League of Women Voters of California Education Fund
Santa Clara County, CA November 4, 2008 Election
	Rick Costanzo Answers Questions Candidate for Board Member; Campbell Union High School District

The questions were prepared by the Leagues of Women Voters of Santa Clara County and asked of all candidates for this office.
Read the answers from all candidates (who have responded).

Questions & Answers

1. How would you determine that the schools are using federal, state and local funds wisely and fairly and how would you report your findings to the community?

A school board is largely a goal setting and policy making body. A large part of the job for a board of trustees is to set goals for the district and to monitor the district's progress toward those goals. As a part of this process, the board must establish policy that ensures that district expenditures are in line with the district's goals and monitor that as well. The best way, then, a board member has to make sure district funds are spent wisely and fairly is to make sure the district's goals are wise and fair in the first place.

A board member must ensure that student learning is at the center of those goals, that improving academic performance is a centerpiece, that there is equity in terms of access to materials and equipment, that there are high expectations for learning for all students, that only those funds which are absolutely necessary flow any other way but toward the classroom, that our schools remain safe places for students to be and that systems are in place for communication with parents and the community. District website postings, school site visits,mass e-mailing, the annual school report cards and direct mail newsletters are all excellent ways to report to parents and the community about district goals and progress toward them as well as the alignment of district expenditures.

2. Are the schools offering instruction appropriate to the diverse educational abilities of all the students?

I believe this is an issue that all schools are wrestling with today. The Campbell Union High School District has a history of being able to offer a full range of courses to meet the needs of all students, from A.P. and honors courses to those that meet the needs of students with severe learning and physical handicaps. As a board member, I would seek to broaden even further the range of educational opportunities and subject choices to meet the needs of students who, increasingly, will live in a world-based economy. But, the real issue is not whether courses are in place to meet the needs of all students. They are in place but may still not meet the ever greater demands required to meet the diverse student population. The real question is whether those courses are being as effective as they should be in meeting those needs. To determine that and to make any necessary changes, we must use data more effectively to determine what each student needs as well as to determine whether or not instruction is fulfilling that need.

3. Where do you want the District to be five years from now? What steps should the District take to get there?

There is a lot of talk today about model lesson plans, and I think that, as educators, we can learn from what has been successful in other places. But, it is also true that students have different needs, and I don't always have faith that an instructional technique will work here, just because it worked well in Colorado. I would like to see this district become an educational organization that focuses on the needs of the students in its classrooms now. I would like to see it with a well developed structure for determining the needs of present students, and I would like to see it with a well developed set of strategies for using data to monitor student progress and for altering instruction to maximize the learning of those students. I don't want us to be satisfied with looking at data just at the end of the year, finding out where learning was weak, and hoping to do better with the next set of students to come. We must do better with the students we have, while they are still in our classrooms.

I would also like to see the district with courses of study that emphasize the practical applications of what is learned, so that theory and knowledge translate to skill sets that have application to job classifications in the real world, and where technology and language skills become part of the way of work and part of the way of working in a world-based economy. I would like to see a district where community-based learning, internet-based learning and brief internships play a larger role in the overall curriculum, and where all students are involved in the activity life of the school in some way. I would like to see a district where more students come away from high school with the skills necessary to attend college, whether they plan to attend college or not, because more and more jobs in the job market that don't require a college education require the same level of skills and abilities anyway.

To do these things will require change, and change can be difficult. But, once again, it is the job of a board of trustees to set goals for the district and to align expenditures to achieve those goals. The board of trustees, then, can be a prime agent of change for the district, and I would like to play a part in achieving those goals, in making the changes necessary to help guarantee our children's future.

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Responses to questions asked of each candidate are reproduced as submitted to the League.  Candidates' responses are not edited or corrected by the League.

Read the answers from all candidates (who have responded).

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Created from information supplied by the candidate: October 23, 2008 13:13
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