The principal of a public high school in South Paris forwarded a recruitment email from the Maine Democratic Party to his students seeking to enroll them as volunteers for political canvassing and phone banking on behalf of the Kamala Harris presidential campaign.
Paul Bickford, Principal at Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School (OHCHS), forwarded a Sept. 28 email from a Maine Democratic Party field organizer to his freshmen students, with the subject line “[Attention Freshmen] FWD: Looking for Volunteers for Maine Democrats.”
“Hi all, I am forwarding a volunteer opportunity that was sent to me for anyone interested,” the public high school principal wrote in the body of the forwarded email.
The email in question appears to have been sent to Bickford by Erin Murphy, who according to her LinkedIn page works as a field organizer for the Maine Democratic Party.
“I am writing in hopes to find some volunteers from OHHS to help out with the Maine Dems Campaigns this election season,” Murphy wrote. “We have a lot of canvassing and phone banking events, but also could use some help with light office work (organizing fliers, putting together signs, helping hang stuff on these empty walls).”
“Our hope is through volunteer work and engagement we can work together to make a stronger future for all of us!” Murphy wrote, adding that having the high school students working for the Maine Democrats could attract “bigger names” in Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris; campaign to visit the state.
“[F]or example…Coach Walz [referring to Harris’ vice presidential pick Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz] would be SO EXCITING!” Murphy wrote.
Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School is part of Maine School Administrative District 17 (MSAD 17).
The school district has a policy, code GBIA, which explicitly prohibits school employees from participating in political activities in their role as staff, to include contacting students and parents outside of school to solicit them on behalf of political campaigns.
The Maine Wire has reached out to Principal Bickford and to MSAD 17 Superintendent Heather Manchester for comment.
<span class="dsq-postid" data-dsqidentifier="31752 https://www.themainewire.com/?p=31752">27 Comments
Must be fired immediately or the board will answer lawsuit for willfully allowing violation of school codes.
Whether republican or democrat this rotten SOB needs to go. Do you really want a school principal who uses his position to control the minds of your children. Whatever happened to reading, writing and arithmetic. No wonder these kids can’t make it in the real world anymore. Whatever political party you are from do you want the public school systems to indoctrinate your kids or teach them to be thinkers for themselves. If you like the former prepare a room in your basement for the generation of cellar dwellers you are going to create.
The issue I have is that no teacher OR parent should be trying to control their kids minds with respect to what their future political beliefs will be. What a massive breech of trust, that principal is raping those kids minds quite literally.
As a parent I teach my kids to never support one line of information coming from any source. Always find at least 3+ credible sources before even thinking of believing something. I give them what I hope is unbiased information on both sides of the isle and I ask them to figure out for themselves who they think they like. My son likes Trump. I asked him why and he really couldn’t say. I explained to him how dangerous it is to blindly follow anyone, even me. Always aske questions and list your likes and dislikes before jumping into the fray.
Principal so and so can be a great dad on his own time. When he is on tax payers time he needs to be as indifferent as possible and challenge kids to research anything political, religious, even consumer related. His job is not to brainwash kids and on those grounds I think he needs to be fired. That job pays good money, I can’t understand how that Principal could be so callous and disrespectful of his students and their parents.
Sndy Coburn
“The issue I have is that no teacher OR parent”
B.S. Thats the parents bleeping job to teach and instruct their children.
I’m under the impression that it is also a violation of law for a state employee to use their position or state resources to advocate for on candidate/party or another. Then this could be another school employees, even though paid by tax $ and state tax $ are not state employees except when it benefits them. The elephant in the room is that this $#!+bag did this for the demoKKKrats so nothing will happen. Justice for all HA, HA, HA.
Well first off they are not schools, they are indoctrination centers. And yes they do control your kids minds, see the whole trans fiasco, before that it was homosexuals, climate change, mandatory volunteering, etc. There is a reason democrats hate school choice
@chesire cat
100%. A parent that thinks they are taking the “high road”, by not instilling their own core values will end up eventually with a blue haired trans Satanist in the end. They control 99% of the media, all of Hollywood, all mainstream music, all television and streaming platforms, 99% of social media and 99% of the education system.
And they are not bound by morals, they will lie, cheat, socially chastise, and threaton anyone who doesn’t adopt their political idealogy. They don’t allow anyone to “make up their own minds”. If you don’t educate your own children someone else will.
