CANDIDATES FOR THE State Board of Education in District 9, l-r, incumbent Dr. Don McLeroy and Thomas Ratliff, spent Friday afternoon in Teague answering questions posed by area educators. Two candidates for the State Board of Education, District 9, made a joint campaign stop Friday afternoon in Teague to answer questions posed by area educators.

Making the stop were incumbent SBOE member Dr. Don McLeroy and challenger Thomas Ratliff.

Both are seeking the Republican nomination in the March 2 primary election— there is no Democratic candidate for the post.

McLeroy, 63, is a dentist in Bryan and has served on the board since 1999, including two years as chairman. Recently, he failed to get confirmation for another term as chairman.

Ratliff, 42, of Mt. Pleasant is a businessman and lobbyist.

Although the two candidates share the same political party, they embrace differing ideas of the role of the state board, and of its performance the past few years.

McLeroy believes the past two years when he served as chairman as a time of accomplishment, and Ratliff views those years as divisive.

The board approved curriculum standards for English, science and social studies which were hotly contested, and changed management of the Permanent School Fund investments.

“We have a huge responsibility over education standards and I take that responsibility really seriously,” McLeroy says. “Some people think I’m a very controversial person.”

He states a goal of helping teachers to raise academic achievement by concentrating on traditional subjects of reading, writing and arithmetic, but not on critical thinking skills.

Ratliff believes that the SBOE should set guidelines for educators, but should not immerse itself in details that can best be worked out by school boards and administrators.

The challenger thinks that teaching needs to evolve with the times—- methods used in the past are not always the best to reach today’s students.

“I’m a big believer in electronic content,” Ratliff says. “We’ve got to teach these kids differently than we were taught.”

Both candidates are fans of e-textbooks, but differ in that McLeroy believes the state board should control all content and Ratliff believes that school district boards should be involved in approving appropriate content.

But, the biggest difference in the candidates is the process under which the board operates, one that has become contentious over the past few years.

Under McLeroy, the SBOE has adopted English, mathematics and science curriculums, revising all three.

It took two and one-half years to draw new English standards, and although it was messy the incumbent is proud of the board’s work.

Ratliff, on the other hand, points out that teachers involved in the process and with whom he has visited say they feel they were marginalized by the SBOE.

“Teachers worked two and one-half years and feel their product was largely ignored and devalued,” Ratliff says.

How the state board selects experts to testify on matters also is a bone of contention. If two members of the board agree a person is an expert, that person is deemed an expert.

“We get people on those panels that are more political than expert,” Ratliff says, likening the board’s experts to political appointees.

The challenger also believes the SBOE would be better served if candidates did not run for seats as part of the political party process, but all ran independently from political parties.

“I do not think partisan politics should be part of the State Board of Education,” the challenger declares.

“I like the idea of Democrats and Republicans running for this office,” McLeroy says.

Because there are no Democrats seeking the District 9 post this year, the candidate that takes the post will be picked in the Republican Primary.

In response to a question from Teague Independent School District superintendent