Four candidates are running for two seats on the Amherst School Committee in the April 3 town election.

The candidates for School Committee are incumbent Irvin Rhodes, 70, of Pondview Drive; Michael Aronson, 52, of Old Farm Road; Lawrence O'Brien, 48, of Harris Street; and Amilcar Shabazz, 51, of Chapel Road.

They are seeking three-year terms on the committee. Solomon Goldstein-Rose, the high school student who was appointed to the committee last week to fill a vacancy, is not running for a full term.

Other contested elections will feature a three-way race for two three-year seats on the Jones Library Board of Trustees between incumbents Austin Sarat of Snell Street and Carol Gray of South East Street and newcomer Tamson Ely of Middle Street, a two-way race for a one-year trustee seat between newcomers Carl Erickson of Greenleaves Drive and Joyce Thatcher of Sunset Avenue, and a two-way race for a five-year seat on the Housing Authority between incumbent Joan Logan of Rolling Green Drive and newcomer Laura Quinn of Shays Street.

School board race

Rhodes, a self-employed educational consultant, is chairman of the committee. He does not have children in the schools.

"I'm running for re-election because there are things that have been started that are not done," he said. "I voted for this superintendent, and I believe the work she's started is really good and I want to be able to complete that work."

Rhodes said he wants to narrow the gap in academic achievement and in the frequency of discipline problems between students from different racial backgrounds. The schools need to increase their after-school programs and start preschool for all students, he said. He added that he would like to encourage more minority parents to participate in the life of the schools.

Aronson, who runs a marketing business, has three children, one of whom is at Amherst Regional High School.

He has criticized the school system for having too many highly paid administrators.

"The bottom line is that when you look objectively at our district and compare it to other similar districts, we are the outlier in cost of administration, and this is taking resources out of the classroom and putting them into the pockets of administrators," he said.

The Amherst schools have 20 administrators who make more than $85,000 a year.

"While school choice ultimately may be suitable for our district, it should not be the first option in the effort to avoid fiscal insolvency," he said.

O'Brien teaches social studies in grades 11 and 12 at Belchertown High School. He has served on the board of directors of the Massachusetts Teachers Association and is currently the grievance officer for the Belchertown Teachers Association.

He has twins who graduated from ARHS last year and a third child who is in 10th grade.

O'Brien said his experience as a teacher would be valuable on the School Committee.

"I'm a big believer in community service and civic engagement," he said. "This is an opportunity for me to be civically engaged in a position where I feel like I can contribute the most. Being on the School Committee is a natural fit for me."

Shabazz is the head of the Afro-American Studies Department at the University of Massachusetts. He has a child who graduated from ARHS last year and another who is in first grade.

He said he would not come to the School Committee with an agenda or try to micromanage the work of administrators.

"My role would be setting broad policy, overseeing the budget, taking a big-picture view and working in a cooperative but critically engaged way to hold to account our professional people," he said.

On the committee, Shabazz said he would seek to "reason among ourselves to best represent the citizens of Amherst and parents in relation to the kinds of policies we're setting forth."

Most uncontested

Incumbents are seeking most of the remaining seats in uncontested elections, including Harrison Gregg of Rolling Ridge Road for a one-year term as moderator, Aaron Hayden of South East Street for a three-year term on the Select Board, and John Coull of Sheerman Lane for a one-year post as elector under the Oliver Smith Will.

Patricia Holland of Montague Road is the only resident running for a five-year term on the Amherst Redevelopment Authority after incumbent Larry Kelley of South Pleasant Street chose not to run for the seat he has held since 1997.

Holland said she has an interest in redevelopment issues, particularly in North Amherst where rezoning concepts have been considered and she is a founding member of the North Amherst Village Improvement Society. This is a restored version of an organization that began in the 19th-century as a way to get street lights in the village.

In a statement, Kelley said he is leaving the position after the ARA took the lead on the Gateway Redevelopment Project but was unable to move forward with any concrete redevelopment along North Pleasant Street between the UMass campus and Kendrick Park.

"After an arduous pace of meetings over the past 18 months with little now to show for it, I believe the Amherst Redevelopment Authority will return to a state of hibernation, and I do not wish to be a part of that," Kelley said.

All 240 Town Meeting seats spread among 10 precincts are also up for election this year because of redistricting mandated following the 2010 federal census. The top 24 vote-getters in each precinct will win, but there will only be contested elections in half the precincts.

Precincts with more candidates than positions available include Precinct 1 with 32, Precinct 2 with 26, Precinct 7 with 31, Precinct 8 with 34 and Precinct 9 with 41.

Precincts without sufficient candidates, and where write-in candidates will be more likely to win, include Precinct 3 with 15, Precincts 4 and 5 with 18, and Precincts 6 and 10 with 20.