Ed O'Connell for Melrose City Council

A Commitment to Civic Action

Ed O'Connell currently serves as a member of the Melrose School Committee.  Twice elected by his colleagues as Committee Chair, Ed’s commitment to civic action and public service in Melrose began more than 10 years ago, beginning with his involvement with youth sports, including coaching stints with Melrose Youth Soccer, Melrose Softball, and Little League Baseball.  In 2011, Ed created the first civic education program in the Melrose Public Schools, bringing the Project Citizen action civics program to the Melrose Veterans Memorial Middle School.  In the years thereafter, Ed served in various leadership positions with the MVMMS and MHS PTO’s, including a term as MHS PTO president, when he led a groundbreaking initiative to address student mental health at Melrose High School.  First elected to the School Committee in 2015, Ed was re-elected in 2019, garnering the third-highest citywide vote total among all candidates seeking local office.  A graduate of UMass-Amherst and New England Law, Ed is a proud staff alum of the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate.  He presently serves as the Civic Engagement Manager for Revolutionary Spaces, the organization charged with stewardship of Boston’s Old State House and Old South Meeting House, where he works in support of civic education and community engagement.  A past volunteer with St. Francis House in Boston as well as a founding member of Melrose Grad Night, in 2020 Ed launched a first-in-the-nation civic education program for incarcerated persons at the Middlesex County Jail, a program he continues to lead.