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Thursday, October 12,1995
ELMEiy School Board Candidate Profiles
Chapel Hill and Carrboro will elect five new members to the Chapel Hill-Carrboro Board of Education Nov. 7.
Today, The Daily Tar Heel profiles the final three of the 13 candidates seeking to improve the school system.
■ School Overcrowding Needs to End
Matthew Barton said he wants the
Chapel Hill-Carrboro Board of Education
to curtail school overcrowding, and as a
member of Stop Overcrowding Schools,
he said he would work to make sure the
board uses proper planning to solve the
problem.
“We (5.0.5.) are actively campaigning
for a reasonable, substantial impact fee,”
Barton said. “It would be used to help
finance the acquisition of land and con
struction of new schools.”
“There is a lot of new construction in
Chapel Hill and Carrboro, and the average
houses being built have about 9,000 square
feet,” he said. “The current fee is only
$1,500. We would like to bring that up to
$3,000.”
Barton said the impact fee would allevi
ate the tax impact on long-term residents of
the town and would subsidize those mov
ing to the area.
“It should be a graduated impact fee,”
he said. “It would be lower for low-cost
housing, so that it would not have a nega
tive impact on low-cost housing.”
Barton said there were other ways to
raise revenue for building new schools but
that it was important to plan correctly to
obtain the maximum benefit from public
funds.
“The school board needs to work very
closely with town and county officials with
research that shows impact studies and to
plan new development so that it will not
overwhelm schools in the future,” Barton
said.
New developments such as Southern
Village and others are expected to place a
heavy burden on the school board to find
space to place new students, Barton said.
■ Better Leaders Will Improve Schools
It is time to establish new leadership in
the Chapel Hill-Canboro Board of Educa
tion, Peter Morcombe said.
“Poor leaders have one answer to every
problem,” Morcombe said. “That is, ‘Give
us more money.’ We don’t need more
taxes. We just need better leadership.”
Morcombe said his major goal will be to
decentralize the way the system is run. He
saidhe would accomplish this by establish
ing site-based management.
“Our district has established site-based
management, but has been careful to keep
the real power at the Lincoln Center,”
Morcombe said.
“Until the vast majority of our public
school administrators work on-site, site
based management will remain just an
other sham reform,” he said. “When au
thority is truly at site level, schools are free
to be different and free to find creative
solutions."
Morcombe said decentralizing the sys
tem should help to improve minority test
scores.
“It’s the highest-performing school sys
tem in the state as far as white children are
concerned,” Morcombe said.
“It's not even average as far as black
children are concerned. What we want to
do as school board members is encourage
the schools to go out and find the things
that work.”
Morcombe said race relations in the
school system are in need of improvement.
“Black parents know fraud is being per
petrated on them,” he said. “I would
strongly base anything I would want to do
as a school board member in trying to close
this disparity between the black and the
Voice Your Opinions on Local Government at The Daily Tar Heel's Candidate Forums
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“The town showed that twice as many
students are coming in new households
than had previously been stated,” Barton
said. “Large developments are coming in,
bringing larger numbers of students into
town. The town’s study now gives us a
factual basis for the need to increase im
pact fees.”
Once students are in classrooms, the
focus turns to performance and safety.
Barton said the board is on track to raise
minority test scores, with a commitment to
experiment with programs proven in other
schools to help minorities.
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white students. There are lots of ways to do
it, if you will just take the handcuffs off the
principals and the teachers.”
Morcombe said he felt the board did not
support teachers’ attempts to combat vio
lence and disruption in die classrooms and
that unruly children should be removed.
“ Y ou can’t just allow the teaching expe
rience of 22 other kids to be mined by one
kid who wants to ride around on the floor
and make noises,” Morcombe said.
He blamed the current board for over
crowding in the schools because of waste
ful spending and poor planning. To allevi
Matthew Barton
Age: 39
Address: 218 Stratford Road
Previous Experience: Current
vice president of Sewell
Elementary School PTA
Occupation: Software engineer
Children: Two, one in public
school
Length of Time in
Community: Two years
CoHege Attended: Yale
University
Site-based management is another topic
Barton would like to address as a member
of the board. He said he feels site-based
management is good, but measures should
be taken to ensure parents and students
receive the benefit of good administration.
“It takes time for people to leam how to
use site-based management,” Barton said.
