sgusers9的部落格

Source: The Eagle, Bryan, TexasOct.self storage 24--Q: What's the most important credential for a school board member to have?A: You know, it's going to sound really simplistic but honestly, the most important credential for a school board member to have is ... to be an involved parent. I don't think that having, if someone has a Ph.D or if someone has a high school diploma, I don't really think it has a direct impact so much as someone who has the ability to kind of see the greater good for their community and for their children and that's an involved parent, I'm kind of surprised, at home many people don't see what goes on in a daily basis, I honestly think that being an involved parent is probably the single most important credential for school board.Q: What kind of experience have you had balancing a budget, more than a household budget? Give specific numbers.A: I have several different experiences with that. First and foremost, I'm a small business owner, but operating my own business, I would say that definitely falls under any and all bearing for budgets. On different boards, on the Foundation Board for Bryan ISD, I'm on both the finance and budgetary committees, so one of my duties on the board is to go over the annual budget for the foundation board. When I was at Allen Academy on the board of directors, the board there was equally responsible with coming up with the operating budget for the school. We're talking budgets that went anywhere from a couple hundred thousand dollars to over a million dollar operating budget in a year.Q: Track record working on behalf of schools and students?A: I made a pretty solid track record with it, and of course you have to think the parent side more than the classroom side, but for all of my children's schools we've always been very involved at the PTO level, or with the administration on development committees. At Allen Academy, I taught Ancient History and Texas history, I've appeared as a guest lecturer in schools before as kind of an expert on 20th century military history. Obviously on the administrative side, I served on the foundation board for Bryan ISD and the school board for Allen Academy. We've worked with countless living history programs for museums which are not directly a classroom, but has much the same effect in delivering information to students. I run study groups outside of school for students, I'm currently working on an American history study group for students from Bryan High, overall I've tutored countless students for history classes; I'm a firm believer that you can make it interesting and fun. Those are probably some of the main points as far as experience on the educational side.Q: What are three of the problems the district faces, but more importantly, what do you think are the solutions?A: There's a couple of key ones. I think the first one is the concept of success for every child. But what I really boil this down to is that there's a large push for everybody to go to college, but that is just not a realistic goal for a multitude of reasons. You have students that are lacking in interest, you have students that lack the financial ability or the academic ability to go and perform well, and some just may not be interested in it at all. But one thing Bryan ISD can do to actually help that, it's easy for people to say we need to increase post-secondary readiness, we need to make sure these kids will have a job, but to actually do it, the No. 1 thing we need to do is we need to take certain programs and we need to expand those vocational programs to offer certifications at the end of the program. For example, the cosmetology program at Bryan High, where they can get a Texas State Cosmetology license, is kind of the pinnacle of what I'm talking about where you actually have the certification when you finish high school to go and have a career. That program is widely successful, but it has a waiting list. So what we need to do is we need to increase the chairs at the instructional level for that program. We need to make sure that every student that wants to be in that program has a chance to do it. If we do, the top 15-20 percent can apply for co-enrollment classes at Blinn where they get college credit for English, math and history, why aren't we sending our vocational students over to Blinn for co-enrollment programs as well? Blinn has a phenomenal welding and a machinist program, and I would like to see our kids who are in shop class ... going over to Blinn for co-enrollment, so maybe one year after they graduate from high school they'll have an associate's degree and be a machinist. Now you're talking about a kid that has a $25- to $30-an-hour job starting. Another example for a vocational program would be automotive/tech classes. We need to look into bumping the exposure in the automotive class and making sure the kids can take an ASE certification at the end of that class so that they're directly employable. And those are some examples, but I think those are very realistic. I hear all the time, "Oh, we need to fix this," but there's no solution. There's no fix. But those are very concrete things that we can do.I think the second one is that we need to work harder, and I apologize, this is a roundabout way to get to this, but long story short, Bryan ISD has a lot of really good programs at the elementary school level, at the junior high level we have Inquire and Odyssey, and at the high school level we have collegiate, we have Hammond-Oliver, we have AP and honors, we have international baccalaureate, so Bryan ISD has a bevy of top-notch programs that are innovative and do a great job educating kids. But what we need to do, we need to get more kids in these programs. I'm shocked at how few people really know what Bryan ISD has to offer in this department. As far as we're sitting here discussing what we would consider a top three issue, I honestly think that is a top three issue. Bryan Collegiate's a perfect example. You have a high school here in Bryan, and Bryan Collegiate's in the top 5 percent of high schools in the nation right now. Kids are graduating there with 60 credit hours on average. It caters to a lot of students who come from families where no one has gone to college, and what we need to do, we need to do a better job making sure kids get into that program. I have a lady that I met here, her daughter was top 10 percent at Sam Rayburn, she was an African-American lady, no one in the family had gone to college, she was very proud of her daughter and her daughter was fixing to graduate Collegiate with 60 hours. And she was telling me how her daughter was top 10 percent at Rayburn and the family mentioned is she going to Collegiate, and she had no idea what Collegiate was, and it's tailor-made for a family like that. So I would really like to see us ensure, not just for Collegiate, but we need to get more kids in IB, we need to get more kids in AP, we need to ensure, especially at the elementary level, at the schools that are predominantly economically disadvantaged ... that those kids are getting the opportunity to go into some special programs. So I think the programs already exist, we just need to do a better job of getting children into them. And I honestly believe that is definitely one of the top three. Another one that I think is important kind of touches off that one, but we need to ensure that we don't have a large educational gap in Bryan ISD. We need to ensure that every student is getting the same education across-the-board, and that we don't have certain elementary schools that are underperforming compared to other elementary schools, and honestly there are a host of factors that are involved, but honestly I think Bryan ISD is addressing the problem and starting to see it, but we need to continue to push a little harder on that... And there's just no substitute