Q & A with the Candidates

They had spent an exhausting week campaigning for the job of Los Angeles Unified School District superintendent, but Ruben Zacarias, Daniel Domenech and William E. B. Siart had never met--until Friday. It was only then, when the three spent 90 minutes with a group of Times reporters and editors, that they exchanged views. Earlier this month, the Board of Education chose them as finalists for the $166,000-a-year job now held by retiring Supt. Sid Thompson. Each man was interviewed individually by the board and numerous school organizations and participated in three public weekend forums. The board is expected to pick a winner by mid-May. Here is an edited dialogue among Zacarias, 68, a deputy Los Angeles district superintendent; Domenech, 51, a regional school superintendent on New York’s Long Island; and Siart, 50, the former president of First Interstate Bancorp.

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Given what you’re facing, the scrutiny, the many problems of the school district, I just wonder why each one of you wants this job.

Zacarias: Very simple. I’m a native Angeleno, I believe in public education, I believe in a democratic society. Public education is the one vehicle that affords opportunities for all peoples. Los Angeles is the Ellis Island of the nation. I believe in this school district; I’ve had 30 years in it, and I’m sure my experience and qualifications will help us continue efforts that we’ve started.

Siart: I’m also a native of Los Angeles; I grew up here. I care a lot about Los Angeles, I’ll stay living here, and in looking at the performance of the school district--in results, accountability--it hasn’t shown performance for kids. Education made a difference in my life. I didn’t have connections and wasn’t born in the right family, but through education I was successful. And I think every one of the kids in Los Angeles deserves that same opportunity. I bring something different to the table from the standpoint of having been successful in a large organization, a complex organization like the school district, but not an education organization. Someone who is not an educator, who is from Los Angeles, should be part of this process.

Domenech: Well, I’m clearly the outsider. Why I’m interested in this position has to do to a great extent with what Ruben mentioned earlier, and that is that, like many of the children that live in the Los Angeles area, I am an immigrant to the United States of America. I came into New York City at age 9, not speaking any English, Cuban-born, speaking Spanish. And because of the educational system and the opportunities that were offered in this great country of ours, I was able to overcome an impoverished background and develop professionally. A lot of people have been suggesting to me that I’m crazy. Why do I want this job? Before my career is over in education, I want to be able to have the opportunity to make a significant contribution within an inner-city setting, a significant contribution to that aspect of American education that’s clearly different from the ‘burbs. Suburban education is doing quite well in America, but the children that attend our urban schools are not. And that’s an issue that I think we need to address. And to the extent that there are three people that are willing to undertake this challenge, that’s magnificent.

What about the sheer size of this school district? What useful experiences have you had getting large organizations to both work and work a little bit more effectively? How do you think that might apply in the Los Angeles Unified School District?

Zacarias: This district has accomplished a unique task in the last several years of decentralizing. One can credit the LEARN reform movement for a lot of that effort. But I think we have to expand it.

Siart: Large, complex organization are always hard to work, whether they’re a school system, a university or a company. Very difficult. So in many cases, the larger it gets, the less well it works. That’s why a lot in corporate America are spinning units off or downsizing. How do you make a difference in a big company or a big organization, make everybody get the message? I think you have to take the units that focus on the customers--in the school business I would say they’re the kids and their parents--and you organize such that the senior level is as close to the people who run schools as possible. So you knock out the layers--the idea of decentralization in clusters or regions. However you do that, you cut down the layers so you can communicate quicker. Then you have to involve everybody in what your message is . . . so that by the end of the day, they know when they get in a situation where you can’t tell them what to do, they know what the themes and messages are, and about 90% of the time they’re going to do the right thing.

Do you know what your top two or three priorities would be in L.A.?

Domenech: Mine is definitely the student achievement, first and foremost. Following student achievement, we want children to be in a safe and secure environment so that they can learn--and we have a big help in that area in terms of the $2.4-billion bond that was just passed. Third to that is enlarging and working on the reform initiatives that are already part of the system in terms of board-based involvement, the LEARN project and shared decision making, but recognizing that those are all elements that are supportive of what happens in the classroom, which is learning, achievement. And the focus of that is the classroom teacher and the child at the classroom level.

