By David Vitrano

L’Observateur

RESERVE – Ten of the candidates who will be on the Oct. 2 ballot for the St. John the Baptist Parish School Board elections participated in a debate Wednesday evening at East St. John High School.

The St. John Association of Educators sponsored the debate.

Said SJAE President Carolyn Batiste, “So much has been going on, and people have been asking us questions.”

Gramercy native and LaPlace resident Nicondra Norwood, who is a meteorologist on New Orleans-based WVUE Fox newscasts, was the master of ceremonies.

As might be expected, many of the questions posed to the candidates had to do with budget matters. Budget talks dominated school board meetings throughout the summer.

Chris Ory, who is seeking the District 8 seat currently occupied by Russ Wise, was asked how he might avoid a financial crisis like the one that caused problems in working out the budget for the current year.

Ory replied, “When times get better, we need to save for when times get bad.”

His opponent was asked what his top spending priority would be.

Wise said, “Our priority has to be the kids,” a mantra that would be repeated often during the course of the debate.

Wise said he believes the parish has often had a problem with prioritizing when it comes to spending and needed to recognize the primary purpose of a school system.

“We are not a jobs producer,” he said.

When Sherry DeFrancesh was asked how she would ensure budget dollars were spent correctly, the board’s newest member stumbled somewhat, ultimately saying, “I don’t have an answer at this time.”

She later explained that she was not used to the world of politics but thought that was her strength as a school board member.

District 10 candidate John Olynick was asked what he thought about the possibility of outsourcing certain jobs such as bus drivers and maintenance personnel.

He replied, “I believe the importance of our budget is to make sure we have great programs for our kids.”

He said if that was the end result, he thought it would be a good idea.

His response drew some groans from the audience, and a couple of the candidates quickly voiced their opposition to outsourcing.

Current District 10 representative Matt Ory was asked what he would do to make sure the school system does not miss out on revenue opportunities.

He pointed out that being a board member is not a full-time position, so that is really the job of administration but noted that board members do have the responsibility to check behind administration and take aggressive action to ensure oversights do not occur.

Candidate Wilbert Ocmond, who is a 39-year veteran of the St. John school system, tackled a question regarding the closing of the Leon Godchaux accelerated program, a victim of recent budget cuts.

He said he thinks the students need to be socialized with students their own age and have their academic needs addressed individually.

“Those students who are two or more years older than the other kids in the classroom present social problems,” said Ocmond.

Some of the other questions concerned making sure all schools are dealt with equitably.

Rodney Nicholas, a Distict 10 candidate, was asked how he would ensure quality instruction was available at every school in the parish.

He said he would work to close the achievement gap that exists among different races and economic strata.

“I want St. John to raise their standards,” he said.

Current board Vice President Patrick Sanders addressed the issue of performance-based evaluations

He said he agrees with the new standards recently set by the state Legislature but thinks some fine-tuning still needs to be done.

“Teacher evaluation is very important he said,” he said but added, “There is no standardized litany of where the whole nation should be.”

Sanders’ opponent Ferdinand Wallace was asked where he would like to see the district in five years.

“We can elevate our kids to higher heights,” he said. “For now I don’t see it going in that direction.”

Statements such as the latter drew the ire of some of the current school board members, particularly Matt Ory, who said, “If this is a failure, I should not be here. … We are not at a snail’s pace … we’re greater than that.”

He and Wise cited the district’s recent successes on state-mandated standardized tests in showing the district’s progress.

Yvette Scioneaux, a candidate for District 2 and front office secretary at East St. John High School, was asked how she would close the gap that seems to exist between the SJAE and the School Board and administration.

She said frequent meetings and open lines of communication would be the remedy for that situation.

Batiste seemed to agree with her assessment.

“They want to communicate. We need to,” she said.

Batiste said she was please with the way the evening turned out although she would have liked to have seen more members of the community show up.

“Being a civics teacher, I was starting to feel a debate coming on,” she said.

The SJAE will meet the candidates in a more intimate setting next week when they sit down to in-depth interviews with each candidate Sept. 8.