Bergen County saw one of its youngest school board members ever sworn in Thursday night amid the inauguration season for newly elected board of education members in New Jersey.
The Closter Board of Education, a K-8 district, inaugurated 19-year-old Christina Argenziano, a New York University sophomore, for a three-year term.
Argenziano, who is majoring in politics at NYU, told NorthJersey.com that she felt she was ready to make an impact as a young person studying politics, and use her experience as a recent graduate of Northern Valley/Demarest High School, to which Closter is a sending district.
“My campaign talked about giving back to the community and a new young perspective, especially today when we have a lot of older voices in politics,” she said.
New York University sophomore Christina Argenziano gets sworn in to the Closter School Board Thursday night.
She thinks she will go to law school but is interested in politics as a career, too. She saw no harm in starting early, she said.
Argenziano said she would focus on student mental health and wellness, on fiscal responsibility and on encouraging “innovative approaches to education that reflect the evolving needs of our students and society,” according to her campaign literature.
With a 400-vote lead over the second winning candidate and a 600-vote lead over the third, Argenziano’s strong margins in the November school board race placed her at the top of a four-candidate race for three seats. She won 1,923 votes, ahead of fellow trustees Marilyn Estrems and Cathy Lee.
Argenziano’s inspiration to run for the board did not come out of the blue. Her father, Joe Argenziano, is a longtime president of the Northern Valley Regional High School Board of Education, serving on one of two seats representing Closter. Joe Argenziano is serving his ninth year as board president and his 10th year as a board member.
“My dad’s been involved with the school board for as long as I can remember,” Christina Argenziano said. “He’s going to meetings all the time. Whenever I don’t know where he is, he’s probably at the high school’s athletic events, or at the school.”
He also helped his daughter make lawn signs during her two-week campaign in Closter.
New York University sophomore Christina Argenziano being sworn in as a member of the Closter School Board Thursday night.
Christina spent two weeks putting mail-in ballots and notes introducing herself into neighbors’ mailboxes, she said. She is a full-time student, but wasn’t worried about juggling school, social life, and the commute from the NYU campus back to Closter to make it to the board and committee meetings.
The Northern Valley Regional district has about 2,200 students from seven towns including Closter, enrolled in two high schools, in Demarest and Old Tappan, and a school in Norwood for students with disabilities. The high school district ranked No. 1 in New Jersey on Niche.com’s 2025 ranking, above Princeton and Millburn high schools.
Closter’s K-8 district is upper-middle class, mostly white and Asian, with each group making up about 40% of the local school population.
“I like to think that here’s a 19-year-old woman who enjoyed her education enough to come back and help,” said her father, who studied engineering at Columbia University and is on the Closter Recreation Commission and the Closter Coaches Association.
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: This Bergen 19-year-old is among youngest school board members