McGruder files as fourth candidate for R-IV board

Incumbent Jill McGruder is the fourth candidate to file for one of two Neelyville R-IV school board positions. Voters will elect two board members in April.

This is McGruder’s second time to run for school board.

A nurse practitioner, McGruder is the Women’s Health Medical Director at the John J. Pershing VA Medical Center

“The first three years was certainly a learning experience,” she said. “I feel like, it’s important to have a well rounded board. I’ll be honest, some days, I get frustrated, and it’s a lot of time. I had no idea, the number of hours you are in board meetings. We often leave at 11 o’clock at night. I’m an extremely busy person, part of me thinks, ‘gosh, do I have time for this?’ I do have time for this. I’ve got to make time because our kids are worth the time that I put into it.”

McGruder explained, “We’re going to be having some big changes coming up in the school district. It’s great to have people from different backgrounds. What I mean, we have business owners, we have people that work in construction, farmers and I also give a little bit from the health care field.”

McGruder hadn’t envisioned her background playing quite the role it did this year.

“Never did I expect to use the amount of health care knowledge they have, obviously, with COVID,” she said. “It’s been a challenge the last couple of years, but I feel like I bring an unbiased opinion to the board. I’m not afraid to stand up for what I believe in, whether I’m the minority or part of the majority.”

When you’re in school, you don’t think about volunteer work you’ll do with your classmates years down the road, she said. You don’t know when you’re playing on a playground, you don’t really think about the fact you could be making big decisions for this school later on down the road.

“It’s kind of neat to see that evolution,” she said. “My classmates, some of them are on the board as well and it’s good to work together, trying to make positive changes for the school many, many years later.”

“I feel that I do add a non-biased view on the board,” she said. “I will say I do have an open door policy, so to speak. Oftentimes, especially when I was first elected, I would have parents contact me frequently about issues they had. I will say that I always reinforced I am not a board. I am one person, but I always take parent concerns, teacher concerns back to the board 100% of the time. It’s not my school. It’s the school that belongs to the entire community, and I hope to be a voice for that entire community.”

McGruder and her husband, Curt McGruder, have been married 27 years. He has worked 30 years for USDA and is an animal care inspector.

McGruder’s children are another reason she wants to serve on the school board.

Their oldest daughter, Morgan, 22, currently is working on a degree in education at Arkansas State University in Jonesboro. Second daughter, Bailey, 19, is working on a degree in health care at Three Rivers College.

“Then God gave us a surprise in our 40s,” McGruder said. “So we have an 8-year-old. Mollie is a third grader in the Neelyville school system. So, to say we are long-term vested in the school system is an understatement. I think I added it up and the number of years I will have children in the Neelyville school districts is 23 or 24 consecutive years.”

McGruder attended Neelyville schools from early childhood until she graduated in 1990.

Others who have filed for the school board are Vernon Barker, Amanda Wolfram and Chuck Reinbott.

The remaining filing dates are 8 a.m. - 3 p.m. Friday, Dec. 17 and Dec. 27 and 8 a.m. -5 p.m. Dec 28.

The school office will be closed from Dec. 20 -24.