Election 2009

A heated race for the position two seat on the Tacoma School Board has brought in five challengers to incumbent Connie Rickman, who is finishing up her sixth year with the board. Candidates range from past educators, to community activists, parents and recent college graduates – all looking to make a difference in the public school system that has such a large impact on the community. Incumbent Kurt Miller is running unopposed in this election. He has had a long career in working with at-risk youth and non-profit organizations, and is a parent of Tacoma Public Schools graduates.

Amy Bates

Having researched the city of Tacoma diligently, specifically regarding the achievement gap, and due to being a self-proclaimed “unflappable community collaborator and advocate,” Amy Bates feels she is an excellent candidate for school board.

“I am a skilled communicator and facilitator. There are so many different interests and ideas (regarding what is best for Tacoma Public Schools), but we need to sit down, have a very candid and frank discussion to get the dialogue going,” Bates stated.

In fact, she believes lack of communication is the reason many important school-related issues have not been properly dealt with.

“(We) need to figure out where we are. Communication comes in when we bring all of the necessary parties together to address these issues and communicate with them candidly, transparently and work cooperatively to tackle these issues. Teachers, parents, students, administrators, community members and the business sector all need to get together.”

When asked what one of the best and worst decisions that the current school board has made in the past year, Bates quickly answered that it was the introduction of Science and Math Institute (SAMI) into the school system.

“I’m glad they recognized the importance of them (science and math) and had elected to address that directly by developing this concept. (We have) one of the best locations for a science institute, and students need math to be able to compete on local, national and international levels, and for that SAMI was a wonderful idea.

“(It was) also horrible because it was poorly communicated in terms of making sure that all impacted parties were around the table during the decision making process. SOTA is wonderful but their numbers speak for themselves: 50 percent of kids are of minority backgrounds in Tacoma, and 20 percent of them are in SOTA. SOTA and SAMI are good ideas if serving all of the students including ethnic minorities,” Bates said.

Bates affirmed she decided to run for school board because she could not convince others active in the community to do so. “There is a great amount of work that a number of us in the African-American community do related to bill 2722, specifically designed to address the achievement gap. (I) work daily with culturally diverse people and bring a passion for success for our students.

“(I) can’t say if I’m on the school board I can fix it. (I) can say I will do all I can to bring as many voices around the table to collectively address this issue and make our district a world-class school district.”

By Dawn Quinn

Catherine Ushka-Hall

As a parent of two middle school students in Tacoma Public Schools, Catherine Ushka-Hall has been actively involved in the district’s affairs for years.

She sees her involvement in the district, perspective as a parent and experience with non-profit organizations as key reasons why she would be a value to the board.

“I felt we needed someone on the school board who understands neighborhood councils, the parks, non-profit organizations,” she said. “All of a sudden I realized I was talking about myself.  I believe I am the right person in the right time and the right place.”

Ushka-Hall’s district experience includes working on bond and levy campaigns, and she was on the school consolidation committee where she was vocal on the issue of keeping several East Side schools from going vacant.

“I think I’ve shown that I can be the person to show up and ask the hard questions.  

“I’ve put a lot of blood, sweat and tears into the district over the last couple years. I’m afraid if we don’t have a school board with courage… we’re going to get pushed back.”

Ushka-Hall has also served as president of her neighborhood council, Parent Teacher Associations, Tacoma Citizens for Schools, Get Smart Tacoma, Stand for Children and the district’s Finance Committee.

In her opinion, the development of the Science And Math Institute (SAMI) was one of the board’s best and worst decisions in the past year.

“I’m not against SAMI, I’m against the process,” she stated. “There wasn’t any public discussion… and to the best of my knowledge, there has been no budget.”

She believes that lack of trust between the public and the board is one of the district’s largest overriding issues.

“We’ve lost a lot of trust during the (former Superintendent Charles) Milligan era that has not fully healed. We need to rebuild that trust and build a plan … that involves the whole community.”

She noted that encouraging better dialogue between the board and the public, as well as developing a greater vision for the district and increasing accountability, could start to re-build that trust.

By Clare Jensen

Chris Van Vechten

Chris Van Vechten spent two sessions serving as an aide to legislators in Olympia, one of whom was Tacoma’s own State Representative Dennis Flannigan. He also co-founded the Tacoma blog “The Melon,” which became his medium for sharing videos of Tacoma School Board meetings before it was officially allowed.

Now Van Vechten hopes his experience can help him get a seat on the school board.

“I have worked on every school bond and levy since 2006,” Van Vechten affirmed. “We need a few things: we need better communication and outreach so people are willing to support. Second, we need to get better at how we run these campaigns.”

Yet he believes the biggest problem facing Tacoma School District currently is funding.

“(It’s) money. Lots of programs are facing problems because we don’t have enough to keep them funded. The reserves are dry. We have to make sure the levies pass next time.”

Van Vechten also affirms that his family is composed of educators, and that due to his own rocky educational start, keeping children on the path to solid education is imperative.

“Everyone in my family is either a teacher or professor. I had dyslexia and ADD by age 4, at age 5 I was treated with 120 mgs of Ritalin a day and spent three years in a hospital for severe learning disabilities. I hated school and almost dropped out in my sophomore year. Then I joined theater, got a scholarship, got a 3.7 GPA at the University of Puget Sound, did teaching in Mexico, started a business and joined the Tacoma Arts Commission.”

