SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — Voters filled Plaster Student Union Room 313 on the campus of Missouri State to hear from Springfield School Board candidates in a Q and A forum.
The seven-candidate field includes incumbents Scott Crise, Maryam Mohammadkhani, and Danielle Kincaid.
The election features challengers Landon McCarter, Chad Rollins, Kyler Sherman-Wilkins and Susan Everett Provance.
The event, run by the student group Paws to the Polls, featured several questions centered around topics like diversity on SPS staff, the effect of potential gender identity/care legislation on students, book bans and why they stand out.
Here’s what the candidates had to say about why they stand out:
“Our terms are three years, and when I see that it’s like drinking from a water hose, that is an understatement. So our board is incredibly young,” said incumbent Danielle Kincaid. “We need to have some stability on the board of all seven of us on the board, there’s only one individual who served more than three years, and that’s Dr. Thomas Tate, who is finishing up her fourth year. So we need some additional stability. I like an efficient meeting, and that’s something that I can bring to the board and I do bring to the board.”
“The biggest asset that I believe that I can bring to the school board is just my lifetime with Springfield schools,” said Susan Everett Provance. “I graduated from Glendale long before they had girls’ sports. I’ve been involved in quite a few different sports and activities. I realized firsthand how important those activities, those experiences are. I know that it builds a lot of self-confidence, but your participation requires your attendance, your grades, and your citizenship.”
“My father was a teacher for 30 years. My mom was a teacher for 14 years,” said Landon McCarter. “My brother, my sister and I graduated from high school and I currently have three children in the district. Next year I’ll have a high schooler, a middle schooler and an elementary student. I got my degree from Missouri State University. I believe that the single most important thing that qualifies me is I’ve been a business owner and a leader in the community now for 15 years. I had a very diverse leadership board of seven individuals from various backgrounds, various identities, and we were very successful at setting a goal of coming together as a team, setting any differences aside that we value and executing.”
“I’ve long been a champion for public schools,” said Kyler Sherman-Wilkins. “I believe there are a number of things that make me uniquely qualified to serve as an educator. I think if I were to point to one particular asset that I would bring is that I’m a researcher and I believe that the best way to address the most pressing issues facing our district is through a data form, research-informed way and not be driven by ideology.”
“I’m the manager of gas plant operations for Associated Electric Cooperative here in Springfield,” said incumbent Scott Crise. “I have three years experience in the board, but as an engineer with a background in construction and operations management, I will make sure that we are properly managing the construction of our new facilities and maintaining our facilities so they are safe and secure.”
“I’m a native of Springfield, live here all my life,” said Chad Rollins. “I have seven kids, three of them are in college. They all went to Springfield Public Schools. I have four currently attending Springfield Public Schools. I graduated from Glendale and then I went to Missouri State University here on campus, got a degree in chemistry and went on to get my doctorate in pharmacy at UMKC in Kansas City. I worked as a pharmacist for 22 years now in independent pharmacy. Mainly I’m doing long-term care in nursing home, just taking care of people in the local community. I’ve been an educator as a teacher for pharmacy students from three different universities on their six-year rotations where they spend time with me.”
“I’ve lived here over 20 years,” said incumbent Maryam Mohammadkhani. “I’m a physician by training and I have three children to our school age currently. The strongest asset that I bring to the board and this is because I am a sitting board member is that I believe that Springfield Public Schools can and should be the number one district, the best schools in the state of Missouri. I absolutely believe that. I think it is entirely possible. I see the road to there and I’m willing to roll up my sleeves and get to work. I think the most important part of that component is a willingness to call out the issues and face the challenges and address them.”
Here’s what the candidates had to say about whether they support SPS making a direct effort to embrace a diverse staff throughout the district:
“Absolutely,” said Kincaid. “In this campaign, the wonderful thing about public schools is that we welcome every single child in our community into our school buildings. The challenging thing about public schools is that we welcome every single child from our community into our school buildings. We do not get to pick and choose. I think I know it is to regional experience when you have more diversity, not only with your students, but also with your your educators, and that starts from the bottom all the way to the top. I am proud that we have an African-American, super intelligent woman [who is our] superintendent and leader. We continue that diversity. We’re not where we need to be. Not just in our schools, in our community, but encouraging individuals conversations in a respectful manner and in a productive manner.”
