ORHS grad, brand manager running for school board

Paige (White) Marshall, a 1988 graduate of Oak Ridge High School and current Oak Ridge resident, is running for Oak Ridge Board of Education in the November 4 election.

Marshall said her father spent most of his teaching career teaching in Oak Ridge.

“I quite literally grew up in these schools, among public educators,” Marshall said in a press release. “I am convinced that there is incredible power in public education to give students a chance to improve personally so that they can contribute responsibly as adults.”

Marshall attended Middle Tennessee State University, where she received a bachelor’s degree in psychology in 1991, and she went on to seminary at Methodist Theological School in Ohio, where she received her M.Div. in 1997.

After serving as a member of the clergy for almost 15 years, she went back to school and completed a master’s of business administration in marketing at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville in 2008. Since then, she has worked in the business world for Procter and Gamble in Cincinnati, Ohio, and for Bush Brothers and Company in Knoxville, where she is currently a brand manager.

Marshall and her husband Bruce have five children, and the youngest two are students in Oak Ridge, the press release said.

“My husband is a retired Air Force chaplain, so we’ve lived all over the country,” Marshall said. “Over the years, with our five kids, we’ve been associated with 11 school systems, including Oak Ridge. We’ve never encountered educators that care more about kids, and we’ve experienced the same attention to individual student excellence that I remember as a student here in the ‘70s and ‘80s.”

Marshall said she is excited about the opportunity to serve her hometown as a member of the Board of Education.

“The way we provide opportunities for students to excel, and the way we prioritize and care for our students, reflect our identity as a community,” she said. “We have a terrific legacy and also lots of challenges ahead. Our community and our world have changed over the two decades that I was away from home. It’s time for us to roll up our sleeves and do the hard work required to keep us moving forward, educating our kids. I’d like to offer my positive energy, my experience (as a pastor and as a business person), and my pride in who we are, to make a difference for students and families in Oak Ridge.”

For more information about Marshall, visit www.facebook.com/PaigeMarshallORBOE.