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The following are the questions asked by the endorsement screening committee of the Hilliard Education Association (HEA) for the election of November 2009. State your reason for becoming a candidate for Hilliard City School Board of Education (HBSBE) and describe your personal experience and involvement with public schools? Above all others, my reason for running for the HBSBE is to serve my community. America is suffering from a kind of selfishness in which most citizens believe it is okay to “let someone else take care of it.” I understand this frame of mind – I carried it myself for many years. My career was consuming, and what time I had left was given to our kids as they participated in soccer and choir and orchestra. “Let others worry about the schools, the church and everything else having to do with volunteer service – I’m too busy,” was my thinking. Fortunately, others did worry about our schools all those years. But then one day in 1999, leaders of the Hilliard Education Foundation paid me a visit at my office at CompuServe. They explained that since CompuServe had become an important part of the Hilliard community (and one of its largest taxpayers), it seemed appropriate that the company be represented on the Board of Trustees of HEF, and they invited me to be that representative. Of course I knew the primary reason for the invitation was that CompuServe was major potential contributor to HEF – not because I was particularly sought out. The qualification that attracted the HEF leadership was that I was a high level executive (and therefore potentially influential in regard to our philanthropic activities) and a Hilliard resident, not because I had been a visible part of our school community. My involvement with HEF from 1999 to 2003 brought me in contact with a number of important leaders in our community. Larry Earman, now a Norwich Twp Trustee, was HEF’s President. Mike Watson, our former district Treasurer, was the founder and Treasurer of HEF. Denise Bobbit ran the Silent Auction for the Evening for Excellence the year I chaired that event (2000). Dave Lundregan and Lisa Whiting were fellow HEF Board members. Dale McVey was an ex-officio member, and of course Robin Trafford was the HEA representative. This involvement with HEF was one of two major influences upon my decision to run for the HBSBE in 2007, and again this year. I’ll describe the other in a following response. What qualities and experience will you personally bring to the HCSBE? Experience in of itself is one of the primary things I would bring to the HCSBE if elected. I am fifty-five years old, have been married to my high school sweetheart for thirty-six years, and am the father of two grown children, who are both products of the Hilliard School District. I’m proud to say that both are in professions of service to their communities. Our eldest is an elementary music teacher in Fostoria, while our youngest (who graduated Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa from OSU), is in her third year of medical school. We have lived in the Hilliard school district for thirty years, long enough to remember when it was Scioto-Darby Local Schools. I have been called to serve in leadership positions throughout my life. From age 8 through high school, my primary activity was Scouting. I served in various leadership positions in my Boy Scout Unit and Explorer Post along my path to becoming an Eagle Scout. I joined CompuServe as a nineteen-year-old Ohio State engineering student, hoping to earn enough money to continue my education. Within the first year, I was promoted to Head Computer Operator, and soon thereafter rose to Operations Manager, leading a team of technicians responsible for the operations of mainframe computers in two computer centers. In the course of my twenty-seven year career with CompuServe, I rose through increasingly responsible positions in engineering and marketing, ending as the Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of our global Network Services Division, leading a team of nearly a thousand people in the US and Europe, and managing an operations budget larger than that of our school district. Since retiring from CompuServe in 2000, I have had the opportunity to serve on the Boards of Directors of several for-profit and non-profit organizations, which has given me a great deal of insight into the purpose and duties of a governing Board – such as the HCSBE. The other experience I’ve had which has motivated me to run for the Board, and gives me rare insight into some of our key issues, was my involvement in the update of the Comprehensive Land Use Plan for Brown Township (along with Doug Maggied). It was in this effort that I learned about the relationship between unmanaged residential development and the economic viability of our schools. More houses are not a good thing unless there is a corresponding amount of commercial development. I do not understand why our current school leadership is quiet on this critical issue. What three issues major issues will I advocate? First is community education – the same answer I gave in 2007. The greatest single threat to the fiscal sustainability of our school district is the ignorance of the people of our community in regard to the ways our schools are funded, and the way the money is spent. We have lots of smart people in Hilliard who can help us deal with economic matters, but their level of understanding needs to be raised – as well as their concern. If we fail to engage them in the solution, future funding decisions (i.e. levy votes) will continue to be made on hearsay and emotion, and that is not conducive to a stable economic environment. Secondly, the HBSBE must conduct its business in public, soliciting constant input in varied ways, and carrying out its discussions in the full view of the community. I continue to be astonished that our Board can conduct a complete meeting in less than 15 minutes when there is so much work to be done. Either our Board is blatantly violating the Sunshine Laws, or they are willing to unanimously enact whatever the Superintendent puts on the agenda without any discussion. Neither is acceptable. Thirdly, the HBSBE and the HEA need to work together to find a model for compensation and benefits going forward which can be sustained in both our current economic climate as well as the future. A school district is a professional services organization, like a law firm, a medical practice or an accounting business. The primary cost of operations will always be compensation and benefits, and it is the year to year change in compensation and benefits which will drive funding needs. Nothing else carries anywhere near as much significance – not the price of diesel fuel, not the cost of copier paper, not even the cost of textbooks. And if you will allow a fourth: The HCSBE must be vocal in its opposition to unmanaged residential development. The Mayor and Council of the City of Hilliard have allowed thousands and thousands of homes to be built in the last decade, while recruiting a comparatively small amount of new commercial property tax revenue (the City of Columbus has been much better in this regard). Our school funding system is a three legged stool made up of residential/agricultural property taxes, commercial property taxes, and