School chief race draws spirited field

SEATAC – The opening-day crowd at the recent Washington State PTA convention was a lively, thousand-strong mass of people. The ballroom swelled with cheers for door prizes, then faded to back-of-the-room chatting.

In front of this crowd, Richard Semler rose. With little introduction, he painted a stark picture from his boyhood: the day his mother told him that she and his father were divorcing.

“That conversation destroyed my life at that age,” he said. “We were dirt poor.” At night, he said, the family would go to the grocery store and gawk at food they couldn’t afford.

The crowd fell silent as he continued.

“And the school? I hated school,” he said. “I hated studies. I hated my life. …And if it were not for three teachers at Shadle Park High School at 13, 14, 15 years old, I would not be here today.”

Welcome to the race for state superintendent of public instruction, an emotional five-way battle for what the candidates say is the most important thing of all: our children’s futures.

The race pits a controversial 12-year incumbent, Terry Bergeson, against Semler and a third strong candidate, former lawmaker and union leader Randy Dorn. The battleground issues: student testing, teacher accountability and school funding.

“This is about kids,” said Dorn, painting a picture of an educational system hamstrung by testing pressures, ineffective leadership and straining budgets.

Here’s a look at the five major candidates so far.

Terry Bergeson

A Cape Cod native, Bergeson, 65, has been Washington’s top education official for 12 years. A staunch accountability advocate, she says it’s critical to show taxpayers they’re getting their money’s worth before seeking more.

In the early 1990s, she headed the committee that launched the Washington Assessment of Student Learning. She has long vowed to “transform” teaching and ensure that every student get a meaningful diploma.

But the test has angered many teachers and education advocates. They say it’s too costly and crowds out other learning. Many locals of the state teachers’ union – of which Bergeson was president in the late 1980s – have issued votes of no-confidence in her. When hundreds of WEA members come to Spokane for the group’s annual convention later this week, they’ll likely consider a similar vote.

“The education communities have lost faith in Terry,” said challenger Dorn.

A former teacher, Bergeson acknowledges the angst over the test. Inflexible federal requirements haven’t helped, she said, and she’d like to see testing in fewer grades. But she said the accountability has dramatically improved education.

“When you stand for something you believe in, you make enemies,” she said.

In June, Bergeson will release her plan for better funding. The burden of paying for schools is increasingly falling on local taxpayers. Fixing schools, she said, will take more money.

“And I know how to do it efficiently, in a focused manner,” she said. “…We need to have a combination of funding and accountability, joined at the hip.”

Randy Dorn

Dorn, 55, says he brings an unmatched breadth of experience: He’s been a teacher, principal and state lawmaker. For eight years, he’s been executive director of Public School Employees of Washington, whose members include bus drivers, tutors and custodians. He knows his way around a classroom, he says, and also knows how to get things done in the statehouse’s marbled halls.

Bergeson has failed to bring real reform and more money into education, Dorn says.

“I understand how to get people in the room and put things together,” he said. “That’s a huge difference.”

Yes, he said, schools should be accountable. But the WASL shouldn’t take so much time. It should give teachers prompt feedback. As things stand, he said, the pressure for high schoolers to pass the test for their diplomas is squeezing out opportunities for creativity and exploring learning.

Teachers “figure ‘if I just pass this kid in the WASL nothing else matters, because that’s his graduation,’ ” Dorn said.

The state must also do a better job of helping groups that tend to struggle with the test, he said, such as African-Americans, Native Americans and Latinos.

Dorn wants more alternatives for the WASL diploma requirement. Grades, attendance and projects should also be considered, he said.

Olympia has famously produced a long list of reports calling for changes in education and how it’s paid for, he said, only to quietly shelve those studies.

“We have to be honest with the public that there are things in education that are getting more expensive,” he said.

Rich Semler

Semler, 62, grew up in Spokane, the oldest of six kids. After earning a bachelor’s degree in zoology and a tour of duty with the Army in Vietnam, he got his teaching degree from Eastern Washington University and his master’s degree from Gonzaga University. For 11 years, he has been school superintendent in Richland.

Semler said he’s running to fix things. The WASL test does little to help teachers teach, he says, and state leaders have no plan for broad reform, and beginning teachers in Puget Sound can barely afford to pay their rent.

“I felt I needed to run to, sort of, right the ship,” he said. Among his supporters: the state teachers’ union.

When educators try to tell state officials that the test isn’t working the way it should be, he said, “they say ‘Well, why are you against high standards?’ It’s like talking to a wall.” Lawmakers have high ideals, he said, but don’t understand how schools work. He sees his role as an intermediary between the state and schools.

His strategy for more school dollars: beef up the lowest teacher salaries and encourage more people to teach math and science. Then use the measurable improvement in learning to make the case for better funding.

“I’m not naïve enough to think that if we just say, ‘We need another $500 million,’ everybody’s going to flock in and say, ‘Give them the money,’ ” he said. A school funding overhaul will take at least a decade, he says.

He also echoes an increasing call for schools to do a better job of teaching the kids who aren’t headed to college.

“It’s our job to find a child’s love, where their heart is, and prepare them for that,” he said.

Don Hansler

Unlike the other candidates, Hansler, 78, has filed papers that limit him to a campaign of less than $5,000. A retired teacher, he ran for governor four years ago. He got 1 percent of the vote.

Hansler has long advocated bonuses for teachers who get good reviews from parents.

As for the WASL, he wants to grant one type of diploma for university-bound students and another for those headed for technical schools.

His answer to budget woes: a flat-rate income tax that would replace most other taxes.

He said parents could call him directly and that he would read all letters he gets, so long as they’re handwritten. Typed letters, he said, would be handled by a secretary.

David Blomstrom

Blomstrom, 52, is the race’s other long-shot candidate. He’s agreed to the same low-budget campaign as Hansler. Blomstrom said he’ll seek no endorsements and attend no candidates’ forums, “simply because they’re manipulated by the establishment.”

He has run unsuccessfully for Seattle school board three times and twice before for state school superintendent.

The WASL is “evil,” he says. But he maintains the key issue in the race is corporate corruption.

“I want everyone in this state to know that corporate Seattle is Washington’s de facto capital and that Seattle is rotten to the core,” he wrote recently in a response to a reporter’s e-mail.

He bristled at the suggestion that he’s a gadfly.

“I’m probably the only serious candidate in the race,” he said, dismissing the main three candidates as “career educrats.”

“This is my sixth campaign for public office,” he said. “This demonstrates that I’m not a quitter.”