School officials traded in two towns
BY SUE M. MORGAN
Staff Writer

OLD BRIDGE — In what amounts to a swap, the local school district has hired a new middle school principal from East Brunswick, and the East Brunswick school district has hired an administrator from Old Bridge.

Joseph Gannon, an East Brunswick High School vice principal, was hired by the township’s Board of Education at its Oct. 21 meeting as the new principal of the Carl Sandburg Middle School. Gannon will begin his new job once he is released from his contract in East Brunswick. He succeeds Arthur Barnes, who will retire effective Dec. 31.

Meanwhile, Jo-Ellen Basaman, Old Bridge’s director of special services, has left the district to become an assistant superintendent in the East Brunswick school system.

The board voted to promote longtime district employee Barbara Cuthbert, a supervisor of special services, to assume Basaman’s former position.

Gannon earned a bachelor’s degree from the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. He has taught physical science in the East Brunswick schools. Gannon also holds a master’s degree in public administration from the University of Western Florida and a doctorate in education from Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

In other action, the board accepted the resignation of Old Bridge High School Principal Christopher Traficante effective Dec. 15. Traficante announced in October that he had accepted a similar position at Southern Regional High School in Manahawkin.

No replacement has been named to succeed Traficante, but Board President Gail Kubicke has indicated that the high school principal’s job will be advertised in area newspapers as well as educational and trade journals.

The two-campus high school also has a new vice principal to replace Laurie Colletti, who left to become principal of Cooper Elementary School. Joseph Sgalia, a former supervisor of the secondary world language arts department, started as a high school vice principal last month.

Colletti succeeded Elizabeth Young, who resigned earlier in the school year to take a teaching position at a Florida university.