West Aurora school candidates talk tests, money

Four people are seeking three 4-year terms on the West Aurora school board: incumbent Valerie Brown Dykstra and challengers Joseph Grisson III, Richard Kerns II and Christopher Sparks.

Grisson defends standardized testing, such as the annual Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Career test. "You have to have tests, otherwise you don't know how good or bad you are doing as a district," he said.

"I understand what they were trying to get at with a national test," Kerns said. "But it was not well-implemented."

Sparks said changing tests frequently has made comparing results year-to-year difficult. And that each time the state changes tests, teachers have to be retrained. He would prefer changes be spread out.

"I think we test too much," Dykstra said, adding that the emphasis on tests interferes with teaching children how to think critically.

"I don't think PARCC is effective," Kerns said. "Especially for our ESL (English as a second language) kids. It is amazing to me, even our immigrant kids coming in are forced to take it in English."

Dykstra agreed. "I don't know how you can accurately test a child who doesn't speak any English," she said.

Money

What would the district do if state funding were decreased or if the state enacted a property tax freeze?

Grisson suggested the district increase efforts to obtain grants and not just from government agencies. There are private foundations, including ones that could provide aid with computer technology, he said. "We've got people in town who can give a few million dollars to do things."

Dykstra has suggested the district could delay doing capital projects a year, and said student programming should be the last thing cut.

One administration move Dykstra opposed was removing full-time librarians from elementary schools.

"The main issue I had with it was they decided they were going to eliminate the library visits and they didn't really tell anybody that was the intent," she said.

The move was made to make way for a STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) program, which she said was covered in existing curriculum.

Sparks' wife was one of the librarians affected; she now is an instructional technology support specialist at West Aurora High School.

"Libraries are not repositories for books," he said. Librarians teach kids how to deal with an "onslaught" of information, including judging the accuracy and veracity of things they see on the internet.

Kerns agreed with the decision. More attention needs to be paid to STEM education, he said, and teachers are capable of helping students pick reading materials. His wife teaches fourth grade at Hill Elementary School in Aurora.

Grisson said he suspects the Millennial generation uses libraries less than previous generations. "I think that things have evolved in how people are getting their information. Librarians could be a great way of offsetting or refuting that fake news," he said. He said he was not sure how to fix the issue. He said he supports more STEM education.