Tommy Wells, Candidate for
Wards 5 and 6 Representative to the Board of Education in the
November 7, 2000, General Election
Parents United Questionnaire, October 2000

First and foremost, the board must set an agenda that is based on collaboration with the entire DC community. This agenda must clearly identify priorities and goals. Once that agenda is defined, the board members need to build consensus among parents, teachers, city officials, and citizens to not only support the agenda but also firmly commit to its implementation. Finally, the board must develop a realistic implementation strategy.

Because the superintendent is charged with implementing the board’s agenda, these priorities and goals in effect are the criteria for selecting the best person for the superintendent’s job. Candidates should be evaluated on their ability to address the board’s priorities and meet its goals, including their records of achievement in cities similar to DC. Moreover, the superintendent’s performance should be based on his or her progress in meeting the board’s goals.

To assist and support the superintendent, the school board must be an advocate for clearing barriers to fulfilling its agenda and providing tools for meeting its goals. This means the board must be committed to using its authority over the public school budget, procurement practices, and personnel policies to support its agenda and foster conditions that attract a well-qualified workforce.

What is the role of parents in the DCPS at both the individual school and citywide? Should the Local School Restructuring Teams be continued and if so, how can they be made more effective?

Parents in the DCPS are the school board’s customers and partners. The board must respond to the parents’ needs and concerns, but also enlist the parents as partners in implementing an agenda for success – whether as advisors, volunteers, school employees, or simply supporters of educational values.

The elected school board members need a perspective beyond their individual districts and should not attempt to micromanage the schools. However, to achieve an equitable school system that provides a quality education for every DC child, the elected members must represent their districts’ interests and provide a resource for the parents and teachers who rely on their leadership. All citizens need to know they can turn to their elected school board representatives to raise their concerns. Moreover, elected board members need to reach out to the parents in their districts to understand emerging issues and monitor the progress of the board’s policy initiatives.

I believe the local school restructuring teams (LSRTs) show promise for ensuring that local neighborhood concerns and values are addressed on a school by school basis. The LSRTs can provide an important service both as advisors to the school board and local school administrators and as partners in decisionmaking. Particularly in the area of school-based budgeting, LSRTs can be an effective force for decentralizing school budgets and procurement procedures. Budgeting at the local school level has received strong support over the years, but the school board has lacked the leadership and will to make it happen. I support continuing the LSRTs and will work to implement school-based budgeting in cooperation with LSRTs throughout the District.

What is your view of the facilities planning process now underway?

The facilities planning process has been an important way to provide members of the school community and the larger community with basic information about school facilities in a way that allows people to see the big picture. The exercises have also encouraged participants to think in new ways about class 5 school size and the alternative use of excess building space.

What has been your personal involvement with DC Public Schools? Have your children been enrolled and for how long? Why are you interested in this position?

My wife, Barbara, and I have no children, and therefore we have not experienced the DC Public School System as advocates for our own family. Instead, our involvement with the public schools emanates from concern for all our city’s children and a strong belief in the central role of schools in strengthening our community.

I began working with the District’s public schools in the 1980s as a social worker, serving more than 250 children in the DC foster care system. Half of those children were in special education. All of the children, as well as their parents and foster parents, needed advocacy and intervention in dealing with education issues. I not only helped these families work with their schools, but also made sure that as many children as possible graduated from high school or obtained government equivalency diplomas. In many cases I managed to enroll the children in college, knowing the tremendous impact that even one year of college has on a young person’s self-esteem and future opportunities.

In recent years, I have continued my involvement in DC schools through the Eastern High School Business Advisory Council, which helps children transition from high school to careers in health and human services. I work to establish business and government partnerships with the school, and engage members of the Consortium for Child Welfare in working with the students. In addition, as chairman of my ANC I created and led an education committee dedicated to working with parents in our community to improve our schools. The committee sought ways to increase parental involvement and improve schools safety and sanitary conditions, creating an improvement checklist for our local high schools. The committee also provided a forum for integrating neighborhood schools and libraries into community life.

Barbara and I also are tutors of two children involved in the Friends of Tyler School program. Barbara began six years ago mentoring a fifth-grade student who is now a senior at School Without Walls. Our relationship with the student and her mother has deepened and grown through the years, expanding from skill building and homework to working together to choose and apply to high schools, cultivate extra-curricular activities, and ultimately enroll in college. I also tutor a fourth-grade student, working with him and his mother to resolve problems that arise at school and participate in the community baseball league.

I want to serve on the school board to improve the lives of our children, restore direction and focus to the board’s work, and support a quality school system that draws families back to our city. Despite a strong economy and booming housing market, DC will become a great city only when we provide quality education for every child in our public schools.

How can you avoid the acrimonious relationships between board members, and between the School Board, Superintendent, Mayor and Council that have prevented a concerted effort to bring to our children’s schools all of the resources need to provide the high quality of public education our children need and our city needs for them?

My professional life has been motivated by my desire and ability to build consensus for constructive change in the lives of our most vulnerable children. As a DC child protection social worker and director of the DC Consortium for Child Welfare, I have worked from within and outside the government to reform dysfunctional programs and initiate new ones to address critical issues, including the crack and AIDS epidemics. As an advisory neighborhood commissioner and community activist, I have built consensus, often among deeply entrenched adversaries, for measures that improve our quality of life. As director of the DC Consortium for Child Welfare, I have worked with a diverse board of directors to forge a common sense of mission and win support for taking on some of the city’s most pressing child welfare issues.