“It should not be used as a replacement for
trained administrators and educators, be
cause a lot of parents do not have time to
attend the meetings. We still need a skilled
group of administrators.”
PROFILE COMPILED BY CARLOS DE MATTOS
Peter Morcombe
Age: 57
Address: 110 Lisa Dr.
Previous Experience: None
Occupation: Electrical
engineer
Children: Six, one in public
school • ■ ■
Length of Unto in
Community: Eight years
College Attended: Cam-
Diiage university
ate overcrowding, he suggested a bond in
1996, bigger than the last S4O millionbond.
“Before it has a chance to pass you need
the school board and the administration to
say, ‘We’re sorry, taxpayers, we made ter
rible mistakes with the last bond, and we’re
going to rectify that situation. This time
we’re going to do it right,”’ he said.
“If the incumbents come up with that
statement, nobody is going to believe them,
so you really have to have a set of new
people on the school board who are cred
ible.”
PROFILE COMPILED BY CARLOS DE MATTOS
CITY
■ Current Curricula Do Not Benefit All
Louise Cole said she would like to see
the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools es
tablish true site-based management and
change its curriculum.
“With true site-based management, if a
particular school wants to implement a
new curriculum and good things happen,
the others will want to try it,” Cole said.
Cole said the current curriculum is not
challenging some students and is leaving
others behind. She said she was concerned
that minority scores in the system are be
low the state and national average.
“Durham had almost 10 times the num
ber of students taking the SAT, but beat our
minority scores by almost 40 points, ” Cole
said. “In a school system proud of being
the best in the state, we’re lagging behind
with our minority students.”
Cole said poor race relations is one of
the problems that has caused the disparity
between black and white children.
“I feel the curriculum is just not work
ing for the black children,” she said.
Cole recommended using either the core
knowledge curriculum or the Calvert cur
riculum, both of which have shown prom
ising results in raising the test scores of
minorities. She said the Calvert curricu
lum, adopted by an inner-city school in
Baltimore, improved scores of students
significantly.
“A lot of curricula today are trying to
give students self-esteem, but you can’t
give them that,” she said. “They need to
earn it.”
Cole also said the present school board
was financially irresponsible. “Lack of
proper facilities and recent extravagant
planning have reduced the district’s ability
to build,” she said. “We’ve spent so much
UNIVERSITY DAY
FROM PAGE 1
of the University was broadened from one
into 16,” said John Sanders, emeritus di
rector of the Institute of Government. “On
the whole I think it’s been good for Chapel
Hill, given the alternatives.”
One of the alternatives Sanders men
tioned was a system used in some states
under which there is one governing board
for the entire state, rather than separate
institutional boards for each university.
“The (BOT) can give more attention to
needs,” he said. “That’s one advantage we
have compared to that alternative.”
Sanders said being linked to the 15 other
schools has been beneficial to UNC-CH,
especially regarding the allocation of
money. He said a statewide bond issue of
COMING OUT
FROM PAGE 1
and exposing people to gays,” she said. “It
is incredibly important for visibility.”
Erickson said there was a need to make
students aware of gay issues. “This is sup
posedly such a liberal, open-minded cam
pus, but people still have a lot of myths and
misconceptions about gays,” she said.
Stacy Hermelin, a junior from Greens
boro, said she participated in Wednesday’s
activities because she felt they might have
made students more comfortable with ho
mosexuality.
THURSDAY
3 p.m. UNC COUNSELING CENTER pre
sents “Intimate Relationships: Changing Old Pat
terns Group.”
4 p.m. UNIVERSITY CAREER SERVICES
will sponsor “Nonprofit Sector Internships” in 306
Hanes Hall.
5 p.m. CAROLINA ASSOCIATION OF
BLACK JOURNALISTS will have a meeting in the
Employee-Faculty Lounge in Howell Hall.
7 p.m. SARR will have a dialogue program
training session in Union 206.
It’s Your Turn to Ask
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• Where you can afford to live
• What cable channels you can watch
• Where you can drink
• Where town-gown relations are going
RAISE your voice & yDur Q uestlons at Hot elections forums!
Carrboro Board of Aldermen Chapel Hill Town Council
& Carrboro Mayor & Chapel Hill Mayor
7pm, Sunday, October 15 7pm, Tuesday, October 17
Union Auditorium Great Hall
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HkSil M
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I
money on these Cadillac-type schools that
we could have built four or five schools.”
