Ryan Kerr

Why did you choose to run?

Originally, I didn’t want to run for the school board this year. I wanted to wait until next year, [when] I could engage a lot more with parents and have a lot more insight into other people’s issues besides mine and some of the families that I speak to on a regular basis. However, either this or the next board will be hiring a new superintendent. That’s a very big process within a district that covers a period of more than a three-year term of a board member, but more so along the lines of 10 to 15 years. It’s something that I know parents want a seat at the table for — especially when it comes to that person being in charge for almost the lifetime of my kids being in school.

What is your connection to Parkway? Where do your kids go to school, if you have any? 

As far as connections, I went to high school in Rolla. My wife graduated from Parkway South, [and] my mother-in-law is a 40-year teacher with Parkway as well as Special School District and retired six years ago. My in-laws have lived in the district since 1984, and then [we] spotted and we bought our house in Parkway in 2012. My kids go to Sorrento Springs.

What qualities can you bring to the school board?

I think the one thing that’s missing from our Board of Education, in particular, is data. There’s not a lot of data collection — or proper use of data — when it comes to analyzing things like discipline and suspensions, which was a big thing at the State of the District presentation. But data [applies] through nutritional balance, curriculum and everything else. We see that with MAP (Missouri Assessment Program) testing because MAP testing changes over the years. A lot of people blame dropping scores on [the] changing [of] tests, but a lot of that you can look at data, and you can segment out where the specific issues are. I think a lot of times, we [just] choose not to.

What kind of role model will you be to the students in Parkway?

Again, a data-driven approach. I think one of the massive things that’s missing — which is a reflection of the MAP data as well as some of the post-high school data — is that we’re not doing a very good job in the last decade or so of teaching critical thinking. We’ve gotten off on a tangent of teaching people what to think instead of how to think, and critical thinking drives just about every testing format post-K-12. So, when you look at, whether it be the NCLEX or the Bar exam or any professional exam you’re gonna take after high school, it’s almost 100% critical thinking, which is data-driven, and we just aren’t doing a very great job at that currently.

What do you do for work, if anything? How would that apply to your position on the school board?

I’m a research nurse. Data — I compile and analyze data daily — every day of the year. That’s something that’s opened my eyes to a lot of things that, because my kids have entered the system, I have just been enlightened to the misuse of data. It’s strange with other candidates because I have a very central view [of] many things. And one of the things that separates me from a lot of other people is if you talk to me about one certain topic, I will give you points on both sides of that topic. There are very few topics [in] that we can’t have multiple viewpoints on both sides and then understand what’s critical to the goal or the vision.

Are there any big or small changes you would like to see happen in the district?
Nutritional balance is one of the biggest deficiencies in this district. When you look at kids that aren’t thriving in the district — whether it’s grades, violence or suspension — almost all of these overlap at about an 80% rate. About 80% of the violence that I see — as far as suspension — can also be tied to almost the same percentage of reduced fee or free lunch kids that are hit, in good measure, from nutritional deficiency. I would like to see more work in that regard as far as how we’re educating families at home — not so much at [the] school level but [rather] providing, you know, outside resources. 

However, the most driving issue currently is violence and suspension policies. One of the frustrating things that engaged me over the last couple of months was attending the State of the District and seeing the racial disparity in suspension days. One of the things that I did after the State of the District was [asking] the board, Dr. Marty, for the rest of the data. And what I mean by that is we have inputs that tell you what went into those suspensions. The district data was [the] total number of days that children were suspended, and then they had it broken down by race. The problem with that is you also have to take into account what are the referrals to the office for and then [for] those referrals that ended in suspensions were those suspensions that were warranted by the offense — were they violent? And were the other referrals that weren’t suspensions — were they because they weren’t offenses that required suspension [or] were they [not] multiple offender type situations? So I think, when you dig deeper into that, you see a lot less of a disparity when you look at the data. 

However, it’s not about the disparity. For me, the issue is that when I asked the district [for] over two months, I didn’t get any answers. And then, finally, the board president told me they don’t have any other data; the only data they have [is the] number of total days suspended. The problem is that in Parkway, we have 58.7% white population and a 15.8% Black population, which is about a 42% difference. The racial disparity for suspensions is about 32%. So 32% more Black children in Parkway are being suspended for 32% more days than white kids, with almost the same referral rate to the office, which is where that data comes in. Without that data, what it tells you [is that] if you adjusted for demographics, you’d have a 70% disparity because of the demographic breakdown. The problem with that is that you either solve the problem by looking at the four or five schools that have these massive bias issues, and there’s only one person that issues suspensions in each school. So you either have four very, very racist administrators — which I don’t think is the case — or you didn’t collect enough data, or you’re not willing to share the data. And unfortunately, we can’t have both ends — we can’t create divisiveness instead of solutions.

Why should people vote for you?

I think that [parents] want their kids to have an equal opportunity to thrive and survive in the school system. Unfortunately, the district is at a point right now, with the amount of parents that I’ve met with kids in middle school — especially Southwest Middle and Northeast Middle — that there is no way that I could send my children to those two middle schools in our area because of the real violence that’s currently going on. Parents need to realize that children [who] are bullied and harassed on a constant basis or see violence on a constant basis are going to be constantly traumatized. And that’s not good for anybody. It’s not good for them [to develop] after high school, and it’s not good for a developing brain to be standardized to abuse.