State Foundation Aid. For many years, these three sources contributed equally to our funding. But over the past twenty years, residential development has exploded, bringing more kids than revenue to HCSD. Had commercial property tax revenues grown at the same pace as residential development, the size of our levies in the past decade would have been halved (or the interval between them doubled). The HBSBE must see to it that the people of the community are educated on these matters, and then it can rally them to hold the municipal leaders accountable for the damage they do to our community. What do I see as the top two or three issues facing HCSD with the passage of HB 1? Clearly the primary issue is that the new funding law does not send any more money our way. Whether this is fair or not is a matter of personal belief, but the outcome is that once more the Governor and the General Assembly has sent the message to the people our school district that there is no more help coming from the Statehouse. This means we have to solve our economic problems ourselves in the near term. Without a significant influx of commercial property tax revenue – which seems unlikely in this economic climate – the existing homeowners and businesses of our community are on the hook to pay for all increases to our operating budget. The other big question mark is whether the Governor’s projections of the revenue from various gambling operations will come to fruition. If it does not, what will be adjusted in the appropriations? We would have to have some concern that the State will reduce the amount of money directed to HCSD and similar affluent districts in order to maintain minimum funding to the poorer districts in our State. Again, whether this is fair or not is not the issue – the State will be forced to make a choice and the evidence is that districts such as ours will come out on the short end of these decisions. Some buildings in our district are still not meeting Average Yearly Progress requirements within some of our sub groups; how would you address this issue? What support and materials would you offer the teachers? This is a question which must be answered by the professional educators in our school district, not the HCSBE. But that does not mean the HCSBE has no role in the solution. On the contrary, the HCSBE should be in control of the solution process, which should go something like this: 1. Understanding our Goals – to be answered by the HCSBE a. Is this a problem which needs to be solved? b. What are the consequences of never meeting AYP in these buildings? c. What is the desired outcome? i. Should all buildings perform equally? ii. Would we accept lowering the performance in one building to raise the performance in another, as long as all stayed above a set standard (e.g. Excellent) 2. Devising a Plan – the responsibility of the Administration, teachers and staff a. What steps are going to be taken to achieve the desired outcome? b. What resources are we lacking? c. Is any reorganization of staff and duties required? d. What is the cost of acquiring the resources, reorganizing, and retraining? e. Presentation of the plan to the HCSBE 3. Economic analysis - HCSBE a. Where will the money come from? b. Is the community willing to support the plan? (if not, go back to Step 1). 4. Execution a. HCSBE directs the Administration to carry out the plan in order to achieve the objectives within given parameters (e.g. cost) b. HCSBE monitors milestone points. If milestones are not being met on time and on budget, initiate a review, and make corrections as necessary. c. Report regularly to the public on progress vs goals and commitments. HCSD has earned the rating of “Excellent with Distinction;” what do you see as the contributing factors to that success? Clearly the performance of the teachers and the supporting staff is a key contributor to this outcome. This is a product of effective curriculum development, as well as classroom performance. As I listened to the several curriculum committee presentations at the HCSBE meetings this year, it was gratifying to hear how well the curriculum staff and the classroom teachers collaborated to develop the new curriculum for various subjects. I wish more people in our community saw this kind of effort in action. We also have to give a good deal of credit to the students and their parents. The parents must themselves care about their kids’ education, and instill an attitude of work and achievement in them. Some parents are better at this than others, and the coaching they receive at parent-teacher conferences can help all improve. The part played by the community must not be overlooked. Whether or not a household has school age kids, we all contribute money to the operation of the school district. We have first-class facilities and a faculty and staff often recognized for their performance (.e.g. the Memorial Middle School Library recognized as Media Center of the Year in 2006 by the National School Library Association). None of these things are cheap, and our community has been bearing the cost largely alone as the State has abandoned us. It is my belief that this level of support is in jeopardy which brings the most concern. The Ohio Legislature is making fiscal and educational policy with little direct input from school districts; what do you see as your role in working with the legislators in representing Hilliard City School District, students and community? I will begin this answer in the same way as I did in 2007: If the Ohio Legislature is not listening to the school community to make educational and fiscal policy, who are they listening to? One must assume that the Ohio Education Association is one of the strongest lobbying groups in the Statehouse, just because of the sheer number of members represented. The political reality in Ohio is, I believe, that the representation of suburban districts, such as HCSD, in the General Assembly is far less than that of the combined bloc of urban and rural representatives. For the urban and rural representatives, the suburban districts are the cash cows expected to provide whatever funding is necessary to support everyone else. This is clearly seen in the fraction of state funding received versus state taxes paid for the various school districts in Ohio. We have far to fall in this respect. According to a report distributed by Rep. Larry Wolpert a few years ago, HCSD gets back about half the taxes paid. But Dublin gets back on the order of 12%. I believe many in the state government would be okay with letting our taxes paid vs. received ratio fall to a level similar to Dublin. The solution clearly lies with the ability of the people of the suburban districts to band together to give some political clout to our representatives. It should be the school boards of the suburban districts who are driving this effort, but they are not. Rather it seems that the most progress toward inter-district cooperation is being fostered by grassroots groups such as EducateHilliard.org, EducateWorthington.org, and similar organizations emerging across central Ohio. We are most definitely not anti-school, anti-teacher, or anti-anything. Our interest is primarily sustainable economics, and our level of State funding is clearly part of the answer. Closing remarks |
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