Briscoe Cain*

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Survey Responses

HAS NOT RESPONDED TO THE 2024 CANDIDATE SURVEY.

Did not respond to the 2022, 2020, 2018, or 2016 ATPE Candidate Survey. 

Below are the candidate's responses to the 2014 ATPE Candidate Survey:

1. Is there a need to increase funding to meet the needs of our student population? If so, how would you recommend securing more revenue for public education?

I would not say we need more spending on public education as much as I would say we need the money spent in the right places. More needs to be focused on the students and teachers and less on the administrators.

 

2. Regardless of the level of funding, do you believe that Texas public education dollars are being spent in an appropriate manner, or should the funds be reallocated and spent in different ways?

Our education dollars are not being spent in as an appropriate manner as they should be. The money should follow the students and the teachers. I support increased local control and the reduction of the one size fit all mandates and regulations from Austin.

 

3. Would you vote to spend public tax dollars on a voucher, tax credit or scholarship that allows students to attend non-public schools in grades K–12? Why or why not?

If Texas could get the conservative reforms passed that are needed there would be less of a demand for homeschooling and charter schools. The demand for school voucher programs was created by the mess that the TEA and Federal Department of Education have created.

 

4. Do you believe the Teacher Retirement System (TRS) should be maintained as a traditional defined benefit pension plan for all future, current and retired educators, or would you vote to convert TRS to a defined contribution plan that is more like a 401(k), in which future benefits are not guaranteed? Why?

I support the current plan for current teachers and am in favor of moving to a defined contribution plan for new teachers.

 

5. Local decisions on whether to continue a teacher's employment and how much to pay each teacher are often based on evaluations. To what extent, if any, should a teacher's evaluation be based on his students' scores on state standardized tests? If you believe student test scores should factor into a teacher's evaluation, how would you recommend evaluating teachers in grades or subjects for which there are no state standardized tests?

Teacher evaluations should be based on the performance of students in individual classes taken as a whole. I'm not a fan of state standardized testing. Evaluations should be made based on local performance standards in like subjects. I recommend requiring testing grades to be accompanied by the class average in order to better evaluate the individual students performance.

 

6. Would you vote to maintain a hard cap on the number of students per class, or should school administrators be given more flexibility to increase class sizes? (Currently, the law imposes a cap of 22:1 in grades K–4 but allows schools to obtain a waiver, a step many of them routinely take.)

Class sizes can be a critical component of student performance, especially in early education. If we could reroute education dollars from bureaucrats and administrators we'd have the money to higher teachers and create new classes from overcrowded classrooms. While I believe class size decisions should be made at the local level, if the current cap rule remains in place, I'd say that some flexibility is a good thing, but only if it used in a temporary fashion, and not as permanent fix.

 

7. If a public school in your district failed to meet state accountability standards for two or more consecutive years, would you support allowing a private entity to take over the management of that school, essentially converting it to a charter school?

I think it depends on the individual case.

 

8. Do you believe charter schools in Texas have been largely successful? Should their presence be expanded? Why or why not?

I think it is too early to determine whether the whole of the charter school initiative has been a success or a failure. Where charter schools are working, those schools should be left to continue thriving. Competition in education, like that in the free market is good thing. The problem is whether the competitors are playing on an even playing field. If we could rid our school system of the teachers unions and the overly burdensome number of state mandated testing we should be able to see our public schools thrive the way they should be.