By Erin Hawkins
Olympic Peninsula News Group
SEQUIM — Sequim School Board hopefuls offered their views of school facilities and teacher pay at a forum last week.
The Sequim Sunrise Rotary Club hosted the forum last Friday to provide a look at the four school board candidates running to fill the positions for director district No. 2 and director at large, position No. 4.
Both positions are for four-year terms on the school board. Michael Howe now holds the director district No. 2 position, and Brian Kuh is serving as the board vice president and director at large.
Jon Kirshbaum and Kuh are running for the director district No. 2 position, and Nola Judd and Brandino Gibson are running for director at large, position No. 4.
When asked whether candidates believe Sequim school facilities are adequate, Kuh, Kirshbaum and Gibson agreed they are not.
Kuh emphasized a focus on getting students career- and college-ready, and said to update facilities, he believes “we have to pass the bond and seek equity in funding from the state level.
“But the way we’re going to build schools here is through a bond.”
Kirshbaum siad he believes the state constitutionally must fully fund K-12 instruction.
“There has to be disparity between what the state provides and what the local people provide,” he said.
Gibson said he believes the future of education is in technology.
“We have inadequate schools in science labs built in 1960, and yet we are trying to teach our children how to advance,” he said. “We need some new facilities.”
Judd said she was unsure how to answer the question because she is not acquainted with the conditions of all the schools and wanted to reserve comment on the issue until she knows more.
Rotary member Brian Jackson asked the candidates how the district could better adapt spending, saying Sequim teachers receive 7 percent less pay than surrounding districts, such as the Port Angeles School District.
Kuh said that as far as administration pay compared to teacher pay, there is a notable difference.
“Yes, the gap exists, and that’s public knowledge,” he said.
He said while this might be true, “it’s not an excuse; our teachers deserve equality across the board and in the region.”
Kirshbaum said: “I think that is somewhat of a function of the representatives of the individual unions and deferring increases to meet hard times.”
He said he doesn’t like to compare pay across districts, adding, “It doesn’t have to be in just Clallam County; I think there are different industrial community differences that make up voter acceptance of proposals for salary increases.”
Judd said she attended the most recent school board meeting and heard many teachers and advocates for teacher pay saying the district is behind in wage support.
“My gut feeling is our teachers have been trying to keep the lid on not increasing their wages, but now as a consequence, they are way behind other school districts in that area,” Judd said.
She said she is unsure how to solve that problem but believes the district “has got to come up with something that can be relied on [to fund teachers] or we’re going to lose quality teachers,” she said.
“They will not stay if they cannot support their own families.”
Gibson said he does not like the idea that Sequim schools are behind in teacher pay.
He added: “It would be interesting to be sitting in that room [district administration] to look at the full numbers and make a determination on where we do stand.”
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Erin Hawkins is a reporter with the Olympic Peninsula News Group, which is composed of Sound Publishing newspapers Peninsula Daily News, Sequim Gazette and Forks Forum. Reach her at ehawkins@sequimgazette.com.