I think I’m going to nominate “ Steve “ for my local school board . It’s people like him that we need to have “monitoring “ these leftist indoctrinators that are all around us .
We have enough crazies . We don’t need more . Voting is the ONLY way we are going to cure this cancer .
Vote out as many democrats as possible in November .
Vote NO on another sixty five million dollars worth of referendum nonsense .
Save Our State Flag .
I won’t hold my breath waiting for this clown to be fired.
The current socialist regime in Maine and DC have emboldened the crazies. God help us if Harris get in.
cheshire cat
A teacher’s duty is to instruct students on how to think and reason, not indoctrinate them.
Every civil servant is prohibited from participating in political campaign at work or by using his/her position as influence. He needs to find a new line of work. Spend some more “proud” time with the family.
Contact information: h.manchester@msad17.org
I think Ms. Murphy means ASSISTANT coach Walz. I can’t think of a worse example for high school students than a man who has lied about his DUI, military experience and rank. Perhaps Bill Clinton instead. He only committed perjury twice while lying about an extra marital affair with a girl young enough to be his daughter. Ms. Murphy has allied herself to a morally bankrupt organization and high school principal apparently is trying to do the same with his students.
This is the most immoral pair Harris/Walz that has ever been illegally installed and the blind ignorance of the supporters is frightening! There is no intellectual reason for supporting this pair at all, and a principal is supposed to be intelligent. That seems to be in question with one a blatant failure to follow written requirements and to blindly supporting people that have no reason or qualifications to be in the position they are in!
This guy needs to be fired!!
I’m a 25 year public high school teacher in New England. I dare you to find a single RINO in Maine who is willing to publicly go after a turd like Principal Bickford.
Make sure you email Troy Ripley Chair of the School Board to see how he will be handling this situation! Dir.t.ripley@msad17.org
The saddest thing about this is HALF the country has been brainwashed just like this guy .
November is the election to save us from these crazies . If Harris wins we are all truly going to get screwed .
I pray the country is smarter than that .
HOW ARE YOUR SCHOOLS MATH TEST SCORS. THAT IS YOUR JOB.
Coach Waltz… these TDS infectees get sicker and sicker by the day. I hope Trump wins so we can watch the “Proud Dad” and his tranny twitch.
I sent Superintendent Manchester a polite email today trying hard not to be nasty like the left so typically is. I also sent an email to the Bangor Savings Bank about its banner being used at the Bangor Pride parade way back in June. The Bangor Savings Bank, other than the automatic “thank-you for contacting us” never offered an explanation to that polite email.
Paul Bickford is Maine’s clone of Tampon Tim Walz.
Ms. Manchester replied to my email I sent yesterday:
“While I am not at liberty to discuss personnel matters with members of the public, it was determined that forwarding an email with volunteer opportunities for students is not in violation of Board policy GBIA. This situation has provided the district with an opportunity to review our policies to ensure clarity for our educators as they work with our students in a hyper-partisan environment.” (bold italics added)
There we are.
The school board needs to fire him. No wonder he did this. He’s a New Yorker who has liberal ideals and values, It doesn’t give a damn about anything other than what he personally wants and his first thought is Gee how can I indoctrinate another person‘s child against their will and willfully violate a strictly prohibited school policy all in the same shot? If the school board doesn’t fire him, they are loudly and proudly, letting every single parent in the district know they could care less that a Principal or teacher violates school policy. And that The staff are implicitly allowed to break rules, but the students and parents must toe the line and obey. Rules for thee and not for me!!
Just so you all know Heather Manchester said “It was determined that forwarding an email with volunteer opportunities for students is no in violation of board policy GBIA”
That’s odd… GBIA Section E: “Soliciting for or collecting funds or distributing material in connection with campaigning or support of political issues”.. Huh I guess distributing material for volunteering in support of a political party during a federal election is excluded?.. Odd its almost like the rules only apply to a particular party … ODD .. No comment from crooked Troy Ripley yet.. We will have to see.. Maybe Maine Wire can look into this…
Thank you Paul for all you have done for the students of the Oxford Hills. Given that every student who walks through your doors has to complete volunteer hours in order to graduate I find no problem with you sharing this opportunity especially given that you had shared a similar opportunity earlier in the year that cam from Senator King’s office. I have no doubt that if the Republicans reached out you would do the same for them.
Given some of the conversations I have had with people lately I think it is a great idea to get our young people involved in politics, no matter what party they choose to be for.