A Merrimack Valley High School student. A former speaker of the New Hampshire House. A music teacher. A local historian. An employment lawyer.

These are among the new members of the Monitor's board of contributors.

A few weeks back, we put out a call for new members of the board: local writers who could contribute regular opinion pieces for the newspaper's commentary pages. The response was overwhelming.

We received more than 50 applications from writers on a wide variety of topics. I whittled the crowd down to a dozen, all of whom have agreed to write several pieces over the course of the next year. Come November 2009, we'll reshuffle the makeup of the board. If you applied in '08 but weren't chosen, I encourage you to try again.

In the meantime, meet the new board:

• Mike Alberici, 39, is an accomplished musician and music teacher who plays nine different instruments. He lives in Concord's South End with his wife and two children. He is a diehard Red Sox fan and loves to cook barbecue ribs and pork. Alberici plays golf - but rarely keeps score.

• Jon Baird, 57, of Wilmot is a longtime contributor to the Monitor. He is a lawyer for New Hampshire Legal Assistance, married with three grown sons.

The loves of Baird's life: the Philadelphia Phillies, Philadelphia Eagles and his golden retriever. His favorite artist is John Legend. His most recent favorite novels are The Turnaround, by George Pelecanos and Fortunate Son by Walter Mosley.

• Ned Helms, 63, of Concord is director of the Institute for Health Policy and Practice at the University of New Hampshire. Helms was a New Hampshire co-chairman of Barack Obama's presidential campaign. He was chosen as a Democratic elector and will cast one of the state's four votes for president.

Helms is a former state commissioner of Health and Human Services and former chief administrative officer of Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Hampshire. He has run in the past for both governor and Congress.

His most recently enjoyed book was The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. "It was the closest I have ever felt a piece of prose has come to being poetry," he says.

• Peter Imse, 57, of Bow, is a lawyer with Sulloway & Hollis in Concord. He has played saxophone with the Freese Brothers Big Band for more than 25 years and recently joined the Joy Spring Jazz Ensemble at his church. Music, he says, has been a great antidote to his work life - a source of joy and friendship.

Imse mentors members of the Bow High School Interact Club. He likes jazz singer Diana Krall and books by John Sanford and Robert Ludlum. "If I did not have a job or family," he says, "I could probably be a pretty good golfer."

• Karen Levchuk, 48, of Concord, is a labor and employment lawyer at Devine Millimet. Prior to that, she was personnel director for state government for three years and a senior assistant attorney general. Levchuk's favorite book is the newly published novel Everything Beautiful in the World, by her sister, Lisa Levchuk. "A few details about my birth family may appear in the book," she says.

Levchuck is proud to have been named a "captain" by the New Hampshire Voter Protection Program in this week's election. "Having never played competitive sports, I was ridiculously happy to receive this title," she says.

• Paul Lindstrom, 44, of Concord, is a senior attorney in the office of Legislative Services, which means he drafts bills for members of the House and Senate.

His unpublished novel, Looking for David was a semi-finalist for Amazon.com's Breakthrough Novel Award. In law school, he was an editor for the Boston College Third World Law Journal. His favorite writer: Nick Hornby.

• Elaine Loft, 48, lives in Hopkinton with her husband and younger daughter. She has spent most of the past 10 years working in the museum world. She was director of the New Hampshire Antiquarian Society and recently processed the papers of Portsmouth preservationist Dorothy Vaughan for the Tuck Library at the New Hampshire Historical Society. She is the founder and coordinator of the Contoocook Farmers' Market. (next page »)