“I’ve had a lot of experiences where we’ve got people that come from all different backgrounds, all different levels of education, all different situations,” said Rollins. “Public school is just that. You’ve got kids that come from different areas. You’ve got kids from different racial backgrounds, and you’ve got kids from different poverty levels. We’ve got to have a place where all kids can come and know that on the other side of failure is success and that’s what Springfield Public Schools is here for as a leader. What I’ve done in the past and my work in health and fitness and I’ve spent six years working with youth, working with adults, and letting them know, showing them what success looks like, showing them what they’re capable of. I think that’s really important that all people have a chance to succeed, no matter where they’re from, no matter where they come from, no matter what size they are.”
“This is very personal to me,” said Sherman-Wilkins. “When I was in high school, in a small town in Southern Illinois, and I was oftentimes the only black kid in my class, and it was really important for me to know that there were mentors and educators who understood the unique challenges that I faced. It was ultimately important to me to see people in the building look like me. I think it’s really important for us to be intentional in recruiting and retaining diverse staff. I think it’s also important to note that this narrative that increasing diversity in our staff is somehow lowering standards is incorrect and it’s frankly problematic and racist. You can have increased diversity in your staff while still also having high standards, and I think that’s something that this you know, I think it’s also important for us to understand that, yes, public school should be a place where every single person, regardless of background, feels safe, but the reality is that’s not what’s happening right now in public schools. There were students who expressed frustration they don’t feel safe because of their sexual orientation or gender identity or because of their race. Some of them feel that they’re not being addressed or their needs through the poverty are being addressed adequately. So I do think we need board members to not only talk the talk, but also walk the walk in terms of being willing to say, hey, there are certain students have unique challenges.”
“I’m an immigrant to this country,” said Mohammadkhani. “I came here with a non-English speaking parent. I lived in a predominantly Hispanic community in Southern California because that’s where you lived if you were poor. I then attended university where it was predominately Asian, and then for medical school, I went to south-central Los Angeles, which was predominantly black. Then, I went to Boston, which is predominately national. I’ve I’ve seen it all. I came to Springfield in the immediate post-9/11 era, and I missed no less than three flights because my suitcase was taken apart because of my last name. I’m in support of it as long as in the name of promoting diversity, we do not exclude individuals or groups of individuals, and that we have to be very careful when we approach this, because I find that sometimes as well-intentioned and as good as people are, we inadvertently do just that.”
“I would support and promote diversity in recruitment and retention of SPS staff,” said McCarter. “Our children deserve the best teachers, the best support staff, the best student aides, everything that they can. I do believe we should work towards them, our staff as well, because our students deserve the best. So right now we have 24,500 students in our school district of various backgrounds and ethnicities, etc. I do think it’s valuable for them to see, you know, their similar identity, you know, across in leadership roles. Nothing I would ever say would be against diverse recruitment process or implement diversity into that. I will say, though, that predominantly I’m interested in a meritocracy of the best need to get the job period, I hope, and that always should result in a diverse skew of individuals.”
“We need diverse staff and students. We need them to work together, said Crise. “I’ll be welcoming to all and everybody should be talking to each other, and I want to make sure that everyone feels safe and secure. Everyone needs to understand each person is unique. Each person may have different backgrounds to build a socioeconomic status, and we must see each person as an individual. We need to make sure and ensure all students are academically successful, no matter their background or socioeconomic status. And come out of high school, college and career. Ready. All right.”
I totally believe in the word public in the Springfield Public Schools, open the doors,” said Provance. “Everything from A to Z needs to come in. I am concerned that a lot of things that I see in society make schools unsafe. I see a lot of I see a lot of rhetoric that puts people down. I see a lot of name-calling, and it makes our society or people in our society feel very powerful. I find that to be very detrimental to the diversity that we have in our schools. I think that we need to look at all of our students from number one graduate to number one at the other end and say, what can we do to make their life the best it can be? We need to help them. We need to have everyone. I said this earlier, you draw a line, you got to get on one side or the other, but you draw two lines and you get everybody in the middle between the lines. We need to quit drawing a line. We need to create an area where everybody comes together. Our schools would be better.”
Next, the candidates were asked, “Missouri leads the nation in the number of bills that limit or remove access to gender-affirming care, gender identity curricular topics, sports participations for trans-students, and others. Missouri schools also exhibit high rates of bullying, violence, and suicides related to those issues. What are your thoughts on this legislation and how do we support staff and students affected by this legislation at Springfield Public Schools?”
