Georgia Democrats Grill Joe Martin

CONYERS, Ga. - More than 40 education-minded citizens showed up Saturday morning, August 28, for the regular monthly meeting of the Rockdale County (GA) Democratic Party. The guest speaker: Joe Martin, Democratic nominee for State Superintendent of Schools.

In a year when jobs and education are two of the most hotly debated topics for any candidate, this position is getting more attention than in some previous years.

In the audience: Kelly Stone, a teacher at a Title I school, who has worked for two different Georgia counties and feels she knows all too well the pitfalls of the current system.

"The dynamics of a classroom are complicated," she told me after the meeting. "You have different learning levels, cultural differences and yet classroom teachers are not considered when key decisions are being made. Teachers have the ultimate accountability with the least amount of power. I have no say in the curriculum of my classroom but I am completely accountable for everything that goes on in my classroom. The new superintendent can have a big impact on the classroom process."

In a state where the superintendent has no budget creation authority, implementing real change is going to be a tall order. In fact, whoever wins in November, the Georgia legislature has already strapped him with a directive of reducing the current budget an additional 10%.

Martin seemed to have a realistic grasp on the limitations and challenges the job holds.

"(As superintendent) I'm just a messenger. I'm just a means to an end," he told the crowd referring to the strong grasp the Georgia legislature holds on the Department of Education's purse strings. "But we need a State School Superintendent that is going to stand up - it's just as simple as that. We need someone who will stand up and support all these wonderful initiatives and make sure they really happen."

Many in the crowd expressed concern over Georgia's drop-out rate, a number Martin claims is not accurately measured.

"We don't know what the graduation rate in Georgia is," he said. "Because there are a lot of schools that report kids who are really dropping out, they just report them as transfers. They don't show up any place else, so I think they dropped out, but they go on the record as a transfer.

It's with the money from the much maligned Race to the Top that Martin hopes to reinstate a true student evaluation system that will track drop-out rates and work to diminish them.

Georgia was just approved for this federal initiative. The state has been promised $100 million a year over the next four years. The program has been controversial because of fear of federal interference in local schools.

"Unfortunately, I think we're going to have to find a way to work with the federal government," said Martin.

To his credit, Martin opened up the end of his portion of the program to questions. He sided with teachers present on the three largest issues raised.

Merit Pay: "Merit pay has to be linked to performance, but these plans to link salaries directly to standardized tests are just farcical."

Current Math Curriculum: "We need a time-out on the new math. There are some good features there, but we jumped into it without really knowing where we were headed. "

College Prep Track: "On the one-tier approach: not everybody's going to college, but everybody needs to have a good education and we just need more options."

Martin holds strong business and education-related credentials for this post. Time will tell if Georgia's voters will entrust him with it come November.