Contact: Lisa Deffendall • First Posted: Friday, November 7, 2008

The Fayette County Board of Education has five members again after the appointment of Kirk Tinsley, an active parent volunteer with broad leadership experience in the school district, to the District 2 seat. Tinsley will assume the spot left open in August when then-board chairman Larry Conner resigned to take a new job in Georgia. The appointment, by Kentucky State Education Commissioner Jon Draud, became effective today (Nov. 7).

“I am very excited to have Kirk on our board. I have worked with him over the years, and he is a tireless worker for kids,” said Superintendent Stu Silberman. “He is an advocate for all kids and lives by our philosophy of ‘It’s About Kids.’”

Tinsley’s new role is just his latest leadership post in the Fayette County Public Schools. He previously served on the School-Based Decision Making Council at Deep Springs Elementary for three years. This year he was elected to the school council at Bryan Station Traditional Middle School, but he had to resign that seat to accept the school board appointment. He is a graduate of the Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership, run by the Prichard Committee for Educational Excellence.

“I’d like to see all schools equal,” he said. “If someone just moved in from New York and asked, ‘What’s your best school?’ I’d like to be able to say all of them are the same.”

He said his experience on the school councils has helped him step outside the role of a simply being a parent and begin thinking about how our schools are serving all kids. That mindset will serve him well as a school board member, he said.

“I’m not making decisions for my kid. I’m making decisions for all kids,” Tinsley said. “I have one kid at my house, but I have 1,100 kids at Deep Springs and Bryan Station.”

After working overnight at Toyota Motor Manufacturing Kentucky Inc., Tinsley goes to Deep Springs and helps direct traffic and man the crosswalks. For several years running, his efforts to collect phonebooks for recycling helped thousands of dollars to help pay for a playground at Deep Springs. He also partnered with another parent to develop a program called The Learning Tree at Deep Springs to promote reading at home.

“I spend all the time I can in the schools. It may sound corny, but I care about the kids and want to make a difference,” Tinsley said. “How do I know if reading to a kid every day is going to make a difference in that kid’s life? If I can put a smile on that kid’s face and at least let them know that somebody cares about them, then I can make a difference.”

Those who’ve seen him at work say Tinsley has had an enormous impact.

“He’s just a champion for all kids. He is such an advocate for student achievement,” said Deep Springs principal Matt Thompson. “He doesn’t let barriers get in his way. He’s always finding ways around the barriers. He’s made me a better principal.”

Tinsley, 53, has been married to his high school sweetheart, Connie, for 31 years. Their daughter Haley is a sixth-grader at Bryan Station Middle School. Born and raised in western Kentucky, Tinsley and his wife moved to Lexington in 1976. He works as a group leader in quality control at Toyota, where he has been employed for about 20 years. Previously he worked for 10 years Coca-Cola Bottling-Bluegrass.

He will be sworn in to office Monday, before the Fayette County Board of Education’s agenda planning session at 5:30 p.m. Tinsley will serve the remaining two years of Conner’s term. The seat will be up for election in 2010.

Earlier this week, three incumbent school board members were re-elected to their posts after running unopposed. Board chairwoman Becky Sagan, vice chair John Price and board member Melissa Bacon each won another four-year term.