“I’m embarrassed to be part of a state that leads the nation the number of bills that can remove access to gender-affirming care, gender identity for very different topics,” said Crise. “I do not agree with, you know, sports participation. Okay. I don’t agree with that, but I don’t agree with anything else. It’s sad that we exhibit the highest rate of bullying, violence, the suicide rates and these issues, and part of that should be addressed through the discipline that we need to have a good discipline plan in place, you know, ensure that it’s consistently followed, you know, that make sure that the teachers and staff are properly trained. We need to hold students and parents accountable. There will be no violence, no bullying, which leads to suicide-related leads to suicides.”
“There’s a lot to unpack in this one question, so I’m going to do my best. I’m going to work backwards,” said Mohammadkhani. “The high rates of bullying, violence and suicides, it is all a reflection of the increasing negative emotions that students are experiencing in the form of anxiety and depression, and we have to look at why is this happening? It’s happening because our students are not connected to each other. They’re not connected to their learning environment. They’re not connected to the teacher in the classroom and to the authority figures and even to their parents and to their peers. I mean, this is just a travesty. A travesty in our in the world, right now, because everybody is so heavily, so incredibly trapped in technology. Technology is a very powerful tool, but it is doing incredible amount of damage to the young mind, to the developing mind, to the developing body, emotionally, physically and psychologically. So that must be addressed. Of course, bullying is not tolerated, but we have to understand where bullying is coming from. We have to understand the homes that students are coming in. I’m tired of the excuses that because it’s in the community, because it’s in the home, it shouldn’t be tolerated in our schools and it does not have to be. Children absolutely thrive in a structured environment. Children love high expectations. They do better when there are rules, they do better when you put them in four walls and limit them. They don’t do well when they’re given too many choices. They don’t understand what’s going on. I’m going to try to quickly get to the the the part about gender-affirming care. Gender identity, curricular topics and sports. That’s too much to do. So I’m just going to hit the one that I think everybody wants to hear my opinion on. So as a physician, I am telling you that I do not like to see the word sexual and child used in the same sentence. I’ll tell you why, because children are not here for this subject. This feeds into the anxiety and depression that they are feeling. This is a topic that which they are not prepared for. They can’t wrap their heads around it. It confuses them. I think all of that is fine, but you will have to wait until they become adults. There’s nobody better prepared to deal with it.”
“Since I’m really big into health and fitness, I’ll hit the sports part of this first,” said Rollins. “As far as sports participation for transgender students, I think whenever you’ve got a sport that’s, you know, dedicated to either females or males because of, you know, competitive vantage, that females should compete against females and males should compete against males. So that’s my opinion on that, and I think it comes down to the competitive advantage of that. If it’s a mixed sports, then it doesn’t matter. That’s my my take on that part of it. As far as gender, I think that in Springfield Public Schools right now, we need to focus on the main three core core academics, which is math science and and English. Right now we’re not doing a very good job. You know, six out of every ten students right now is not a reading level at their at their current level in the district. So we’ve got to look at that, look at curriculum and see how we’re teaching, look at the quality learning environment in our classroom. Let’s get that those things under under wraps first before we even look into that, because I feel like as a parent, a lot of this comes down to these are things that are situations that should be dealt with parents and their and their kids. We do need to look at bullying. We need to look at violence. There’s been quite a few situations over the last few years in our schools. I would be for hiring more resource officers. There’s studies that the more resource officers you have that have good relationships with the students, not just to be the police officer, but to be there to get to know the students. It lowers bullying and violence by 30%, and that’s a data-driven statistic, right there.”
“I think this is a national embarrassment that Missouri leads the way these these types of legislation,” said Sherman-Wilkins. “You know, the board had an opportunity to affirm and support for LGBT students and staff. That was the petition that I and members of the community brought forward to the board, and with the exception of Dr. Shurita Thomas-Tate, it was not supported. I just want to say that that that we could have done something if the board failed to do so. For me, this comes down to do our students feel safe and supported and do our faculty or our teachers or paraprofessionals, where do they feel safe and supportive? The answer is many of them do not. We have support members for individuals who are running who have questioned the efficacy of safe-something stickers. You have board members who have talked about how teachers who are LGBT are grooming our youth. These are problems. These are attacks on some of the most vulnerable people in our community. So it’s not just happening at the state legislature, state legislative level. It’s also happening here in our school board. One of the reasons I’m working in school, I want to be a champion for every single child, and that means identifying the unique challenges of our most vulnerable youth and standing in support of them. I’m glad there’s embarrassment, but I would hope that in the future would take more steps to make sure that students and teachers do feel supported. A statement doesn’t fix everything. It’s the bare minimum, frankly. I feel like we need to do more than just talk the talk, but also walk the walk.”
