Incumbents Favored In School Committee Race

Cambridge voters will head to the polls today to elect six candidates to the School Committee, helping to determine the course of the city’s education program over the next two years.

In their campaigns, candidates have focused on familiar themes, with many saying they aim to close the achievement gap along racial and socio-economic lines, they oppose the MCAS test as a high-stakes graduation requirement, and they will focus on the city’s high school as its restructuring program continues.

Ten candidates—including five of the six incumbents—are running for the school board, with the incumbents widely expected to retain their seats.

“I know the candidates have been campaigning very hard,” said Saundra M. Graham, a former city councillor and state representative. “There’s a lot of new people in town, and, depending on whether they come out to the polls, [that] will change the election.”

Incumbents Alfred B. Fantini, Joseph G. Grassi, Susana M. Segat, Alice L. Turkel and Nancy Walser are running for reelection, while Fred Baker, Vincent J. Delaney, Marla L. Erlien, Richard Harding Jr. and Alan C. Price are aiming to get elected to the School Committee for the first time.

Graham said that the incumbents “are fine” and that the seat being vacated by five-term School Committee member E. Denise Simmons—who is attempting to make the traditional jump to the City Council—will be claimed by either Harding or Price. Both candidates seek to fill the void left by Simmons as a member of the school board and of the black community.

“We normally have had a minority of the School Committee, and the liberals do vote to sustain that,” she said.

Former Cambridge mayor Barbara Ackermann echoed Graham’s sentiments.

“It’s very important in a city with so many minorities to have minority representation in the School Committee.,” she said. “Luckily two African-American candidates are running. I hope that one of them will be elected.”

The defining issues of the election will be the high school and the MCAS test, Graham said.

“The kids have not been getting the quality education they deserve,” she said.

Most candidates do not believe the MCAS should be used as a graduation requirement.

“It starts to limit amount of innovation public schools can do,” Walser said.

“Using [the MCAS test] as a graduation requirement is not kind, and is also not really going to lead to kind of results that improve student learning,” Turkel said.

Price also opposes the “high-stakes” test and suggests offering “local diplomas” to students who do not pass the MCAS, he said.

Baker offered a different view, however. He said the MCAS should simply be delayed as a graduation requirement until “we get it right.”

Some candidates have emphasized the importance of integrating non-English speaking students into the schools.

Turkel said she is “proud to be one of the active School Committee members” to create AMIGOS, a bilingual immersion program.

Segat supports bilingual education as well as foreign language instruction in kindergarten through third grade. Marla L. Erlien also advocates bilingual education and helped to establish the AMIGOS program as a bilingual school.

On this issue, Baker also diverges from the general opinion of most candidates. While he supports immersion education, he said he strongly opposes bilingual education.

“Wherever it’s been eliminated, test scores have gone up,” he said. “We ought to do [non-native English speakers] a favor and teach them English.”

On the issue of the achievement gap—a perennial problem in the Cambridge schools—the candidates offer a variety of proposals.

Harding has said he wants to improve the educational opportunities for minority and lower-income students, saying that school-choice is unfair for these students.

Grassi also opposes school choice.

“We have to deal with the inequitable system of school choice which separates our students by race, socio-economic status and level of special ed services,” he said.

Baker, however, said he supports the current system of school choice.

“Parents can do a better job of choosing a school than the government,” he said. He explained that when “bad schools” are consistently not picked, they will have to “clean up their acts.”

Price said he wants to improve all schools so that school choice does not remain an issue.

“One of defining issues of this campaign is getting people to focus on

the reality that no amount of shuffling kids addresses fundamental inequalities

building to building,” he said.

Despite their differences, all candidates agree that the quality of Cambridge public education must be improved and that it must be distributed equally among all students.

“[My} prime concern is the achievement gap—making sure kids from different economic, racial and cultural backgrounds are able to achieve in the school system,” Turkel said.

And after one term on the school board, Walser remains optimistic about the power of the School Committee to improve education in Cambridge.

“Cambridge has a reputation for not putting an emphasis on quality, so people don’t expect the best,” she said. “We’re on the verge of changing that.”