Zacarias: Mine are about the same. One has to be student achievement. Two, school safety. And three, teacher preparation. We must expand our staff development, not only for teachers, but for our paraprofessionals. I don’t know if you know this, but teacher assistants or teacher aides are given a lot of instruction and language acquisition classes, where the teacher is not really bilingual. Fourth, the superintendent has what’s called his “call to action,” which includes curriculum standards, and it’s crucial, absolutely crucial, that we define what those curriculum standards mean. It’s one thing to say, “All children in the eighth grade will be given algebra.” How many eighth-grade teachers have been given the opportunity to learn how to teach algebra? When I was teaching fourth-grade elementary in Boyle Heights, someone at the national level said there shall be new math. You know what they forgot? Training the teachers to teach the subject.

Siart: I would agree with the objectives. Achievement: Focus on the tests, trying to get averages to about the 50th percentile. Secondly, specifically focus on reading at grade level by third grade. And the other one, which I think is probably the most difficult to define, is outcomes. Kids go to school because when they come out of 12th grade, they’re going to do something. And one of them is to go to four-year colleges, one of them is to go to community colleges and one of them is to get a job. I think that would be a real way to measure what the outcome of your effort is and so I’d figure out a way to do that.

I’d like to talk about hurdles that each of you face. Mr. Domenech, you’re an outsider in a town that’s not kind to outsiders--check with Police Chief Willie L. Williams or former school Supt. Leonard Britton. You’re a Cuban American in a town dominated by Mexican Americans. So how are you going to overcome those obstacles?

Domenech: Because everybody loves success. And the key line here is that whether you’re an insider, an outsider--if you come into the job and you don’t succeed, it’s not going to matter. And we all have to have a plan and we all have to have the ability to implement that plan and make things work and to quickly begin to show the parents and this community that change is being made in the right direction. When that happens, I think the fact that I am not a Mexican American, even though I am a Latino, or the fact that I am not a native resident of Los Angeles will not matter.

Mr. Siart, you’re white in a school district that is 67% Latino, and you’re not an educator. How do you overcome this?

Siart: I don’t think it makes any difference which one of us gets this job; the parents are expecting results, and they should. And the objective is to get in there and change, because what we’re doing right now isn’t doing it. You’re looking for visible signs. If you see a change in performance, then the parents and the students are going to start moving toward satisfaction.

Mr. Zacarias, people say you’re too old and you’ve been in this system a long time, aren’t you part of the problem?

Zacarias: I’ve had 30 years of experience, as a teacher and an administrator. I would stand on my record of qualifications and accomplishments. As far as age, I’ll run 20 or 30 laps with my two colleagues and see who’s in better shape. That’s not an issue to me.

If rapid change is what’s needed, can you tell us the time frame you believe you would need to enact radical change, and would you put that in your contract: that if I do not enact radical change in this period of time, then I will go?

Domenech: Let me tell you, from what I know about superintendent contracts, it doesn’t matter what you have in your contract--you’re going to get fired, period. Reasonable change? I think you can expect reasonable change within a period of a year because what you’re looking for here is a pattern that’s going to be consistent in terms of growth. Within the first year you’re going to be able to show the start of a trend that’s moving in an upward direction. The expectation realistically should be that within a five-year period you can make a significant change in achievement scores on the part of the students in this district.

Siart: I don’t want and don’t expect a contract, so it won’t make any difference, but I agree on the time frame. I think you ought to expect somebody to be in this job for five years--if they’re any good, it’s going to take them that long to make a big difference. But you ought to see tangible signs of change within 12, I might even go out to 18, months.

Do you mean, in the Mayor Richard Riordan mode, you would do this job for a buck?

Siart: Uh-huh. Finance is not my issue.

The proposed breakup of the school district, including the Valley secession movement, has received a lot of attention lately. What do you make of it, how seriously do you take it and how would you deal with it?

Zacarias: It is serious and somehow, in house, it’s not taken too seriously. I think the breakup of the district is really symptomatic of frustration that the taxpayer, parent, citizen has with the system. What they perceive to be a lack of quality education. I hear people say, “Well, we’ve got to launch a PR thing.” No. The best way to fight it is to produce children who can succeed. . . . I very strongly feel that if we don’t, the time will come when people will reach the point of saying, “To heck with it.” Eventually we’ll see some sort of division.

