THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, April 26, 1996 TAG: 9604260490
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A12 EDITION: FINAL
SERIES: Decision '96
Part 2: The Issues: Portsmouth School Board
SOURCE: BY VANEE VINES, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: PORTSMOUTH LENGTH: Long : 140 lines
In his six-year tenure, Superintendent Richard Trumble has stuck by his belief that the best way to prepare all students for life after high school is to give them a solid foundation in the basics, aiming to make sure they can at least function at the level of a college freshman.
That way, he says, whether they're headed for college or the workplace, they'll have the smarts to hold their own in today's global economy.
That was the guiding philosophy when the nearly 18,000-student district ditched many of its vocational-technical offerings in the past several years. The reasons for the shift away from vo-tech education also touched on districtwide budget crunches; obsolete equipment that was never replaced; and, subsequently, declining course enrollments.
The training most students leaning toward vocational or technical careers were then offered didn't amount to much - academically or otherwise.
Vo-tech education - the paucity of it, really - is now one of the hottest issues in the city's first School Board election and a regular City Council election May 7.
It's taken several years of persistently dismal districtwide achievement - and the prodding of some School Board members and those on the Vocational Education Advisory Council - to get Trumble to rethink his ideals.
But numerous students, parents and taxpayers in this blue-collar city complained from the start about what they viewed as the demise of vocational education - specifically courses that trained students for trades such as carpentry or auto mechanics.
``The vocational training program is so minimal it's nonexistent,'' said Stephen A. Barrow, a retired administrator with the Norfolk Naval Shipyard and a member of the advisory council.
The quickest way to get more students involved in specialized vocational programs is to strengthen ties to area institutions like Tidewater Community College, which has an array of vocational courses, and to pursue more partnerships with businesses that can give students on-site training in skilled professions, Trumble said.
In fact, both the administration and the School Board are now aggressively pursuing those ideas.
The board also earmarked an extra $364,000 in next year's budget for vocational ed.
The money will help pay for new equipment - computers, for example - and cover tuition and other costs to send more students to vocational-technical centers outside the district, administrators said.
``Clearly the tide is changing,'' Trumble said.
``The current board is concerned about what options we're providing for students who are, one, not college-bound and, secondly, do not have college-ability skills.''
At the heart of the matter is a deep-rooted fear among city residents that thousands of students will miss out on a decent future because they're not headed for college; yet, they're not getting truly marketable skills to compete without a college degree.
That scenario, they say, doesn't bode well for Portsmouth's future.
Donald Newton, an 18-year-old student at I.C. Norcom High, says he's getting the kind of education he wants.
But he's getting it in Norfolk.
Every school day, Newton travels to Norfolk's Technical Vocational Center, where he's enrolled in the automotive mechanics program.
Each semester, Portsmouth pays currently pays Norfolk $1,143 per student, per semester in tuition for Newton and five others to take hands-on, specialized classes at the center. The first semester bill for eight Portsmouth students was about $9,000.
Newton, who's been enrolled in the program since September, said his mom asked a Norcom administrator about the program last summer after she read about it in the paper.
He wishes more Portsmouth students could have the same type of opportunity.
``They're not, like, stressing the issue to get more people involved in vocational stuff,'' he said.
``That's why we got people hanging out on the streets. . . .But the first thing (school officials) holler about is money. It's always money.''
Money has indeed driven some of the district's decisions in the past several years to move away from vocational education, particularly the type that requires expensive hardware.
Many vo-tech classes that cleared the administration's chopping block are - even by Trumble's standards - ``low-tech or no-tech'' and ``nothing special.''
Some classes remain popular, like catering and those related to health occupations.
But by and large, the district's vo-tech offerings stress only clerical skills, basic technical skills or the kind of knowledge acquired in what was once known as home economics.
Few of the courses are intellectually challenging.
A key reason Portsmouth has one of Virginia's lowest drop-out rates is because ``modified'' - or watered-down - classes have been created, particularly in vocational areas, to keep underachieving kids on attendance rolls, Trumble acknowledged.
Like other districts across the state, Portsmouth has a ``Tech Prep'' program, which combines academics and technology.
But that, too, has felt the financial pinch.
The district has struggled just to pay for regular education. That's one of the main reasons it's now looking to farm out any beefed up vo-tech offerings to places with existing centers.
While sending students to such places can be expensive, it's cheaper than providing the same thing at home, Trumble said.
Guidance counselors and other educators, he said, also will be encouraged to spread the word about new offerings - once the board settles on what they should be.
Few students know about the arrangement with the Norfolk center, for instance - mainly because the district typically covers tuition only for special education students whose ``individual education plans'' call for such training.
One of Portsmouth's biggest wake-up calls came in December, when General Motors Corp. announced a school-to-work partnership that could land Norfolk and Hampton high school graduates $50,000-a-year jobs right out of school.
Portsmouth was passed over because it no longer has a vo-tech center or an automotive program.
``It was very disappointing to see a lot of those things go,'' said Laverne Townes of Cavalier Manor, whose son, Jeffrey Keranen, takes classes at the Norfolk center.
``With better vocational training, a lot of those students could still go out and get reasonably paying jobs. Now, most of our young people can only get service jobs at McDonald's.''
Trumble himself is still trying to figure out what type of beefed up vo-tech program will attract all kinds of students - including the district's brightest - while also providing more ``academic rigor'' and benefiting those trapped in a web of school failure.
Tall order.
But what's not wanted, he said, is a new initiative that's like the vast majority of vocational programs in secondary schools across the country - intellectually undemanding. Dumping grounds for students who are the hardest to educate.
``Why perpetuate the traditional view?'' he said. ILLUSTRATION: Photo by Richard L. Dunston/The Virginian-Pilot
Norcom student Donald Newton must go to Norfolk's Wo-Tech [Vo-Tech]
Center because Portsmouth's programs were gutted.
KEYWORDS: PUBLIC JOURNALISM COMMUNITY CONVERSATION PORTSMOUTH SCHOOL
BOARD CANDIDATE ELECTION by CNB