Photo by Deb Gau Marshall School Board candidates, including Aaron Ziemer, Ben Walker, Sara Runchey and Jeff Chapman talked about issues related to Marshall Public Schools facilities and curriculum at a Thursday night panel.

MARSHALL – All four candidates running for Marshal Public School Board in the upcoming election gathered Thursday to talk about the district’s needs, from facilities to academic programs.

The panel, which brought together current school board members Jeff Chapman and Aaron Ziemer as well as candidates Ben Walker and Sara Runchey, was one of several held Thursday night in Marshall. There are a total of three Marshall School Board seats up for election on Nov. 6.

The panel discussion led with a question about facilities needs in the Marshall Public School district. In recent years the district has had two failed referendum that would replace or expand school buildings in Marshall. However, candidates said they thought the need for space and updated facilities was one Marshall will still need to address in the future.

“It’s one of the major things we face,” Chapman said. He estimated that the Marshall district has seen an increase of around 400 students over the past 10 years, and schools were in need of more classroom space.

Chapman said there was also the issue of what to do with the West Side Elementary school building.

“Right now, we look at West Side – it’s a 60-year-old building. Half the plumbing doesn’t work,” among other problems, Chapman said. “It’s really served its purpose,” and needs to be replaced, he said.

“There are some pretty big needs in the school district,” Ziemer said. In order to address them, he said, the district may need to find updated ways to market a building referendum, and to reach out to people who didn’t feel like part of the process before.

Runchey said approaching another referendum or building project would need lots of community support and engagement. Runchey referred back to her experiences on the school district’s facilities committee, marketing a referendum around 10 years ago. She said her disappointment with that process was that there wasn’t a lot of engagement with businesses and other parties outside the community.

Walker agreed that marketing would be a key part of revisiting building and space issues, but also pointed out the role that funding mechanisms played. “I think we need to revisit how we go about getting that funding,” he said.

The discussion also covered the academic achievement gap between students of color and white students in Minnesota. Candidates acknowledged the problem, but they were also more positive about Marshall’s efforts to close the gap.

“This is something we as a nation have been dealing with a long time,” Runchey said. Runchey said she didn’t have answers from a teacher’s perspective, but she did think part of addressing the achievement gap would be engaging the community.

Walker said, as a teacher, he’s found the best way to get the most out of students is to listen to them. Marshall should do the same with its community, he said.

“We need to listen to what other people need, and try to find ways they can be successful,” Walker said.

“The tough thing is, I think we have to acknowledge that what we’ve been trying hasn’t been working,” Ziemer said of the achievement gap. “I think we really need to get back to putting control back to the teachers in the classroom, back to the administrators, and back to the people who can really make a difference.”

Chapman pointed out that while Minnesota may have a bigger achievement gap than other states, Marshall doesn’t have the worst achievement gap in Minnesota, and is working to close the gap.

“Our achievement gap is changing for the better,” Chapman said.

Candidates also talked about whether Marshall High School needed to put more emphasis on vocational skills in its curriculum.

“I think we need to look at all options,” Ziemer said. Ziemer said Marshall has been active in looking toward vocational and technical education, and implementing technology in the classroom.

Chapman cautioned that state funding and mandates on education limit what Marshall can realistically do. If the district were to expand vocational education, something else might have to be taken away.

“What I’d really like to see is some of the mandates taken away,” Chapman said. He said he’d like to see something more like Watertown, S.D., where the city high school and vocational/technical school are next to each other and share resources. But, Chapman said, “We’d have to have our state legislators help us on that.”

Runchey said Marshall has made positive strides in vocational education with the welding and nursing programs at MA-TEC, but it would be great to see more.

“I do think we have to change the idea that everybody’s meant for a four-year degree, or a two-year degree or a one-year degree, and really start teaching to the needs of our students, and the needs of our community in terms of workers,” she said.

Walker said he’s also heard concerns from young people about a need for more practical life skills education – things like filing taxes or auto repair and maintenance. Marshall has lots of good options for academic achievement, Walker said, but “I think we need to put more of our focus right now on that.”