sometimes 迷你倉o mentoring and tutoring from teachers. And if that means we need to have more staff at elementary schools that are struggling, we need to possibly look at paying teachers and staff for overtime at certain elementary schools where they can provide tutoring and extended tutoring in the afternoon or the occasional Saturday schedule. I think that would help address that issue.Q: One of the main issues for a school board is to evaluate a superintendent: How is Dr. Wallis doing as the top administrator of the district? What does he need to work on? How would you measure his success?A: I think that it's kind of a little tough in the sense that he hasn't been here that long, but so far I think he's done a very good job. Unfortunately, I think sometimes to measure the effectiveness of your superintendent can take two, three four years to see the implementation. One thing I will say for sure is there's been some issues that have come up recently, Dr. Wallis has seemed extremely proactive at addressing these issues. I know you saw the last report that had come out with Bryan and Rudder failing to meet the metrics for the postsecondary readiness, and I've been impressed with his response. At nothing else, when a problem arises, I can't expect the superintendent to foresee everything that's going to come down the pipe, but I do believe he's been very proactive and aggressive when it has come up.Q: What do you think the highest predictor of success is for a student?A: I think the highest predictor of success for a student is probably involved parents or an involved teacher or administrator. I think students have to have somebody that truly cares and keeps them interested. Unfortunately, school in and of its own is not always that interesting for kids right off the bat, and it helps to have a positive influence. But I don't think a lot of times, and there are statistical, obviously statistically the higher socioeconomic standards are a good prediction for student success. But is that kind of the chicken and the egg, I don't think financial stability automatically makes it, I think the financial stability tends to increase or allow parents to be more involved. And of course we've seen schools that have done extremely well that have a large percentage of socioeconomic disadvantaged students. Kemp Elementary is a perfect example of a school that does not have a ton of funding but performs extremely well in testing. And I would say it's the parents and the administration in that school versus pointing to the national standard says that due to the socioeconomic bracket the children will perform "X." So I think parental and administrative and teacher involvement. That fantastic teacher in second or third grade can make the difference for a lifetime for a student.Q: Where do you land on teaching evolution in the schools? What about sex education (what grades, etc.)?A: That's a pretty fair question. I think that obviously evolution should be included in curriculum. I know that there are a lot of people who have objections to it in a religious belief context, for me personally, I think that it can be presented exactly what it is, which is the theory of evolution. It should be put out there, and it can always be predicated with a statement that this is a theory that is currently the most commonly held belief and the most commonly held theory and you explain it. I don't see a qualm with that. With sex education, this is a fine line, but I think that needs to be tweaked a little bit. First and foremost, I absolutely believe in a parent's right to decide what is correct and appropriate for their child versus the state or the school system. That being said, I think what you need to do is offer the alternative for a parent to opt their child out, because currently sex education falls under health class, so I think the parent should be able to opt their child out, and my belief is that the parent who cares enough to be vocal about it to opt their children out because of the way it's presented ... those people will take care of it on their own, so to speak. Maybe there's a way they want to present that information to their child, but I have a hard time believing that someone who would care enough to opt out would then just ignore the issue. Now that being said, and I think that's something that needs to be addressed, I think the time frame they do it is a little interesting. And I don't know what the magical age is where it needs to be done, but currently health is taken as a freshman in high school. I know from having daughters in the elementary to high school level, you're having no shortage of students hitting puberty in fifth or sixth grade, but sex education is being covered in ninth grade. We currently have girls that are pregnant in our junior high system. There was a pregnant eighth-grader at Sam Rayburn last year. I don't think health class a year after she has a child is going to help her. So that's my only concern with it being pushed off as late as it is, and I understand the concern that people don't want their child exposed to it at too early of an age, but we've kind of got to find that middle ground in there.Q: How do you think the district is handling growth and what can it be doing better?A: As far as growth goes, I actually think Bryan ISD is doing a phenomenal job. ... There was a lot of discontent when they talked about building a second high school, but I think the idea of having Bryan with two 4A schools and College Station with two 4A schools, I think that's going to hold the kids in the school district. It will save on transportation costs, it will increase rivalry inside of our hometown, in the elementary school level, I think the schools are meeting the needs of the students as far as total numbers in the schools. So I think the district is doing a good job growing, and inside of that growth I think they're doing a good job with keeping the schools balanced. I was really impressed when they redistricted between Rudder and Bryan High, I mean, when you look at the demographics between the two, they're extremely well balanced as far as composition of the student body, ethnic diversity, socioeconomic diversity, it's really tempting for someone to point a finger and say, 'Well, that's the good high school, and that's the bad high school,' and I think they've done a really good job of not allowing that to happen. I think with Bryan High and Rudder, I think all you can say is that's the older high school and that's the newer high school. I don't think one is inherently better than the other. ... It's not easy telling people to build a new school, we're going to change where you go to school, it always creates some concern in the community, but I think Bryan's done a good job.Q: Why should voters pick you over your opponent?A: You know, I'd love to be able to have some big dirty secret on my opponent but I'll be honest, I've met him and he's a nice guy. I don't have anything bad to say about him but I think that I'm the better qualified candidate. I've got three daughters in the district, elementary, junior high and high school level, so I think that kind of gives me a good perspective as to what's going on and I can bring to the table. I think I've got good experience with both public and private schools that kind of help shape my decision-making ability that might be a little different than someone else's, I'm passionate about education and I always have been, and especially when we talk about the vocational program and the student's ability to earn a living, this is something I've been extremely passionate about literally for years, and I think the time is finally right and the opportunity is there to put it into action.Copyright: ___ (c)2013 The Eagle (Bryan, Texas) Visit The Eagle (Bryan, Texas) at .theeagle.com Distributed by MCT Information Servicesmini storage