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Candidates hoping to serve as Michigan’s next state superintendent say they see students’ lackluster literacy performance, the need for more student engagement, and high rates of chronic absenteeism as key issues when it comes to improving schools.
The State Board of Education on Monday interviewed four of the seven semifinalists, in 90-minute time blocks. The remaining three candidates will be interviewed Tuesday and after those sessions, the board will select the finalists.
The superintendent’s job is the top educator position in Michigan. That person oversees the Michigan Department of Education and presides over, but doesn’t vote at, state board meetings. They also advocate in the community and with the Michigan Legislature on issues relevant to the state’s public schools. Hiring the superintendent is one of the state board’s main functions.
Those interviewed Monday were Paul Salah, superintendent for Huron Valley Schools; John Severson, executive director of the Michigan Association of Intermediate School Administrators; Thomas Ahart, an education consultant and former superintendent of Des Moines Public Schools; and Christopher Timmis, superintendent for Dexter Public Schools.
Tuesday’s interviews will be with Glenn Maleyko, superintendent for Dearborn Public Schools; Judy Walton, superintendent and curriculum director for Harrison Community Schools; and Lisa Coons, former state superintendent in Virginia and former chief academic officer for the Tennessee Department of Education. The interviews begin at 9:45 a.m. and can be viewed on YouTube.
It’s no surprise academic achievement was top of mind for the superintendent candidates. Just 24% of Michigan fourth graders were proficient in reading on the most recent National Assessment of Educational Progress, a national exam given to a representative sample of students in every state. While Michigan’s performance has been stagnant in literacy, other states have seen significant growth. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer called out the poor performance earlier this year when she noted that Michigan spends more money than many other states but is getting less achievement.
“It’s not acceptable,” Whitmer said. “Let’s face our literacy crisis with fierce urgency.”
The candidates largely offered similar sentiments.
“We need to accelerate third grade reading proficiency dramatically,” said Ahart, who led the Des Moines district for a decade before resigning in 2022.
He suggested that local school boards should focus their meetings on student outcomes instead of on things that are “two or three or four degrees removed from what’s actually happening with students.” Des Moines implemented a program that specified that 50% of a board’s time in meetings should be spent talking with principals, central office teams, students, and families about student achievement.
“That helps not only the board put more focus, obviously, on student achievement, but it also greatly narrows the focus of the entire district staff, because they know all of their work is being put on public display once a month or twice a month, and it opens a very big window to the community to understand better what’s happening,” he said.
Student engagement is a major priority for Timmis, who has been a superintendent in Michigan for 18 years. He said the current education system is designed to sort and select kids.
“And it does a great job of it. Some kids are successful, and we sort others right out of the system.”
Under this system, he said, “we are failing way too many kids.” He noted that the graduation rate for students with disabilities is 60% in Michigan.
He said his goal in the first five years as state superintendent would be ensuring that every student graduates on time ”with the skills and the knowledge to be successful as healthy and happy adults.”
Timmis advocates for a competency-based system focused on measuring student engagement rather than the current system, which he says is largely focused on seat time.
For 10 years, the Michigan Department of Education has touted an initiative aimed at helping the state rise to among the top 10 in the nation in education by this year. The state is far from reaching that goal.
One of the initiative’s goals was related to literacy, which continues to be a pain point.
Salah said one of the greatest challenges in addressing the “alarming” literacy rates in Michigan is that there have been “fits and starts” in efforts to turn it around. State lawmakers in 2016 passed a third grade literacy law that called on greater investments in literacy coaches and early intervention. It also called for holding back some third graders who were far behind , though that part of the law was repealed in 2024.
Schools invested heavily in literacy efforts as a result of the law, but the pandemic stalled those efforts, Salah said. More recently, laws were enacted that require students to be screened for dyslexia and require the MDE to recommend reading curriculum that is aligned to the science of reading, a body of knowledge that emphasizes phonics along with building vocabulary.
Salah said the state needs a consistent vision for improving literacy.
“The focus on phonics, science of reading, LETRs (Language Essentials for Teachers of Reading) training is all important,” Salah said. However, he later said, “we have to continue to fund this literacy initiative.
“We cannot stop in a year from now because there’s a different focus,” he said. What successful organizations do “is they focus on a few rigorous goals, and they stay the course.”
Digging deeper on literacy is important, Severson said. He noted that the MDE has trained thousands of teachers in LETRs training and said the training should continue and be incentivized. There currently is no requirement that teachers take the LETRs training.
Also important, he said, is “training elementary principals to be stronger instructional leaders.
He also wants to address chronic absenteeism. In Michigan, about 30% of students are chronically absent, according to the latest statewide data from the 2023-24 school year. In some districts, the percentages are even higher.
“If students aren’t coming to school, they can’t learn, right? So we need to look at this problem systemically, not just what schools can do, but what all we can do in the community,” Severson said.
Monday’s interviews were disrupted several times when one board member wanted to ask a question about a parent’s rights related to gender identity.
Tom McMillin, a Republican from Oakland Township, asked Salah, the first interviewee, whether he would stop efforts to “deceive parents” by keeping information from them about their children’s gender identity, pronouns, and the bathrooms they use.
He was referring to MDE training videos that sparked media attention in 2022. In the videos, a trainer suggested that teachers can talk with parents about a student expressing suicidal thoughts without having to reveal that gender identity or sexual orientation is a cause of their distress.
Board President Pam Pugh, a Democrat from Saginaw, immediately interjected, saying the question wasn’t on the approved list, prompting McMillin to say, “I’m being silenced. Are you serious?”
After a break, Pugh reiterated her stance, saying that the question wasn’t on the list, but noting that board members could ask follow-ups questions as long as they were relevant to the question that had just been asked and answered. She didn’t object when McMillin asked the same question to Severson after the candidate answered a question about Michigan’s political landscape.
Lori Higgins is the bureau chief for Chalkbeat Detroit. You can reach her at lhiggins@chalkbeat.org.
