Texas
Commissioner
of Education Mike Moses granted the Chronicle about 45 minutes of his
time last week for a Q & A session on his short tenure as commissioner and
the recent controversies his appointment has brought about. Here are the
highlights of our interview with him.
The Austin Chronicle: You are compared with your predecessor, just as your
successor will be compared with you. Lionel “Skip” Meno tended to view the
agency as an agent of change, and he networked groups of people together. What
about you?
Commissioner Mike Moses: First, I have a lot of admiration for
Commissioner Meno [and others before him]. I think each person brings their own
persona and their own style of leadership to the job. I would like to think I
have some problem-solving capabilities, that I can be a consensus-builder. I
think I have some understanding of the arena in which we work — and it is both
an educational arena and, at times, a political arena. It requires, I guess,
some understanding of the philosophical issues that drive people…
You know, we’re redefining the Texas Education Agency. Commissioner Meno was
probably correct in that he saw the agency as directors of change… In
response to Senate Bill 1, we have to change the culture of the agency. Perhaps
then, we can be better agents of change ourselves. That includes downsizing,
that includes maybe looking at how we interact with people in the field, how we
interact with the business community, how we interact with the media, how we
interact with parents and the public. We’re making some progress in that
direction, but I’m sure like all other commissioners, including my predecessors
— and as you say, my successors — there will be a continuous, ongoing
challenge in the area of communications. Because there’s so many different
constituencies there.
AC: Under your leadership of the “new” TEA, what is the agency’s
relationship to Texas’ 1,000-plus school districts?
MM: Well, I think that school districts are beginning to see maybe a
lessening of some requirements. I don’t think it’s something they’re going to
see instantaneously… You may have caught the article in Education Week that reported a couple of school superintendents in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area
are saying that they saw us as less intrusive at this moment, and we have also
become somewhat more responsive. One of the things that I have encouraged our
staff to be mindful of is that 90% of all our communications are via the
telephone. Our telephone personalities do matter.
AC: So the way you’re being less intrusive is by being not just permissive,
but less proscriptive?
MM: I think we’re still permissive in many areas. We are not trying to
prescribe how children should be taught, how school districts should operate,
how many minutes should be in the class period, when the public address
announcements should be made. Those kinds of things were in the code at one
time.
AC: Was there another way of handling the CDC [Centers for Disease Control]
grant?
MM: Well, you always look back at those situations and say that’s
possible. I said at the very beginning that it wasn’t to be obstinate. I hate
to think that I’m hard-headed. In hindsight, there may have been another way to
handle it.
I think that this agency and the state board had wrestled with health
textbooks, wrestled with ESR curricula — Commissioner Meno had suspended that
particular grant. If those dollars were going to be taken, then I think we
needed to get to a point where people could be comfortable with the decisions
being made and why they were made.
I said earlier that the arena in which we operate is educational but it is
also sometimes political. And sometimes, I think it requires some care be given
to people who have differing and varying viewpoints, even though I may not
agree with some of them. I do feel as though I have a responsibility to seek
consensus and a comfort level, if you will, from as many parties as possible
before moving on something that’s real controversial.
In my opinion, we needed to have something that assured us that a [particular]
curriculum in the area of health and sex education was not going to be
required. We were told verbally that one would not be required. My simple
request was: Let’s go ahead and receive that in writing. It may help some
people who are less than comfortable with that kind of grant see that, in fact,
we are taking some steps to ensure that any moneys we receive are going to be
spent consistent with [Section] 28.004 [dealing with human sexuality education]
of the [revised education] code. And that was really what I wanted all along.
I said publicly and in writing that as the parent of two children, I want my
children educated about the things that will hurt them. Obviously, HIV
infection and AIDS are deadly and tragic diseases. And we need to make sure
that children are properly taught about those kinds of diseases and about what
prevents those diseases. I still believe with all my heart that the [decisions
on the] teaching that is done, and how it is done, need to be made by parents,
the teachers, the principals — maybe the Sunday school teachers — but the
people who are closest to those children…. Was there a different way to have
done it? Maybe…. Do I like all the attention and publicity? Obviously not.
I’m obviously in a position where you like to please as many people as you can.
But you know on given days, you’re not going to do that.
AC: But you first said to the CDC that the agency wouldn’t be submitting a
workplan, rather than telling them you had certain conditions.