“I’m very upset with the waste of money
the administration has perpetrated,” Cole
said. “We had a S4O million bond referen
dum, and they only built one and three
quarters schools with that money. The
schools are extremely elaborate. They’re
extremely hard to heat and cool. The hall
ways have 36-foot ceilings, and the library
has a 42-foot ceiling,” she said.
Cole said she hopes parents will have a
greater say in what goes on in their
children’s schools.
around $ 310 million which was to go to the
UNC system that was passed several years
ago was proof of the advantage.
“The only reason it won was because it
was all for one and one for all,” he said.
“Had there been 16 separate bond issues, I
think all of them would have lost.”
Sanders said concentrating programs
such as law and medicine at a few univer
sities was more economically sound.
“It’s an ideal way to use limited re
sources,” he said. “We can’t afford to run
16 medical schools.”
Significance of the Ceremony
Spangler said all the campuses in the
UNC system recognized academics in some
sort of celebration each year. However, the
ceremony at UNC-CH this year has taken
on special meaning, he added.
“NCOD (National Coming Out Day) is
great because everyone can realize that
they really do know gay people,” she said.
“Once that happens, homophobia will start
to decrease. We hope that NCOD will
allow people to be more open and to be
proud of who they are.”
Students were very supportive ofNCOD
activities this year, said Dale Kawamura,
B-GLAD co-chairman. In previous years,
NCOD activities have been unpopular with
many students, but the reaction seemed to
be better this year, he said.
“National Coming Out Day was very
successful because we had a lot of interest
Campus Calendar
CHILD ADVOCACY PROGRAM will meet m
Union 213.
OVERCOMERS will meet in 100 Hamilton Hall.
The topic is “Having non-Christian friends.”
CAROLINA INDIAN CIRCLE will meet in
Union 210.
N.C. FELLOWS AND LEADERSHIP DE
VELOPMENT will have a workshop on “Public
Speaking: A Leader’s Meeting.”
9 p.m. CELLAR DOOR LITERARY MAGA
ZINE will have a general interest meeting in Union
226.
Sail)} Gar Hppl
Louise Cole
Ago: 49
Address: 904 Woodbine Dr.
Previous Experience: Culbreth
Middle School Governance
Committee, Curriculum Restruc
turing Task Force
Occupation: Microbiologist
immunologist for the Environmen
tal Protection Agency
Children: Six, two in public
school
Length of Time in
Community: 19 years
College Attended: Brigham
Young University
“I like public input, but if we have true
site-based management, the parents are
not going to have to come to the school
board,” she said. “They’re going to go
directly to their teachers and the princi
pals, and they would only come to the
board if there’s a problem they can’t solve
at the local level.”
One problem that concerns parents is
violence in the schools. Cole said teachers
should be given more support in disciplin
ing and removing unruly children from the
classroom.
PROFILE COMPILED BY CARLOS DE MATTOS
“At UNC this is a double ceremony in a
way,” he said. “Each campus (of the 16
system schools) has some event in the fall
which celebrates scholarship.
“There will be 200 universities repre
sented by delegates. We encourage the
chancellors from the 15 other schools to
attend.”
“I think it is a very significant event,”
Spanglersaid. “ThehistoryofUNC-Chapel
Hill has been a distinguished one. When
things go well, it reflects favorably on other
campuses.”
Spangler said he thought there would be
several thousand peopje present at today’s
ceremony.
“It’s an event of significance across the
state of North Carolina,” Spangler said.
“In every town and village, we have gradu
ates who’ve done well in all those areas.”
in the activities in the Pit and good atten
dance at all of our programs,” he said.
“Every year it gets better.”
Erickson also said the event got a good
reaction from the student body.
“I feel like this year we’ve had a lot of
support,” she said. “Hopefully NCODwill
be able to dispel some of the myths. We still
have the reactions from people who don’t
understand, but I hope that they approach
us about their concerns.”
Many students who were not affiliated
withß-GLADparticipatedin Wednesday’s
activities.
For the Record
In the Oct. 11 issue of The Daily Tar Heel,
the headline 'Fetzer, Kerckhoff Comfortably
Win Re-Election in Raleigh and Durham’ in
correctly stated that Durham Mayor Sylvia
Kerckhoff retained her position in the elec
tion. Kerckhoff received the highest number
of votes in the primary election. Kerckhoff and
Harry Rodenhizer will face off for the final
election next month. The DTH regrets the
error.