The defeat of an incumbent candidate in a Carrollton Board of Education election might be something that hasn’t happened in at least a decade. The last time long-time board members Dr. James Pope and Joe McGinnis remember an incumbent being defeated was in 1977 when McGinnis won his seat on the board.

Dr. Rick Martin won against incumbent David Parkman in 1993 but resigned before taking his seat, said Julianne Foster, spokeswoman for the school system.

“It is rare, though,” Foster said.

Board members Lynn Kress and Kelly Glanton both lost their bids for re-election Tuesday and two new members, Dr. Jason Mount and David Godwin, will succeed them.

The 2009 campaign was also the first Carrollton School Board election in a long time in which so many candidates ran, with nine vying for the four seats.

“I sensed there was some unhappiness with the incumbents because two out of three got beat and I nearly lost,” said McGinnis, who defeated challenger Bruce Brewer.

“I think there were some people that were disenchanted with the stadium,” McGinnis added, referring to the cost of the improvements to Grisham Stadium.

At the one debate for school board candidates held by the League of Women Voters of Carrollton-Carroll County, most of the questions revolved around money.

Dr. Robert Sanders, professor of political science at the University of West Georgia, said the economy probably has a lot to do with the election results and even the fact that so many people ran for the seats. It’s a “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” type of mentality, he said.

“Basically, what people are seeing is it’s a crisis mode and it’s philosophy of the fact that there are desperate times and I want to get out there and help change it,” Sanders said.

Whenever the economy goes bad, the president and other elected officials tend to be voted out of office.

“Other things are philosophical, even the environment, global warming, the war in Iraq, but the economy touches us immediately in a direct way,” Sanders said. “When we see that our kids aren’t getting a proper education, our taxes are going way up, we’re being furloughed, we’re being laid off, then we feel we’re in a crisis, so that brings people out.”

The addition of two new board members means that come Jan. 1 some adjustments are going to be made on the board.

While he has been on the board, Pope has seen members come and go and the first time a new member comes to the board there is always a period of adjustment.

“A lot of times people have a misconception of what a board member does,” Pope said. “A lot of people think that you’re the person who micromanages the schools and they tell you this in school board school that your function is to be a policy maker.”

That’s a lesson many new school board members learn quickly first through their orientation at the state’s school board school in December and through meetings.

The addition of two new board members on the six-member board also means some acclimation for the members as they get to know one another.

“It changes the whole dynamic, because it’s just new people,” McGinnis said. “You’ve got to understand where they’re coming from, how they work, how they react.”

Superintendent Tom Wilson has seen it before — the new board members and the old have to work together and personalities have to mesh to make the board cohesive. It always helps if the new board members go in with the best interest of the children on their minds.

“I’m confident that both gentlemen that won the election ran for the right reasons,” Wilson said. “I’ve talked with them and I know their hearts are in the right place and I think they’re going to do a great job.”