So What Do the Candidates for Mayor Say?

Very soon, ballots will be mailed to voters. We are voting for a number of City positions including mayor. So what do the candidates have to say about education? Here are links to Joe Mallahan's website and Mike McGinn's website.

Neither candidate supports school vouchers or charter schools.

Mallahan has nothing at his website about education. I found this quote at Publicola from a recent forum:

"I will work with Seattle Public Schools to create community schools, where adults can pursue continuing education and receive additional training in the early mornings and evenings while their children receive quality child care."

I know that Dr. Enfield, our CAO, recently traveled to NYC and there, with Councilman Burgess, visited a number of community schools. She told me that it was very interesting but that the district has so much going on that it would be difficult to give this kind of project the attention it would need to get going. Now if Mallahan, if elected, and his staff wanted to get this project underway that might be good but I doubt it would be the first thing on their agenda.

I am still waiting to interview Mr. Mallahan but I'm sure this little blog is pretty low on the list. Maybe by the end of September.

McGinn, if you didn't already know, has education as a major plank in his platform. His website has a whole section on education. You can go back through the threads and see my early interview with him on his views.

Whether you agree or not, the one thing I give him credit for is the understanding that as Mayor (and I have heard this from City Council members as well), he would get a cheerful earful from constiuents on a regular basis on Seattle Public Schools. He said that the high percentage of private school enrollment plus the general dissatisfaction among the general public should warrant a mayor to think about what to do. Whether his answer is the right one, that's up to you to decide. He does point out,

"That’s why President Obama’s Education Secretary Arne Duncan believes that mayor should take control of big-city school districts where academic performance is suffering."


Mayor Nickels and Senator Murray had suggested this a couple of years back as well so it's not like McGinn's pulling this idea out of a hat.

I guess SPS is kind of like the weather; everyone complains but no one does anything about it. Is all the complaining worth a huge change? I had someone say to me recently "Our school system isn't that bad off." and I would agree at a certain level. But I would also say that the constant churn (to use Mary Bass' word) is exhausting. It feels like this district is bogged down with so many issues that the actual educating seems far down on the list. It feels like well, maybe next year when X,Y and Z have calmed down, things will be better. I cannot honestly say that at this point with so many issues in flux that things will be better in the near future.

Something to think about.