Candidates telling different stories on testing

A pair of candidates for a seat on the Mat-Su Borough School District School Board are sharing their different perspectives.

Thomas Bergey grew up in a two-room schoolhouse in Gakona, Alaska. His mother was a teacher since 1944, and Bergey continued his education on through the University of Alaska and in the Army.

“One of her biggest complaints was the amount and quantity of supplies that she had to buy personally for her own classroom, so I am very sensitive to that situation,” Bergey said.

Bergey sees the test scores in the Valley as too low, and has extensive history in literacy and testing during his time in the Army and as a homeschool parent.

“I’m distressed that we present ourselves so low and there needs to be reason for that,” Bergey said. “These are skills that are needed for them to become employable and they’re base skills and we’re doing our children an injustice.”

Bergey is a farmer in the Butte and wants to see a fresh set of eyes on the school board. He also wants to see increased control of curriculum in the classroom for teachers.

“The whole purpose here is to ensure that the children coming out are functioning at the level society needs,” Bergey said.

Bergey says that parents with two or more children will see at least one of their children fail to function at grade level for reading, and Bergey has taken issue with that.

“Make parents feel more empowered in their individual local schools and not bring the focus down more to the individual building and the individual classroom as much as I can. And in a big district, there is always going to be a degree of centralization that we cannot avoid,” Bergey said.

Debby Retherford tells a different story of testing. A recent study showed that Mat-Su students scored higher than those in Fairbanks, Juneau, Kenai, and Anchorage.

“Continuing to improve our graduation rate where we’ve improved it in 13 percent in the last 10 years,” Retherford said. “People don’t understand the sound bytes they’ve heard about test scores and that our children are at the bottom of the heap, because they’re really not. They’re basically the best in the state.”

Retherford takes issue with the politicization of elections following districting of school board members.

“It’s not about party politics,” Retherford said.

Retherford has engaged with concerned parents and teachers during her time served as a member of the school board.

“They certainly aren’t shy about calling me or sending me emails, so I’ve talked to a lot of people. I’m always available to answer questions if people want to email me.

Retherford wants to pursue behavioral health support to ensure safety of Mat-Su students, and wants to partner with the community even more to help students through challenges. Retherford also has problems with Prop B-3.

“I think there are consequences to some of these voter initiatives,” Retherford said. “I think we need to be careful that we know everything about combining this election before we do it.”

Retherford denied the rhetoric that her opponent has employed, saying that Valley test scores are far too low.

“I don’t believe he’s telling an accurate story about our school district. He's talking about our budget and, as a banker, I know our budget really well and its tight. He’s talking about test scores and we really are not on the bottom of the heap,” Retherford said.