Rock Hill School Board Election

Picture by Andrew Kiel - NAACP Candidate Forum

There are four Rock Hill School board seats to be filled next week. Only one  has any opposition, that being the at-large seat which Chairman Bob Norwood decided to not to run for re-election.

The four candidates for that seat are: Dan Ballou, Terry Hutchison, Tyrie Rowell, and Wayne Wingate.  Be sure to thank these folks for running. They are offering some real choices.

I usually point out at each election, something that has been attributed to Mark Twain, In the first place God made idiots. This was for practice. Then He made school boards. It is probably better to point out some examples of what a good school board member has and what a good school board looks like.

There have been three candidate forums (4 if you count the 6th grade at Ebenezer Elementary School). There were a lot of good questions (and answers). Here are some follow-up questions I would have liked to have asked:

• You have all said the Rock Hill Schools are good or great. Please tell us the benchmarks you use to make this determination?
• You have all said the Rock Hill Schools can be better. What should they  be improving and what would be the road blocks to making progress?
• One of the board duties is to evaluate the superintendent. What do you believe are the most important qualities for a superintendent and what measures would you look to for an evaluation?
• What do you believe is the school district's biggest barrier to improving academic success and what would you recommend to reduce the effects of the barrier?
• If resources were no barrier, what would your school district look like?

A big thanks to the candidates. Good luck during this last week.