Above, from left, Malini Nayar, Paul Stephan and Meredith Higgins, who were elected to the South Orange and Maplewood Board of Education.
The team of Malini Nayar, Paul Stephan and Meredith Higgins has been elected to the South Orange and Maplewood Board of Education.
The trio won the three seats that were up for election, defeating Ashley Ludovicy-Donahue, Ashwat Rishi and Daniel Caplan.
Nayar was the top voter getter with 8,355, Higgins was second with 8,035 and Stephan third with 7,720. Caplan finished fourth in the voting at 6,376.
The candidates not running again include board President Nubia DuVall Wilson, Second Vice President Regina Eckert and Bill Gifford. There are nine people on the school board. The terms are for three years.
Nayar, Stephan and Higgins ran under a “Listen. Learn. Lead.” slogan while Ludovicy-Donahue, Caplan and Rishi ran under the slogan “Progress. Partnership. Promise.”
Nayar is a community development finance professional, longtime Maplewood resident, and parent of two Columbia High School students. Originally from India, she moved to the U.S. in 2001 for graduate school and settled in Maplewood in 2012. She has lived in various
neighborhoods in Maplewood, but is now settled south of Springfield Avenue, with her partner,
Christina, and their two dogs. Nayar works for a nonprofit lender that finances affordable housing and community development projects.
Stephan is a public interest lawyer and former public school teacher. After graduating from SUNY Buffalo, Stephan began his career in education—teaching K–7 music in Orange and then first grade in Newark. As an attorney, Stephan has brought multi-million-dollar cases against chemical companies that polluted drinking water and oil companies that concealed the science of climate change. He has represented consumers in litigation against corporations like Facebook and General Motors, and advocated before the Virginia Supreme Court for a transgender student whose teacher refused to use the student’s correct pronouns. Stephan has performed as a pianist with the South Orange Symphony and is a district leader in the Maplewood Democratic Committee. He and his wife Liz, along with their two dogs Josie and Charlie, moved from South Orange and are proud first-time homeowners in Maplewood.
Higgins is a community dance educator, Seth Boyden parent, graduate student in clinical mental health counseling meeting educational requirements for the LPC and the Registered-Dance Movement Therapist credential, and Maplewood resident. Raised in Dallas, she graduated from Indiana University in Bloomington with dual degrees in voice performance and music education before traveling internationally to perform and teach. She later spent a decade building community and training instructors at a Bollywood-fitness company and presenting at national fitness conferences.
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