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Kyle Frank: Candidate Profile

Oakton Community College School Board (6-year Term) (Independent)

Note: Answers provided have not been edited for grammar, misspellings or typos. In some instances, candidate claims that could not be immediately verified have been omitted. Jump to:BioKey IssuesQA Bio City: SkokieWebsite: Candidate did not respond.Office sought: Oakton Community College School Board (6-year Term)Age: Candidate did not respond.Family: Candidate did not respond.Occupation: LawyerEducation: BA Northwestern JD VanderbiltCivic involvement: Candidate did not respond.Elected offices held: NoneHave you ever been arrested for or convicted of a crime? If yes, please explain: NoCandidate's Key Issues Key Issue 1 Increasing the dismal graduation rate.Key Issue 2 Taxpayers are having difficulty paying property taxes. We need to keep tax rates stable or lower them.Key Issue 3 Identification and removal of poorly performing instructors.Questions Answers With enrollment up at my many community colleges, it can be challenging to keep pace as far as available classroom/lab space, the number of qualified teachers and available course work options. How would you manage that?All stakeholders save money when students pass courses on their first try, without dropping his or her course. We need to make sure students manage expectations by enforcing prerequisits for each individual course. We need to match individual students with appropriate insturctors and remove instructors who have high drop rates and/or high failure rates. There is a lot of unused public space in the district. We need to utilize our high schools, since they have lab space.In tough economic times, many students (and working professionals) turn to a community college for its educational value. How do you ensure that a person's financial sacrifice results in an educational benefit?With respect to traditional students, we need to offer the placement exam at each high school in the fall of their senior year. This will manage student expectations. Then students will know weaknesses they can work on while still in high school. Then they can avoid remedial coursework. We also need to encourage students to take AP Courses while still in high school, which can decrease finacial sacrafise. With respect to working profesionals, we need to develope programs to reward these students for the expirience they bring and award college credit (through a exam) for this.Is a tax rate increase needed and, if so, how do you justify it?A tax rate increase is not needed.Community colleges provide many services to a diverse population. Is there a service your college should be providing that it is not, or reaching a segment of the population that it is not?We are not providing appropriate education to a lot of students. Sadly, many if not most students do not earn their degree. We need to manage expectations by offering the placement exam while students are still in high school, so they can work on academic weaknesses. Too many of the students drop our when taking remedial courses. I also want to offer a formal 5 year high school/associate degree, focusing on vocational education.If you are a newcomer, what prompted you to run for the community college board? If you're an incumbent, list your accomplishments or key initiatives in which you played a leadership role.Recently, I ran for state rep. in the 17th district against Laura Fine. One of the many things I learned was the low completion rate of traditional and working students. We must change this.