School board candidates speak at AARP forum

School finance, No Child Left Behind and student achievement were among the major issues batted around by Cape Girardeau School Board candidates during a Monday forum.

Seven of nine candidates vying for positions on the board were present at the forum, which was sponsored by the Cape Girardeau County AARP chapter. Candidates Walter White and Thomas Reinagel, who are both running for three-year terms, were unable to attend.

This is the first year AARP has sponsored a forum for school board candidates.

"There are always hot topic buttons that can be pushed and information that we're interested in," said chapter president Laverne Nothdurft.

The questions posed by an AARP moderator and selected answers from candidates are below:

Q. The Cape Girardeau school system is referred to as a hold-harmless district. What does this mean and what are the implications?

Incumbent Sharon Mueller explained that because of a high local property tax base, hold-harmless districts' state funding is virtually frozen at 1992-1993 levels.

"We have the same legislative mandates and the same programs we have to provide as other districts, but less state funding," said Mueller, who has served on the board for six years.

Candidates also commented on upcoming changes to the way the state appropriates funding to districts and the equality of the current system. The legislature is currently considering a revamp of that system.

Board member Skip Smallwood, who along with Charles Bertrand is running for an open one-year position, said his top priorities on the board are making the district more financially efficient, forming public advisory committees and improving communication. The state funding issue falls in there as well, he said.

"This is my real concern," Smallwood said. "We're right back visiting 1992."

Bertrand, a former school administrator who relocated to Cape Girardeau from Texas, said, "Public education needs to be funded somewhere other than people who own property. There are a lot of other taxes that could fund public education."

Q. How has the No Child Left Behind Act been implemented in Cape Girardeau and what are the results so far?

"It's changed the way in which this district uses information from the Missouri Assessment Program," said incumbent Steve Trautwein, a biology professor at Southeast Missouri State University. "We now use that data to craft strategies for the next school year."

Three-year term candidate Debra Mitchell-Braxton, who directs the Upward Bound program at Southeast, said putting too much emphasis on NCLB will not solve the overriding societal issues facing at-risk and other students.

"We need to teach kids lifelong skills, not just teach them how to pass a test," said Braxton. "Let's not invest all of our eggs in one basket. There are still a lot of kids left behind with this act."

Candidates also discussed issues regarding the financial cost of NCLB on school districts.

"If the federal government wants us to have this, then the government should be accountable for financing it and not just leave us holding the bag," said Creighton Gould, a police officer at Southeast vying for one of the three-year terms on the board.

Q. Spending tax money meant for education on feasibility studies and personnel searches is a sore subject with people in the district. What is your resolution?

Current board president Charles Haubold said there's only one thing he might have done differently regarding last fall's search for a new superintendent -- the timing. Haubold said he might have conducted the search a year or six months earlier, but does not regret paying the Missouri School Boards' Association some $12,000 to find a new district leader.

"The school board's two main responsibilities are to hire a superintendent and set policy," Haubold said. "Sometimes you have to pay for a good leader."

The school board has four positions open, three terms of three years each and one term of one year. The election will be April 5.

cclark@semissourian.com

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