The Columbia County School Board meeting chambers were filled with more citizens than usual as the board said its goodbyes to Superintendent Lex Carswell during his last board meeting on Tuesday. 

Carswell chose not to run for reelection and will be replaced by Fort White Middle School Principal Keith Couey, who ran unopposed for the position this year. 

Carswell said he has been looking forward to retirement but told the board and gathered citizens through tears that now that the moment has come, he is sad. He said he is grateful for every person who has worked hard to make the Columbia County School District. 

“It’s a bittersweet time in my life,” Carswell said during Tuesday’s meeting. “I look forward to the next chapter with my family, but I will miss the family… I’m gonna miss the people I work with.” 

Carswell was first elected to the position in 2016, after 35 years as an educator, 7 ½ years as Columbia County Assistant Superintendent under three different superintendents, and three years as the Florida Department of Education’s Administrator of Facilities for Kindergarten through University, according to the district website. 

“You left the school system better than you found it,” Board Member Keith Hudson told Carswell during Monday’s meeting. “And I say, thank you. And I thank you on behalf of everybody in the school system.” 

Hudson said Carswell was a good leader through COVID-19, and helped lead a half-cent sales tax initiative that will bring two new schools to the district. 

Board Member Narragansett Smith also lauded Carswell for his work on school safety. Smith said she and Carswell used to work together as assistant superintendents, and that they have a connection from that. 

“We went through a lot, and I saw you in different lights, but one thing that has really touched my heart… is our faith that keeps us going,” Smith said. “And when you have what we have, that faith, we know that our interest is definitely for the staff, but most of all for the children.”