“I’m concerned that Missouri leads in these bills,” said Provance. “Thank goodness they can’t cooperate to pass anything. So that’s that’s good. I think a lot of these things we worry about and there’s nothing to worry about. Springfield Public Schools belong to MSHSAA. MSHSAA controls our sports or we’re not on a level where we either we drop out of MSHSAA and go our own way or we belong to MSHSAA. We don’t need to go crazy on that. I really believe in age-appropriate curriculum. I want to address the bullying, the violence and suicides and tell you that we need more counselors in the school. I think that I don’t want I always blame COVID, but it’s been a situation that has had more stress, has had more anxiety, and the kids feel at a younger ages. I’ve never heard of an elementary child with an eating disorder until recently. I would like to address the gender-affirming care. Who knows more about the child and the family? The parent should be making decisions. I’ve made the statement that if the parent feels that their child should be homeschooled, that should be it. If they feel they need to be in private schools, put them in private schools. If the parents think the best thing for their child is to be in public schools, put them in public schools, and then we get bills that are passed that say all of a sudden parents don’t know what’s best for their kid. I am opposed to legislation that takes away a parent helping their child.”
“Go sit with a friend and try to answer this question in two minutes, it’s incredibly difficult,” said Kincaid. “There is a reason I am not running for Jefferson City or Washington, D.C. and that reason is what I care about are the 24,500 students that are in our school buildings. I don’t care if they are a different religion than me, look a different way than I do. I’m looking for kind people and I support. Like I said earlier, what’s the wonderful thing about public schools? We welcome every single child from our community into our our school buildings. What’s the challenging thing about public schools? We welcome every single child into our school building. I welcome every single student, every single child in our community, into our schools.”
“The part that I’m embarrassed about is definitely, you know, Missouri schools with all sorts of at high rates of bullying, violence and suicide. That’s not okay,” said McCarter. “Those are serious problems that are serious issues. I really, deeply care about those issues. If a kid doesn’t feel safe in school, then that’s hard to learn. I’ll just touch on a couple of things. This is a lot of information. So I agree with Susan Provance about gender-affirming care. I believe that a parent should have absolute authority over their children on that. In terms of curriculum, sports participation for trans students and others, I agree with Dr. Rollins. What I do want to focus on is what unites us, which is the academics, the ABCs, the one, two threes. I don’t know if there’s four or five other more hot, divisive topics in the community right now. To be who you talk to, you’ll get a bunch of different answers and that’s going to kind of be something that that could cause some dissension. What I’d rather do is focus on academics. You know, we have less than half of our students at reading level, math level, science level, and I want to focus on that.”
One of the last questions was asking candidates about book bans within the district:
“First, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you for asking this question, because there is a very dangerous narrative that is out there right now that we have fought and that we’re one seat away from extremist book banning or book burnings or something along those lines,” said Mohammadkhani. “I’m here to reassure you that that is false. It is a dangerous narrative. It is being flung about so casually, is so very concerning. It should concern you that there is this level of disinformation and outright lies. The Board of Education in Springfield has never talked about the issue of what we are to do with books, and the topic of book burning has never come up. Only once was I part of a quorum where there was the book titled ‘The Perks of Being a Wallflower’, which was in the curriculum, and brought to the board because there was a guardian who had some concerns about it. This book has many sensitive subjects, but one of them is the use of LSD and alcohol for the purposes of enhancing sexual pleasure. There’s nonconsensual sex in this book. As a physician, I tell you that Bibliotherapy is something that is done by professionals, highly trained professionals. Our teachers are asked to teach. They’re not asked to conduct Bibliotherapy. So when we put something in our curriculum, this is not a library book. It was in the curriculum. It’s important to understand that we also have policies that state that alcohol is against board policy. So when you put something in the curriculum, it somehow promotes alcohol, [at least] the way I look at it. This was a book that was in the literature to film, which means you get to watch the film. The film is controversial. So why do something that controversial? There were so many lovely classic pieces of literature Of Mice and Men, To Kill a Mockingbird, or so many wonderful classics. I say those because I’m besieged by phone calls by individuals asking me if I’m trying to get rid of books.”
