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RALEIGH – Democrats are back in charge on the Wake County school board.

The new board members were sworn in Tuesday night and they got right to work with their first meeting and electing new leadership.

Voting along party lines, the board elected its senior member, Kevin Hill, as chair and Keith Sutton as vice chair. Hill says he hopes the board can work together, across party lines, minimizing the 5-4 split.

"I'm hoping to be able to use those experiences and my relationships with staff, with principals, with the superintendent to work with all my colleagues on the board, to help them move along so we can get away from this 5-4 [split]. I challenged them, I have before and I will again, that we need a new board majority of nine,” said Hill.

In another partisan move, the new Democrat-backed majority decided to also elect a new vice-chair, ousting Republican John Tedesco.

“We've accomplished a lot over the last two years. We dealt with $100 million in cuts without cutting teachers. We delivered on parental choice assignment plan and we protected the classroom. So now it's showtime and let's see what the new group does,” said Tedesco.

However, most of the new majority spoke of putting partisan politics aside and working together for Wake County children. As of Dec. 1, Wake County's school board chair is now allowed to vote on all issues facing the board.

Previously, the chair was only allowed to vote to break a tie.