MM: Those conversations were taking place via the telephone. Perhaps
they should have been put in writing…. We were also interested in minimum
agency time in terms of the administration of the grant as well…. I wanted to
really make sure that was not something that was adminstratively going to cause
us to have to do another division of labor here. I could have probably,
perhaps, communicated that in writing.
I don’t make any pleas here, other than to say that that was occurring when I
was about eight months into the job. And I say to you again: I’m probably still
learning, and I hope I always am learning about issues and how to deal with
them.
AC: What about your not meeting with a group of students outside your office
on November 16, when a rally was held to protest your first decision?
MM: Well, I didn’t think that particular forum was appropriate for a
meeting. I later met with some people who came up that day. I don’t think you
can sit down with 20 or 30 people and have a constructive conversation….
There was a lot of emotion in that situation, to be honest with you. And I
understand that. And frankly, I don’t know that I wouldn’t have added to it by
having that meeting…. I understood their right to make their feeling known in
the manner that they chose to do that. And I tried to at that moment, I guess,
to maintain some appropriate decorum and dignity and then deal with the
situation in a setting that would probably lend itself to more constructive
negotiations.
AC: Are you taken aback by the attention you’ve gotten from the Capitol
press — and do you feel you’ve been treated unfairly?
MM: Oh, I guess anybody that’s a public official could make that
statement. I don’t know if that’s a cop-out. I think everyone that’s in a
setting like this is interested in being understood and perceived fairly.
I’m a native Texan. I care about Texas. I’m a daddy, a husband. I don’t know
that there’s anything very special about me. I think I’m a just person who’s
just been very fortunate to be at the right place at the right time and lucky
to be given some responsibility…
The attention doesn’t really surprise me. I think the issues do sometimes
become emotional. And there isn’t much gray. It seems to be either black or
white…. It doesn’t mean that you give in to your constituency.
AC: You’ve said that you didn’t cave in on the CDC grant.
MM: [I’ve been accused of making it political], and if I did, I’ve
managed to make people on both sides mad, so that probably wasn’t very
bright.
AC: Conservative lawmakers saw this as favorable to their position on
sexuality education.
MM: I don’t think they would have, [if] a position had [not] been taken
by another group of lawmakers. Again, the political arena may make those kinds
of things happen…. What I’m trying to do is be consistent…
As you know, there were a lot of people critical of Academics 2000, also known
as Goals 2000. I publicly supported it, I publicly endorsed it, I publicly
recommended it. And quite frankly, I didn’t find some of the same critics of
the [rejection of the] CDC money saying, “[Accepting Goals 2000 money] is a
good step.” I made that endorsement with the strict proviso that we would not
be told how to spend those dollars.
AC: Well, Goals 2000 is a more arcane issue than health education.
MM: I understand that. But I’m just saying the principle still applies.
There was $29 million dollars at stake [with Goals 2000]. This [CDC] grant
involved $460,000…. I think I acted consistently with Academics 2000, as I
did with CDC…
AC: What about the Texas Family Association’s recent mail-in campaign —
targeted at you and SBOE (State Board of Education) Chairman Jack Christie —
asking you to uphold “the fundamental rights of parents”? [Note: The campaign
is part of an appeal of a court case involving the release of standardized test
materials.]
MM: I think that parents definitely have a fundamental right in the
upbringing of their children. I also think that in respecting the parents’
fundamental right in the upbringing of their children, the school’s right to
have a code of conduct, a dress code, grading guidelines, rules for safety —
for the common good — only makes sense. And I think that the school’s right
has to be respected in that area.
AC: But their argument is that the schools’ rights, and therefore, the
government’s, prevails over theirs.
MM: I think the plaintiffs in the [court] case have acted in good faith.
And I really don’t think that they themselves would try to argue against a
school district’s code of conduct. However, if you leave that kind of decision
in case law without questioning it, it doesn’t mean somebody else couldn’t come
along and raise that issue. It’s a very legal and very complex argument…
What the attorney general has done is gone back and redrafted the brief, and
has recognized that parents do in fact have a fundamental right in the
upbringing of their children. But when these children are presented to the
schoolhouse door, there are some rights that schools have as well to ensure the
safety and common good of all the children within the campus. That’s what needs
to be resolved here. n
This article appears in February 2 • 1996 and February 2 • 1996 (Cover).