Siart: I agree the reason that people talk about that and talk about vouchers and talk about moving their kids out is because they’re not getting results. And unless L.A. Unified gets results, it will, in my opinion, absolutelybreak up. . . . I think probably it will happen in these next three years; whoever gets this job will go through it. One of the things that I look at, too, from a business standpoint is: What is the cost to deliver all these services that aren’t the actual education at the site? Because the theory is always, if you’re larger you can amortize that cost over more customers or more locations or more sites. In theory, then, the L.A. district should be able to deliver those at less per student than the smaller districts. If that’s right, out of whatever money you get you can take more money per student and put it in the classroom. How come we’re not getting the results if we actually are able, in theory, to put more money in the classroom? If achievement works, then we ought to be better off as a larger system than a smaller system and the people ought to support that. Most corporations are the same way. If they can’t perform as a large company, they divide up and go on into smaller companies. But if you don’t, it becomes a scam.

Domenech: It’s usually the haves that want to pull out, leaving the have-nots holding the bag, and when you do that, what you’re talking about is a situation where limited resources become even more limited because those that pull out of the systems are the ones that tend to have a bigger means financially and the wherewithal that contribute to the system. What the democratic system is all about is that those of us that have contribute to and pay taxes that help support those that do not. When you look at the integrity of a system the size of the Los Angeles school district, if you begin having the school districts that are at the upper end of the financial spectrum pulling out of the system, what that leaves are individuals in the system that have even less than what they had before with even reduced finances, and the problems then are exacerbated.

What kind of “grand gestures” would you make to regain public confidence early on?

Zacarias: Within three weeks, I will have ranked every school in this district using measurable data--national tests, dropout rates, opportunity transfers, dropout rates. It’s not a grand gesture, but something that needs to be done. You want change, people have to sense pressure, consequences. Not to be punitive, but: “If this doesn’t happen, then you face this, this and this.” You know, I think we’ve complicated this thing called education. It’s very simple: Either a school by these measurable indicators is performing, or it’s not. And if they’re not, I have a very simple system. As regional superintendent, I told schools: “I want two things from you--go back, sit down with your staff, find out why do you have this problem, then I want a plan of action. Then I want you back here in three weeks, maybe four weeks. And I want you to put it in writing.” The first year, people came back with their plan of action, but no analysis. This is like a doctor prescribing medicine without knowing what the ailment is. Amazing things happen when people see there are consequences, that somebody is on them, saying, “Why this, why this?” It’s not enough to have test scores published once a year. The hardest part of this job is being honest; that is part of being in school administration, because schools are a very tightknit family. We’ve been together for 10, 15, 20, 30 years. But you either cut it or you don’t.

Domenech: My grand gesture would be to provide for every school in the district, based on the measures that are available to the school district, a report card that every child could take home to the parent so that every parent can see how their child is functioning in that school relative to the performance of all the other students. And every school can see where that school is functioning relative to the performance of the school district as a whole and the district as a whole can see how it’s performing relative to national standards. Once you’ve done that, you have made a public issue of exactly what the schools’ positions are relative to all of these other measures. And that will help significantly in focusing public attention on those areas that are in need of improvement. And it will also help the district focus the limited resources. That becomes the benchmark then for progress as we talk about what are the expectations then in terms of a year from now that we need to see, and the growth over a five-year period.

Siart: That’s interesting because I’ve always believed in grades--because I think everybody gets them real quick. And in banking that’s what I used. I gave our bank a grade in 1985. And it was a D. I had a chart and I showed them why they had a D. And I said what we want to do is an A, which was an objective. They had never reached that objective in 25 years. And so we said, this is where we’re going to go. It was in five years, which is about the same time frame for change, and then every quarter we gave a report card and then we gave a grade. I think every school ought to have a report card because people understand report cards. I might even go further and have them near the principal’s office. I’m sure if it’s sitting on the front of the school, and each time anybody walks in there they’re going to see a grade, and if that grade’s below a B or below a C, I don’t think anybody’s going to be too excited and they’re going to be pushing for change.