“Libraries are a fundamental part of our education process, and they provide flexible, innovative learning experiences and encourage independent learning,” said Kincaid. “I do not support book bans. As a firm believer of the importance of intellectual freedom, I do not support the banning of age and content-appropriate books in our school libraries. Our current school board policy outlines the process for the selection of library materials in our schools, and I support this board policy which requires library materials that enrich and support classroom curriculum, Taking into consideration the varying interest, abilities and maturity level of our students at different ages. It’s vital for students to have access to a wide range of age-appropriate perspectives and ideas, even those that may be controversial or challenging so that they may develop under the guidance of a teacher. The practice of critical thinking. Our district should strive to encourage independent learning and promote students natural drive to become lifelong learners. I support the current board policy to allow librarians, teachers, administrators to select the library books in accordance with the objectives of the board policy, ]while also letting our community request a reconsideration of the decision resulting in a due process procedure upon receiving such a reconsideration request.”
“Books should never be banned by curriculum,” said Crise. “The librarian should work with teachers like they talked about to determine what books are best for the children, depending on the curriculum and in accordance with the policies, the board policies, of course. Ultimately, though, it’s up to the parents, I believe, and they should be given the choice that they’re parents or that their children read these book.”
“I think it just comes down to a resource allocation,” said McCarter. “We have a physical space of a limited amount of money to buy books and money to buy curriculum and time to teach the curriculum and time to read the books. So, you know, I heard somebody use an example. I’m going to rip it off, but if we decide to change our lunch program from corn dogs to pizza, we’re not banning corn dogs. We’re just choosing to not have the corn dogs at lunch now. I’m not interested in banning anything. I’m interested in having a responsible discussion about what’s age-appropriate for kids. I hope no one’s trying to force, you know, weird stuff on our kids that would be really weird, and seems like if you would just read the book, we’d be able to find that out pretty quick. So my opinion is, let’s just take one situation at a time. I’ve never dealt with an issue personally that has to do with this. I’ve never even said anything to the effect of I want to ban books or remove this or that or whatever, but I will say if a parent does bring something up, I’ll take a look at it and we’ll just all use common sense. To me, that seems like a pretty easy thing to do.”
“I strongly oppose book bans,” said Sherman-Wilkins. “I do think there’s a conversation to be had about age appropriateness. Of course, my concern then would be who decides what age appropriate. I do think that we can reach some common ground on what is age-appropriate, certain certain ideas. If I’m elected, I think it’s really important for us to evaluate district policy at all times. From what I understand about the district policies currently, about books and what they have in the library for accessible students, I would support that policy, but I would not support banning books.”
“I’m not for banning,” said Rollins. “I don’t think anybody here is. I agree with a lot of what has been said. As a parent, I think that we just, you know, keep books that are age-appropriate. I think that’s important. We want to enrich learning. I’m big on textbooks. I’m big on learning through books. I’m big on reading from books. I read to my kids every night, you know, to chat and do things like that. So and I think as they get older, I feel like it’s a good way for students to learn. I think we can leave the discretion to the teachers and libraries.”
“We all stand for the same thing. Books are good,” said Provance. “I think that when you talk about the process where a parent says, ‘I don’t feel that that book is appropriate for my child’, I think that’s an individual decision. I know that we have processes in place, but if a parent has a problem with a particular book for their child, it doesn’t mean that it’ll be a problem for the other 24,000 students. I think that when you take a look to the school board, you’re probably talking about the curriculum, the entire set of classroom textbooks, or because a book is something that is going to open up a child’s mind. They can read, they can discover, they can question, they can be influenced. That’s all great. I don’t think that a book ban is going to work in our Springfield Public Schools. I think that if there is a student that or excuse me, a parent that disagrees with a textbook, that would be a situation to the school board, but not one particular book. Our librarians have served on curriculum committees before. I trust the librarians. I trust the curriculum coordinators. They have the information. They will be age-appropriate. So trust them.”
The SPS School Board election is on April 2.
