teacher Organizations at Fern Hill, Peirce and Henderson, and served on numerous District committees in which community input was sought.

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James Davison

James Davison holds a B.S. degree from Villanova University. A native of Delaware County, he has been a resident of the district for 22 years. Currently a realtor with RE/MAX Preferred in West Chester, Davison was formally CEO/CFO of DM Publishing, Inc. His two children, educated by the district, are graduates of Penn State University. Their success in college is proof of the quality of education they received from the West Chester Area School District.

Davison first served on the West Chester Area School Board from 1991 until December 1999. He was elected to a new four-year term in December 2007. During his tenure on the board, he served as Board President, Vice-President, chair of the Property & Finance, Personnel, and Pupil Services committees, and as representative on the Intermediate Unit Board. He was also involved in several successful contract negotiations with the professional staff. In addition, as chair of the Property & Finance committee, he was involved in the oversight of numerous building renovations at the elementary and middle school levels. Mr. Davison, along with the district’s director of business affairs, Dr. Suzanne Moore, led a team of presenters to Moody’s Investor’s Service which resulted in the District receiving the highest bond rating of any school district in Pennsylvania.

Mr. Davison has also served as a member of the East Goshen Planning Commission & Municipal Authority, and on Pennsylvania Republican State Committee.

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James T. Smith

James Smith holds a B.S. degree from Muskingum College in New Concord, Ohio, and graduate credits from Temple, West Chester, and Penn State Universities. He is a resident of the district for 30 years currently living in East Bradford Township. An educator for 38 years, he is a retired district teacher. He served the district for 21 years, most of that time as a social studies teacher at East High School. He has also coached high school football and baseball, and gave free classes on “Football 101” in the Adult Night School of Chester County. From 1990 to 1998, he was athletic director and head football coach in the Marple Newtown School District.

Mr. Smith served as an adjunct professor at West Chester University in Driver Education from 2000 to 2005. He and his wife have five children who graduated from East and Henderson High Schools and three grandchildren presently attending District schools. He was elected to his second four-year term in November of 2007. Mr. Smith is a member of the Board's Personnel Committee and currently chairs the Secondary Education Committee. He is also the Board’s representative to the Central Chester County Intermediate Unit.

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Dr. Ricky L. Swalm

Dr. Ricky L. Swalm holds a B.S. degree in Health and Physical Education from the Pennsylvania State University, an M.S. degree in Physical Education from Washington State University, and a Ph.D. degree in Curriculum and Instruction from Temple University. He is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Kinesiology at Temple University, where he coordinates the undergraduate and graduate programs in teacher education for health and physical education. He is a former president of PSAHPERD (Pennsylvania State Association for Health Physical Education Recreation and Dance) and EDA/AAHPERD (Eastern District Association of the American Alliance for Health Physical Association Recreation and Dance.) He consults with ETS (the Educational Testing Service) on its PRAXIS testing exams and has helped write the state standards for health, safety, and physical education. His research agenda is on styles of teaching and psycho-social impact of physical activity on children's development.

Appointed by the Board to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of Joseph P. Green, Jr. in February 2007, Dr. Swalm was elected to his first four-year term on the Board in November 2007. He serves on the Elementary Education and Property and Finance Committees and has two daughters in district schools. One daughter attends Rustin High School and one daughter attends Penn Wood Elementary School. He resides in Glen Mills in Thornbury Township, Delaware County.

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Gail Tomassini

Gail Tomassini holds a B.A. in business administration from Cedar Crest College, Allentown, and an M.B.A. in finance from New York University. She worked in finance for IBM in Poughkeepsie, NY until her first child was born. That child has since graduated from East High School. Mrs. Tomassini was also fiscal manager for the Friends Association for the Care and Protection of Children from 1994 to June of 2001. Formerly a resident of East Goshen Township, she has resided in Thornbury Township, Delaware County since April 2005. She has two sons; one is a graduate of the University of Delaware and the other is currently attending the University of Colorado in Boulder.

Mrs. Tomassini was elected to her second four-year term on the School Board in November 2005. She chairs the Personnel Committee and is a member of the Elementary Education Committee. She is also the Board’s liaison to community communications. Prior to her Board service, Mrs. Tomassini was co-president of the Home and School Association at East Goshen Elementary School and the Parent Teacher Organization at Fugett Middle School. She was active in the Parent Teacher Organization at East High School and was a member of the Site-Based Teams at all three schools. She served on the Steering Committee and as an Action Team member for the District’s current Strategic Plan when it was written in 2001.

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Non-Voting Appointed Board Members
Pauline A. Bachtle, Secretary
John Scully, Assistant Secretary
Suzanne K. Moore, Treasurer