According to Van Vechten, the best and worst moves made by the Tacoma School Board this year were disallowing the filming of board meetings, then rescinding that decision later.

“One of the big issues was to televise school board meetings and they voted not to because it was too expensive. My friends and I started taping them and uploading them to ‘The Melon.’ Lots of people want to be more informed about what happens during these meetings and it’s not always convenient for people to come to them.”

Although he feels the board needs much improvement, Van Vechten has three priorities for change that he would bring to the table if elected.

“First, it’s maintaining teachers to keep class size in check. Secondly, we need a recession-proof commitment to the arts, sports and electives. Third, we need to improve the quality of school food, while still keeping prices low enough. We can buy local, organic and get grants. When 60 percent of the student body qualifies for reduced cost lunch, many may be coming to school with no nutrition, and it’s hard to teach kids to learn if they’re hungry. I would like a more healthy alternative.”

By Dawn Quinn

Jerry Thorpe

Jerry Thorpe spent 33 years working as a teacher for Tacoma Public Schools, but it was not until he started substitute teaching during his retirement that he realized his desire to sit on the school board.

During his past four years subbing, Thorpe has been exposed to every nook and cranny of the many, diverse Tacoma schools.

“I’ve gotten to see many different schools,” he said. “I’ve been just amazed at the problems I have seen, and what needs to be done.”

Thorpe has also served on the Metro Parks Commission and the Port of Tacoma Commission.

He sees the high dropout rate as Tacoma Public Schools’ biggest issue.

“Tacoma has an absolutely ridiculous dropout rate – how can any school district ignore those figures?”

He said as a board member he would support any intervention practices where students who are at risk of dropping out are identified early and given extra attention and help.

“(Students) need to be worked with individually to find out what is the key to get this child to continue in school and to graduate. It takes some real work.”

He also noted reaching out to parents and working directly with families of students is key.

“Every school needs social workers,” he said.

He also wants to focus on basic academic skills, such as grammar and cursive writing.

“I’ve found that the grammar is not really supported. When I was told that I about fell over.

“To me it’s the basics, the three ‘R’s’ are still important. They got to have those basics. They got to have a good background.”

Thorpe noted he is willing to dedicate his time to the issues the district faces, including taking a “hard look” at the budget and working to continually support teachers and students.

“These things are important, it’s important for kids. We need to raise kids’ self-esteem, so they know that the school district holds them as important people. They are the clients of the school district.”

By Clare Jensen

Deb Blakeslee

As a board member for many non-profit organizations in Pierce County such as the Coalition to End Homelessness, and due to memberships with organizations such as the Parent Teacher Association, and as founder of the Powerful Women’s Leadership, Deb Blakeslee hopes to bring her unique vision to the school board.

“I don’t have kids, I don’t have an agenda. As a taxpayer, I want to see all kids graduate on time and on grade level. I want to identify problems and come up with solutions.”

Blakeslee affirmed that the biggest problems in the school district currently are the dropout rate and achievement gap.

“I think that it’s more of a community thing. I would like to see a mentor or educational advocate for each student or an individual education plan, but now is a bad time because of the economy. The community needs to be more involved, more voices need to be heard at the board level. We need more community input and people need to give more than their two or three minutes at a board meeting,” Blakeslee said.

If voted onto the board, Blakeslee would integrate members of the community with pertinent people on the school board to initiate conversations.

“I want to hold more community meetings with the board or superintendent, and more at the school level in the community.”

The decision to run for school board came out of attending Get Smart Tacoma two years ago. After pledging to help the community, no one got back to her and the other 100 attendants about the ways to do that.

“I e-mailed four people who headed it to see what was going on, and they said it morphed into Tacoma 360. Now several years since, we haven’t been able to help out in small, meaningful ways. Tacoma 360 will help, but we want to do something.

“I’m gonna light a fire, that’s my goal.”

By Dawn Quinn

Connie Rickman

Incumbent Connie Rickman has a long-standing working relationship with the Tacoma School District as an educator. She has spent the last six years serving on the Tacoma School Board.

She noted her experience in the district and the trust she has earned from former students, parents, staff and colleagues have encouraged her to continue working on the board.

“I can’t say ‘no’ to them – they’ve convinced me to continue to serve them and their children,” she said.

Rickman views the budget as the biggest issue to be dealt with for Tacoma Public Schools.

“Without the necessary funds, we can’t attract and retain the best possible staff and get other resources needed to continue to improve our student achievement and the achievement gap.”

She noted the district and board have currently been working together to cut expenses in order to retain staff.

“Our most important activity has been our constant and consistent work, as a board, with Dr. Jarvis and his cabinet, on the budget, so we could keep our staff intact.”

Rickman noted one of the worst decisions the board has made in the last couple of years was the controversial hiring and firing of former Superintendent Charles Milligan, a school leader who lasted less than one year with the district among poor staff and community relationships.

“As a board, we cannot afford to repeat the same ‘silence’ mistakes with our present superintendent, whom we are fortunate to have. As for this last two years…the board has built on what Dr. Milligan started. And in collaboration with Dr. Jarvis…his staff and others, we have worked to improve our teaching and learning strategies and techniques so our students will get the best possible education we’re capable of giving them.”

By Clare Jensen

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