Tuesday night, with just five days remaining until the St. Louis Pubic Schools election for three open seats on the Board of Education, 10 candidates were asked their vision for eliminating the achievement gap between black and white students in the district.
The forum drew about 60 people, which was “the largest crowd yet” for a candidates’ forum, according to Harold Crumpton, president of the St. Louis Chapter of the NAACP.
Peter Downs, who has two children in the city district, said that “the school board sets policy, and it is up to educators to enact that policy.”
He said one way of improving the performance of students in the predominantly black school district is by increasing money spent on maintenance.
“School should be a special place,” he said. “It should be kept in good repair. It should be kept spotless.” Downs said a school in Franklin County, Illinois had embarked on this strategy, and test scores of students quickly improved.
He said other ways to improve black student academic achievement include “teaching students where they are at, which means sometimes a first grader would be sitting next to a fifth grader. Educators must deal with that.” He added that “computer-based education” could help fill in the gaps and bring students up to proper academic levels.
Flint Fowler, executive director of Herbert Hoover Boys and Girls Club, said, “One must first recognize that there is an achievement gap indeed.”
“We must open the discussion on race and its impact on education. There should be no finger pointing. We should use data and research to guide us and show what will work and what won’t.”
He said teachers must be encouraged to “take risks” and also “give students a voice.”
Fowler also said that underachieving students are often not made aware of after-school programs and programs that would help them improve schoolwork.
“There is no magic bullet. It will take the entire community,” he said.
Nancy Galvin said that a reduction in the achievement gap calls for “clear goals aligned with academic standards that are set very high.”
“You set the curriculum in line with the goals, and then it is important to have consistency from school to school.”
She said the district must hire “highly qualified teachers who majored in his or her own subject matter.”
Galvin said school counselors must also be “familiar with African-American culture” and end the cycle of “sending too many black kids to special education and too few to gifted classes.”
Daniel Kinney used his four minutes to attack Mayor Francis Slay and City Hall.
“The best way to bridge the gap is to instill trust in the community,” he said.
“The only way to do that is to quit the raping and pillaging of this community, and quit trying to buy elections. We must tear down the ivory tower built by the majority of the school board. We have to draw the proverbial line in the sand. It’s time for the greedy cockroaches at City Hall to start hiding again. Whether they like it or not, the light is about to be turned on.”
Joseph Keaveny admitted that he had “no idea of the magnitude” of the achievement gap until he began his campaign for school board.
“Over the last four years, it has got worse. This is just wrong. I saw the outrage when the board announced 16 schools would close and when kitchen help was outsourced. I never saw the outrage over (the achievement gap).”
He said the community must be involved in improving black students’ academic performance and people need to bring any concerns including discipline “to the board.”
“There is plenty of blame to go around. Now we need to concentrate effort on getting the resources to improve,” he said.
Frank Kriegel Jr. said that the gap in academic achievement between races “didn’t always exist.”
“This has not been a problem for a long time.”
He said that socioeconomic conditions created some of the gap, but said “the school board has no real power” to eliminate it.
He said that the change must come in individual schools, such as Peabody School on the city’s near South Side, which he said has “a dedicated principal, teacher and students.”
He said that almost all of its students receive a free or subsidized lunch, yet its third-grade reading scores “exceed the third-grade state level and every school (in St. Louis) except Kennard, the gifted students’ school.”
He also praised the Open Reading program and other phonics-based reading programs.
Joe Moramarco said the first step to closing the achievement gap is “acknowledging that it exists and realizing we can’t keep our heads in the sand on this matter. It exists in magnet schools, it exists in gifted schools.”
He said the teachers in the classroom “must understand the culture where students come from,” and he called on schools and teachers to recognize a problem at home and find the proper resources to rectify it.
He said when a remedial program is called for, “get it” and “we need the will to do it.”
He said the community “can count on my voice as one that will insist that we not keep our head in the sand on this matter.”
Veronica O’Brien, the only sitting school board member who is running for an open seat, said the district “is failing all of its children.”
“Before we leap into dealing with the achievement gap, we need to educate all our children first, be they white, black or Bosnian.”
O’Brien, whose children attend Clayton schools as part of the voluntary transfer program, said black students who are in that program “are achieving. They are doing a little better. This proves that it isn’t ‘just black Johnnie or Susie’ that can’t learn. Something else is going on in this district.”
She praised board member Ron Jackson’s commitment to battling the achievement gap, and said she hopes to return to the board “to work with wonderful people such as Ron.”
William Purdy, a former school board member and president, said the achievement gap was addressed during his time on the SLPS board with the passage of two resolutions.
“What happened to them with this current board, I don’t know,” he said.
He said he attended every school board meeting over the past two years and has “yet to hear the subject of the achievement gap being addressed.”
He said “equity in facilities and technology” are key to reducing the achievement gap. He added that another factor would be “shedding that corporate mentality. (The school board) must care about children. This is not just an eight-hour-a-day job, and improving the district can’t be approached this way. If so, no one will succeed.”
Monica Nichols-Johnson said her first-hand experience as a former teacher in the district gives her knowledge other candidates do not possess.
“The biggest challenge will be the budget. But the board will never get anything done, because we have got to be together. Everyone has to get along, for starters,” she said.
She cited “inappropriate spending” and “a lack of community involvement” as problems that have helped to increase the achievement gap.
The forum was sponsored by the NAACP, Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., and the St. Louis Black Leadership Roundtable.
Backing the candidates
Mayor Francis Slay is backing Fowler, Keaveny and Moramarco in a series of radio ads, has endorsed the three candidates and is backing them financially.
The organization Advocates For Kids has endorsed the same three candidates and has the public backing of Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis President James Buford, acclaimed attorney Frankie Freeman and Black Leadership Roundtable chairwoman Sandra Moore, president of Urban Strategies.
The 28th Ward and 2nd Ward Democratic Committee have also endorsed Fowler, Keaveny and Moramarco.
The following individuals and organizations have endorsed, Downs, O’Brien and Purdy:
Arthur “Chink” Washington, Alderwoman Bennice Jones King and the 21st Ward Democratic Organization; Alderwoman Dorothy Kirner, Norma L. Sutterer and Margaret Lampe and the 25th Ward Democratic Organization; Alderman Frank Williamson, Joseph Palm and Patricia Moss and the 26th Ward Democratic Organization; state Democratic Officer and Committee Leader Mattie Moore and the 2nd Ward Independent Democratic Organization; and the 1st, 3rd, 5th, 20th and 27th Wards.
