Republican Tom Horne, Arizona’s newly elected state superintendent of schools, was the guest speaker at the Fountain Hills Tea Party meeting last Thursday, Jan. 19. He addressed concerns from locals and explained his focus on raising test scores, ensuring school safety and eliminating “distractions” from the classroom.

Horne was state Superintendent from 2003 to 2011, and he said he ran again because he has seen statewide proficiency in basic subjects like math and English drop significantly since his time in office. He does recognize the challenges students faced with virtual learning during COVID, but he believes “distractions” in the classroom contributed to the decline well before the pandemic.

Horne did several things on his first day in office, like removing “Q-Chat” and “Equity, Diversity and Social Emotional Learning” from the Arizona Department of Education website. He also removed requirements for school districts to follow social emotional learning tactics in order to receive grant monies.

While supporters of “Q-Chat,” including the CDC and Mental Health for America, say it’s a supportive resource for kids as they go through puberty and have questions about their sexuality, Horne does not like that the volunteer chatters are unlicensed. He also had concerns over hackers accessing information to sell to child predators, and he did not like that the “Q-Chat” website was designed with escape buttons so kids can easily hide the website from their parents.

Campus support

Horne addressed a question from the crowd about school safety grants related to social emotional learning, and Horne said it was a good idea to have counselors and social workers in schools. However, the caveat is that the school must have a school resource officer (SRO), or some kind of trained police officer on campus as well.

Arizona is one of the worst in the country with student-to-mental-health-professional ratios. According to the Arizona Center for Investigative Reporting, Arizona has 716 students for every counselor and 1,593 students for each psychologist. The recommended rations are 250:1 and 500:1.

Fountain Hills Superintendent Dr. Cain Jagodzinski is in step with Horne on school safety, and one of the first actions he took this year was increasing the number of SROs in Fountain Hills from one to three. Arizona has had relative fortune, with only one “preplanned” school shooting and 18 other gun related incidents on school grounds since the 1970s, according to media reports.

There were, however, 13 mass shootings at places other than schools in Arizona in 2022 alone that left 16 people dead and many more injured.

Service

Horne said his mission this term is to be a “service organization emphasizing increased test results and empowering parents’ rights.” He said he’ll take that mission one step at a time, and his first priority as a service organization is to help schools and students reach higher proficiency in math and English.

According to Horne and confirmed by reports, standardized test scores taken in the spring of 2011 had a statewide average proficiency rate of nearly 62% in math and over 77% in reading. Rates continued to rise until 2015, until Arizona switched standardized tests from AIMS to AzMerit, and scores dropped to 34% and 35% respectively. By 2019, passing rates rose to 42% in each subject, but rates would decrease significantly due to COVID.

The Arizona Department of Education changed the standardized test three times in three years, but Horne said he will keep the same test in place to allow for continuity and easier test score tracking. In 2019, 53% of Fountain Hills High School students passed the English standardized test, and 62% passed the math test.

Horne believes two key factors can increase student motivation to succeed, discipline and high standards. Horne previously had graduation requirements related to passing standardized testing, and his first legislative goal is to reinstate that practice.

Horne believes that social emotional learning discouraged administrative discipline, like suspensions and expulsions. In his experience, with 24 years on the Paradise Valley School Board, those administrative consequences get more parental attention and are more effective in stopping behavioral issues.

Vouchers, etc.

Horne approved $22 million in voucher payments through the empowerment scholarship account (ESA) towards private schools on his first day in office. The vouchers have been controversial for allowing families who already enrolled their children in private schools to take public money earmarked for K-12 public schools and spend it on private institutions. Horne supports the vouchers because he believes the competition between schools will push all institutions to improve.

The topic of Critical Race Theory was discussed several times during the meeting, and Horne shared a story in one of the first instances it came up. He shared the story of a guest speaker that spoke of race and politics to a school. Instead of banning that speaking or a group they were associated with, Horne found a speaker with opposing viewpoints to come speak to the same students.

“Kids can learn from controversial speakers,” Horne said. “But they have to hear both sides.”

Horne said he believes that true emotional gratification comes from genuine achievement, whether it’s academic, athletic, or artistic. That is why he is pushing for improved test scores and removing social emotional learning from schools.